Lesson 9: "Small businesses in Africa need patient capital and time to grow"

 

With the lesson n°9 from "Fifteen Years, Fifteen Lessons from Africa", we continue to share insights about key elements characterizing the impact investing sector and we focus here on the frequent need to extend the investment period when targeting small and young enterprises in Africa. Extending the investment period often appears necessary to enable these companies to reach their full growth and impact potential.

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Which economic model to support SMEs? Focus on Lesson n°8

 

The eight lesson of the document "Fifteen Years, Fifteen Lessons from Africa" analyzes I&P’s choice to focus on small investments led by African entrepreneurs in fragile states. This represents an impact choice, motivated by the fact that there are very few financing solutions available. That being said, this choice has several consequences on the economic model of the fund.

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The GIIN released its annual Impact Investor Survey: Key learnings and Figures

The Global Impact Investing Network (GIIN) published the 8th edition of its Annual Impact Investor Survey, a comprehensive assessment of data on the global impact investing market comprising data and insights from 229 of the world’s leading impact investors, among which Investisseurs & Partenaires.

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Discovering African management: Focus on 7th lesson from "Fifteen Lessons from Africa"

 

Chapter three of the document "Fifteen years, Fifteen lessons from Africa" gather a few lessons learned from I&P's experience as an investor with African entrepreneurs. Considering the size of the companies we invest in, the human dimension is essential and the creation of a long-term relationship of trust between the investor and the entrepreneur is a key success factor.

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Revalue commercial and marketing dimensions: a key issue for African SMEs

 

The sixth lesson of the document "15 years, 15 lessons from Africa" focuses on an aspect often underestimated by small and medium African enterprises : the commercial and marketing dimensions (customers' knowledge, branding, market access ...). I&P's experience has shown how critical these issues are: they drive as much the success of a company as its ability to produce or manage its finances.

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Invest in agriculture and agrobusiness in Africa: issues to consider

En 15 ans d'activité, I&P a financé de nombreuses entreprises dans les secteurs de l'agrobusiness et de l'agriculture. Ces secteurs représentent environ 40% de notre deal flow, et plus d'un tiers du PIB dans nos pays d'investissement: il est donc crucial de comprendre les enjeux spécifiques à ces secteurs afin d'accompagner au mieux les entreprises et maximiser leurs impacts. C'est pourquoi nous consacrons un chapitre entier à ce secteur dans le document "Quinze ans, Quinze Leçons d'Afrique".

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The African economy: Moving from imitation to innovation

 

I&P continues to explore the document "Fifteen years, Fifteen lessons from Africa", with a second chapter dedicated to the structural changes of Africa’s economy and markets.

We focus this week on the lesson #4, in which we tell how the African economy has shifted dramatically from an economy of imitation to an economy of innovation. analyzing what consequences it entails for investors.

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"Fifteen Years, fifteen lessons from Africa" : zoom on lesson n°3

 

The third lesson of the document “Fifteen Years, Fifteen Lessons from Africa” explores the new dynamics created by population growth and the emergence of the middle classes in Sub-Saharan Africa.

 

This lesson closes the first chapter of the document, dedicated to the strategic issues specific to the African continent.

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"Fifteen Years, fifteen lessons from Africa": focus on lesson 2, business environment and integrity

 

I&P explores this week the second lesson from the document "Fifteen years, Fifteen lessons from Africa". Entitled "The business environment is improving, but in a gradual and disparate way, which engenders integrity risks for firms", the lesson presents some best practices to limit integrity and corruption issues before and during investment.

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