Q&A: The reason why we are in Africa with Flourish Ventures' Principal Efayomi Carr

Flourish Ventures, an impact-focused Venture Capital has been making waves across the continent lately. With their focus on providing investment to startups that enhance the financial health of their customers, Flourish is seeking to be the next impact forecast venture capital to have an impact on the lives of Africans. Maisha 254 is joined by Efayomi Carr, the firm's Principal, to tell us more about what Flourish intends to achieve on the continent and why they came to Africa in the first place. 

1. What informed the choice to begin operations in Africa at this juncture?

We already had a presence in Africa before we made the decision to open a physical premise in Nairobi. We have so far invested in over a dozen start-ups across Africa located in Nigeria, Ghana, Egypt and Kenya that include Apollo Agriculture, Fair Money, Financial Services Innovators (FSI), Flutterwave, Lendable, Pula and Paga.

Africa is an important market for us and we feel that having an office on the continent will enable us to be closer to the markets and it will deepen our focus as well as enable us to get first hand the in-market experience of the trends shaping the industry in real-time in Africa

2. How is Flourish Ventures planning to contribute to deepening financial health across the continent?

Flourish has always been focused on providing support to entrepreneurs whose innovations advance financial health and prosperity for individuals and small businesses. With our deep understanding of industry dynamics, we will work with start-ups offering a range of financial services including embedded finance platforms and products for consumers and small businesses as well as technology offerings such as insurtech, and regulatory technology, among others.

We believe that there will be more significant long-term benefits to the African markets since these solutions will be tailored for the African consumer, and they will play a great role in enhancing the continent’s overall financial health.

3. What drew flourish ventures to Kenya in particular seeing as the firm has an African focus? Why not set up shop in another country?

Kenya is a tech and entrepreneur hub in Africa and there have been great ventures and innovations coming out of the Kenyan market over the last decade. Kenya has led the way with innovations such as mobile money transfer services which enhance financial inclusion, which have been adopted the world over. And we are seeing more fintech products and start ups coming out of Kenya, so we felt that Nairobi was a good location for us to have our office in Africa.

Setting up shop in Kenya also brings us closer to the hubs on the continent where fintech is making great strides and advances.

4. What decisive steps can governments take to enhance the growth of foreign venture capital on the continent?

We believe that governments across Africa can play a major role in the enhancement of the venture capital space. First and foremost, they can hold open discussions with players within the global venture capital space, so we can look at policy challenges that may prevent fintech innovations from thriving.

Additionally, governments can strengthen education in Information and Communication Technology (ICT) for its young citizens so as to create a wider base of educated and tech savvy entrepreneurs ready to innovate and provide solutions for the African market.

5. What is Flourish Venture’s projection for Africa’s fintech venture capital sector in 2021 and beyond?

The fintech sector worldwide has seen massive growth over the past year, the growth was accelerated by the advent of the global Covid-19 pandemic which made online solutions and online payment platforms etc extremely needed across all levels of society.

The increase in the use of cashless payments and other financial services that have minimal person-to-person interactions especially has contributed greatly to the boom in new fintech innovations, and we feel that the environment created by the new norm is here to stay.

We expect to see more amazing innovations coming out of Africa in the near future in the fintech sector.

6. How prepared is Flourish to deal with the highly competitive market in Africa?

Flourish has over time partnered with industry thought leaders in research, policy and regulation to better understand the underserved and help foster a fairer and more inclusive economy. We

feel that this approach, coupled with our focus on long term partnerships and growth makes us very unique.

Unique mainly because we do not just look at our investment in the company, but also the health of the company and the greater societal impacts that the solutions will have on the market across Africa.

We invest in the people too and this is what will give us the edge over other players in the African Venture Capital space.