Madica gets US$6m from Flourish Ventures to back more African startups
Madica has secured an additional US$6 million from Flourish Ventures to extend its pre-seed investment programme by three years. It plans to invest in 25 to 30 more African start-ups and expand support for founders who are often overlooked by traditional VC networks.
The funding builds on Madica’s initial investment pilot. Since its launch in 2022, the pilot has backed 18 start-ups across 10 African countries and 12 sectors, pairing early-stage capital with hands-on business support.
According to Madica, the extension will also give it more time to test whether its model can help overlooked founders achieve sustained growth and generate VC returns. The findings are expected to inform future investment decisions and offer lessons for other investors looking at Africa’s underfunded start-up markets.
“Madica was launched as an experiment to test whether pairing capital with hands-on company-building support could help overlooked founders building world-class businesses generate venture outcomes,” said Emmanuel Adegboye, head of Madica. “From the outset, we knew that gathering meaningful evidence would require years of investment, support and learning.”
Adegboye said the programme’s early years had produced encouraging signals, but that building lasting companies takes longer.
“Flourish Ventures’ continued commitment gives us the capital to build on those lessons and test our conviction across a broader portfolio while deepening our company-building support,” he said. “We want the resulting evidence to give other investors a model they can apply, shaping where funding goes and how founders are backed across Africa, well beyond Madica.”
Madica said companies in its existing portfolio have gone on to raise, on average, twice the amount of its initial investment in follow-on funding. The organisation sees this as an early sign of investor confidence, but said the start-ups still need to show sustained commercial growth and longer-term returns.
The portfolio spans sectors including AI, climate technology, semiconductors, biotechnology, human resources and mobility. Applications to the programme have come from 78 countries and 28 sectors, with 40% originating outside Africa’s four largest VC markets.
All portfolio companies are majority African-owned. More than half have at least one female co-founder, and 39% are led by female CEOs.
Madica continues to accept applications from start-ups headquartered in Africa that have a minimum viable product, traction with paying customers, full-time founders and little or no institutional funding.
Efayomi Carr, investment partner at Flourish Ventures and co-founder of Madica, said the new funding reflects the investor’s confidence in Madica’s approach.
“We retain our conviction that with the right capital and support, exceptional talent across Africa can build world-class businesses. Madica’s first three years have strengthened that belief, and we are excited to continue backing the team as they help more entrepreneurs achieve that mission,” Carr said.
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