Venture capital in Africa poised for measured rebound in 2025, with South Africa leading the charge

VENTURE capital (VC) across South Africa and the broader African continent is entering a period of cautious recovery and renewed opportunity, after two years of contraction and recalibration.

- ALISON COLLIER

After a turbulent period in 2022 and 2023, 2024 was a year of recalibration. Now in 2025, we're seeing signs of resilience and reawakening across African venture capital. The key differentiator has been quality, due to founders who are building real businesses with disciplined capital use, strong unit economics, and scalable platforms.

Following a 46% drop in African VC funding in 2023, 2024 showed early signs of stabilisation. According to internal valuation memos from Endeavor's Harvest Fund II, African equity funding declined just 2% year-on-year in 2024, totalling $2 billion (R36bn).

This suggests the market may be bottoming out.

Quarter four 2024 was particularly strong, driven by three late-stage mega-deals - TymeBank ($250 million), Zepz ($267m), and Moniepoint ($110m) - which accounted for nearly half of the continent's total funding.

While the volume of deals was still low, the return of nine-figure rounds was a key indicator that investor confidence is cautiously returning.