Finding Fintech's Future: Towards a Thesis on Investing in Africa

The Trajectory Africa

The Trajectory Africa’s first principles series was inspired by a desire to understand the drivers and assumptions underlying investable opportunities in key sectors hypothesized to be the engine of African VC, starting with fintech.

Across 11 episodes, we explored the opportunities for, and limits of, ubiquitous digitalization and the role of fintech, the jobs to be done by, and characteristics of, a digitally enabled financial system, the case for infrastructure building in payments, partner-led neobanking, the logic of financial operations, community-based lending and savings-led embedded finance, and finally, boosting trade by facilitating b2b cross-border payments and connecting enabling infrastructure.

But somehow, all those granular questions led to many big, hairy questions. So, to help sense-make on this final, fintech-focused episode, we have Emeka Ajene, Founder and Publisher of Afridigest, a business media brand with an editorial focus on ideas, analysis, & insights for business innovators across Africa and beyond; Afri.capital, an emerging investment firm focusing on early-stage, tech-enabled investments; and Africreate, a strategic thinking partner & trusted advisor to senior executives doing business in Africa.

I hope you enjoy the conversation!

Tune in to hear about:

[2:58] - The infrastructure of trade — the chicken or the egg

[5:58] - How to win in neobanking

[19:38] - Superapp logic

[23:39] - The role of banks in fintech — partners and competitors

[37:32] - Financial products as cultural products

[43:03] - Creating sources of lending data

[56:05] - The remaining investable opportunities in African fintech

[1:02:28] - The role and value proposition of fintech’s 1st gen infrastructure builders

[1:22:52] - First principles for understanding Africa’s fintech opportunities

Recommendations:

• Afridigest. A newsletter that delivers Africa-focused ideas, insights and analysis on business and innovation.
• Chasing Outliers: Why Context Matters for Early Stage Investing in Africa. A report I co-authored on VC investing in Africa.

Connect on social media:

• Emeka Ajene on LinkedIn
• Emeka Ajene on Twitter
• The Trajectory Africa on LinkedIn
• Tayo Akinyemi on LinkedIn
• Tayo Akinyemi on Twitter