Africa’s startup ecosystem has matured into one of the most dynamic entrepreneurial spaces in the world. Billions in venture capital, debt, and grant funding have fuelled waves of innovation, particularly across the continent’s major hubs. But what does it take for a venture to enter Africa’s startup hall of fame?
In his Substack newsletter Africa: The Big Deal, Max Cuvellier Giacomelli recently analysed over 4 000 funding deals since 2019 to identify the continent’s Top 100 most funded startups. The data offers a rare view into who is raising capital, which sectors are thriving, and what these trends reveal about Africa’s innovation story.
The entry ticket: USD36 million
To make it into the Top 100, a startup must have raised at least USD36 million since 2019. Those in the top 30 have all surpassed USD100 million, while the top five have each raised more than half a billion. Leading the list are MNT-Halan (USD1 billion), Sun King (USD877 million), d.light (USD617 million), Opay (USD570 million) and TymeBank (USD530 million).
Collectively, the Top 100 have captured 69% of all startup funding raised on the continent since 2019, or USD12.8 billion of a total USD18.7 billion. They account for two-thirds of all equity raised and a remarkable 86% of all debt funding. For founders and MBA candidates alike, these figures show how investor confidence concentrates around ventures that combine scale, structure, and a clear growth story.
The Big Four lead the map
Unsurprisingly, four countries dominate the list. South Africa leads with 23 ventures, followed closely by Nigeria with 22. Kenya and Egypt each host 17. Together, these ‘Big Four’ account for four out of five of the continent’s most funded startups.
South Africa’s group is heavily fintech-focussed, with names like TymeBank, Jumo, and Planet42. Nigeria has seven of the top 20, including Opay, Flutterwave, Interswitch, and Moniepoint. Kenya’s strength lies in diversified innovation, from energy to agriculture, while Egypt’s startups span transport, retail, and finance.
Beyond these hubs, Ghana stands out with five startups on the list, while countries such as Rwanda, Senegal, Côte d’Ivoire, Morocco, and the DRC also feature. The spread reflects a slow but steady broadening of Africa’s innovation geography.
Beyond fintech
Fintech remains dominant, representing 42 of the Top 100 ventures, but the remaining 58 show that innovation in Africa is far more diverse than often assumed.
Energy ventures such as Sun King and d.light continue to attract large volumes of both equity and debt funding. Transport and logistics companies like Moove, Swvl, and Yassir have captured investor attention as urban mobility challenges grow. Agritech, Healthtech, and e-commerce are also making inroads, alongside niche areas such as waste management, irrigation, and property technology.
Notably, 26 of the Top 100 can be classified as ‘climate tech’, spanning clean energy, green transport, and sustainable agriculture. For investors, this reinforces a clear trend: Africa’s biggest opportunities increasingly align with its most urgent sustainability challenges.
The people behind the ventures
Teamwork, not solo heroics, defines Africa’s start-up elite. Of the Top 100, 88 were co-founded by teams, most commonly pairs or trios. Yet diversity remains a serious gap. Eighty-four of these ventures were founded by solo men or all-male teams, and none by all-women teams or solo women founders. Only 16 have gender-diverse founding teams.
This imbalance is reflected in leadership. Of the 100 companies, just three currently have women CEOs: Anu Adasolum at Sabi, Belinda Shaw at Cape Bio Pharms, and Carrol Chang at Andela. A few others have had women in the top role in the past, but overall the picture highlights how far the ecosystem has to go in achieving gender equity.
Cuvellier also looked at founder origins. Around 68 of the 100 CEOs could be considered African nationals or of African heritage. The data underscores Africa’s globally networked entrepreneurial reality, where success often blends local insight with international experience and partnerships.
Lessons for Africa’s next generation of leaders
Africa’s Top 100 most funded startups illustrate the power of scale, strategy, and storytelling in a fast-evolving market. Three lessons stand out:
- Scale follows structure. Capital favours ventures with governance and repeatable models over raw ideas.
- Diversity drives opportunity. Fintech dominates headlines, but the biggest growth lies in energy, logistics, and climate-aligned innovation.
- Inclusion is the unfinished business. The gender gap in leadership remains one of the continent’s most pressing challenges.
Africa’s innovation story is still being written. As the ecosystem matures, success will belong to founders and investors who build not just fast-growing companies, but inclusive, sustainable ones too.
Read the full analysis
For detailed data and rankings, read Max Cuvellier Giacomelli’s Inside Africa’s Top 100 Most Funded Start-ups on Africa: The Big Deal.
by Shivani Ghai
