Open Capital

African businesses have tremendous market opportunities but often need support in order to achieve scale. Access to capital is only one part of the equation. Beyond finance, they need a formalized business model supported by clear systems and processes, a detailed & professional growth plan, carefully structured partnerships, and proper incentives to build a team that will perform. For highly scalable businesses, they provide intensive, operationally-focused advisory services to help plan and achieve growth. Practically, they help create month-to-month long-term growth plans, implement new systems and processes, perform analyses to appropriately price products and evaluate partnerships, plan new market entries, create marketing and distribution strategies, prioritize opportunities, and plan team structure and staff incentives, among others. In many cases, their business clients require capital to achieve their growth targets. In these cases, they work with businesses to attract the right investors and structure capital raises. They never seek to manage or invest their own capital – they work closely with a large and growing investor network to channel funds available to deserving opportunities. For investors, multinationals, donors, and large organizations, they leverage their knowledge of African operations to create innovative structures and strategies, manage existing portfolios, analyse value chain opportunities, perform in-depth market assessments, and help answer difficult strategic questions, with their focus on actionable, tangible recommendations. As they move into their fifth year of operations, they have completed more than 100 client engagements across 9 East and Southern African countries. They have a wide investor network that includes nearly 120 private equity funds, family offices, angel investors, and institutions headquartered in Africa, Asia, Europe, and North America. Their success comes from their technical approach and team. They partner closely with their clients, absorbing and processing information quickly, performing detailed analyses and market reviews, and developing actionable recommendations that can be immediately implemented. Their full team is based in Nairobi and brings top-tier experience from East Africa and the world, with prior experience at firms including The Boston Consulting Group, Bain & Company, IFC, Credit Suisse, Citigroup, and Hogan Lovells. Their fundamental belief is that markets and sustainable enterprises offer a powerful, long-term solution to poverty. As they continue to grow, their goal remains to provide world-class commercial support to African enterprises, investors, and industries in order to achieve rapid growth, innovate new products & services, create jobs, and improve livelihoods.

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