Powering Africa’s Future: Inside Eunice Ajim’s Early-Stage Investment Vision
Shifting Trends in Early-Stage Investment in Africa
Over the past decade, Africa’s startup ecosystem has garnered significant traction, yet it remains one of the most challenging landscapes for early-stage investment. In contrast to the U.S.—where venture capitalists readily invest in ambitious ideas with little initial proof—African founders are typically required to demonstrate business viability through actual revenue before they can secure funding.
Even though the market appears to have stabilised overall, the WT x Future Africa Annual VC Report 2024 reveals remarkable shifts in funding stages over the past three years, with investments moving further down the value chain. Early-stage funding, in particular, has taken a hit, with its share of overall funding dropping from nearly one-third to less than 10%. The report notes that commercial capital at the early stage has largely withdrawn, leaving accelerator and grant funding as the primary sources of support—funds that are often too modest to quickly scale a startup into a valuable venture.
To explore the nuances of early-stage investing in Africa, I spoke with Eunice Ajim, the Founding Partner at Ajim Capital. Her fund has backed startups such as Raenest, Dojah, Chpter, Clafiya, and Daba Finance. At just 29 years old, Eunice has already navigated the entrepreneurial journey twice—raising USD 4.2 M for her second company before transitioning into venture capital. Her social media posts frequently provide a candid reality check for founders battling Africa’s challenging funding landscape.
The Journey from Founder to Investor
Originally from Cameroon, Eunice moved to the U.S. for higher education and later ventured into tech entrepreneurship. Her first startup—a marketplace leveraging artificial intelligence—was truly ahead of its time but ultimately did not take off. Undeterred, she co-founded Open Teams, a platform that connected enterprises with open-source developers, successfully raising USD 4.2 M over two funding rounds. Through her experience hiring African developers, Eunice encountered significant challenges, such as limited access to talent, cumbersome cross-border payment systems, and complex compliance requirements. These obstacles sparked her interest in African startups and led her to begin angel investing. By 2021, she had written 10 angel checks, and in 2022, she officially launched Ajim Capital with an initial target of USD 10 M dedicated to early-stage African ventures.
Raising Capital: A Tougher Battle for African Founders & VCs
Eunice is frank about the uphill battle that African venture capitalists face when raising funds. “It took us almost two years to close our fundraise, and even then, we didn’t reach our initial target of USD 10 M,” she explains. Unlike in more mature markets, securing local limited partners in Africa is extremely challenging, which has forced her to look to international investors. As of February 2025, Ajim Capital had deployed capital across 22 companies, and when combining her angel investments, the fund has backed 35 African startups.
One of the major hurdles for founders is the prevailing expectation to demonstrate traction before receiving funding. While U.S. founders can often raise millions based solely on a compelling vision, African entrepreneurs must usually show steady monthly recurring revenue (MRR) to secure investment. “In the U.S., you can raise millions just by selling a vision. In Africa, you need to show sustained monthly revenues before investors take notice,” Eunice remarks.
Good ideas alone aren’t enough when capital is scarce and competition is fierce.
Risk Assessment: What Ajim Capital Looks For
Investing at the pre-seed stage is inherently risky, especially in a market where templates and benchmarks are still evolving. Ajim Capital’s approach is built on a thorough evaluation of several factors. “We don’t just back ideas; we need to see founders who have proven they can execute,” Eunice explains. The fund favours repeat founders or those who have honed their skills at successful startups—she believes that even a failure offers more learning than no experience at all. Storytelling also plays a pivotal role: “If you can’t sell your vision to me, how will you inspire customers, employees, or future investors?”
Ajim Capital requires that startups generate at least USD 5,000 in monthly recurring revenue before they are considered for investment, reinforcing the notion that tangible progress is paramount. The firm often looks for founders with prior experience at leading African tech companies like Flutterwave, Paystack, or Andela. Beyond evaluating the team, Ajim Capital scrutinises whether the market is truly ready for a particular innovation. While some African founders try to replicate successful U.S. business models, Eunice stresses the importance of understanding local market readiness and consumer willingness to pay. Scalability is also crucial—Ajim Capital seeks startups that have the potential to reach valuations exceeding USD 100 M, ensuring viable exit opportunities through secondary sales, mergers and acquisitions, or public offerings.
Expanding Horizons and Exit Strategies: The Investor’s Endgame
Ajim Capital is also mindful of the need to diversify investments beyond fintech, a sector that has long dominated African VC funding due to its scalability and clear revenue models. Eunice is keen on supporting underrepresented sectors, which has led the fund to expand its reach into B2B SaaS, healthtech, proptech, and developer tools designed specifically for African enterprises. Although fintech still accounts for 60-70% of the portfolio, the fund is strategically pivoting away from saturated segments such as cross-border payments and microfinance, where competition has intensified, in order to unearth new, high-growth opportunities in emerging sectors across the continent.
Exits are a critical component for any venture investor. Eunice outlines three primary exit strategies for Ajim Capital. The quickest route is through secondary sales, whereby the firm sells a portion of its shares in a company after it has secured a significant funding round, providing swift liquidity. Typically, Ajim Capital invests in companies with post-money valuations between USD 3 M and USD 5 M. By the time these startups begin fundraising at valuations of USD 30 M to USD 50 M; their investments have already experienced a tenfold growth—a robust outcome that often leads to a partial or complete exit. Mergers and acquisitions (M&A) serve as another key exit avenue. When investing at around a USD 10 M post-money valuation, the goal is to achieve returns of 20x to 30x upon a successful exit.
While initial public offerings (IPOs) are an attractive theoretical option, they remain uncertain in the African startup ecosystem. Historically, African IPOs have delivered modest returns, making them a less favoured exit strategy unless a company can change that narrative.
So, Can Africa Become a Unicorn Capital?
While M&A offers substantial exit opportunities, Eunice’s ultimate ambition is for her portfolio companies to reach unicorn status—the pinnacle of return on investment. Despite the many challenges, she remains optimistic that Africa is on the brink of a unicorn wave. Eunice predicts that by 2030, at least 30 African startups will surpass the USD 1 B valuation mark. This vision is inspired by historical trends in the U.S., Europe, China, and India—markets that took seven to ten years of sustained investment before producing a surge of unicorns. She draws comparisons with India, which now boasts over 130 unicorns, and Latin America, which has around 60. With funding for African startups accelerating since 2020, she envisions the emergence of at least four to five unicorns annually in the coming years.
Every single African VC is doing their best
At the same time, Eunice acknowledges that the African VC ecosystem is still maturing, and local investors face their own fundraising struggles. “Every single African VC is doing their best,” Eunice states, acknowledging the dedication and challenges within the investment landscape. Unlike U.S. funds, African VCs must actively sell the continent’s potential to sceptical international LPs, which adds another layer of complexity to securing capital.
Eunice points out that valuations fluctuate wildly. Some startups raised highly overvalued rounds during the 2021 funding boom, only to struggle later with down rounds as investor enthusiasm waned. She stresses the need for valuation discipline to maintain investor confidence in the ecosystem. “Some startups raised highly overvalued rounds during the 2021 funding boom, only to struggle later with down rounds as investor enthusiasm waned,” she explains. This fluctuation in valuations creates additional pressure on both investors and founders to maintain realistic expectations in the African market.
In the end, if capital meets opportunity with a clear, disciplined approach, Africa isn’t just on track to create unicorns—it’s setting the stage for a robust, sustainable investment ecosystem.
The Future of African VC and Startup Growth
Eunice’s journey from entrepreneur to investor encapsulates the complex realities of early-stage investment in Africa. While the funding landscape continues to evolve, challenges remain—from the uphill fundraising battles faced by VCs to the stringent traction demands imposed on founders. Yet, with a thoughtful and adaptive strategy, Africa’s startup scene is poised for explosive growth, potentially delivering dozens of unicorns in the next decade.
For founders, the takeaway is clear: revenue and demonstrable market demand trump vision alone. For investors, the opportunity lies in identifying scalable businesses that extend beyond the well-trodden fintech path, thereby shaping a dynamic and thriving future for Africa’s tech ecosystem.
