Renew Capital Launches EmFi Lab To Target Africa’s USD 330 B SME Credit Gap

Renew Capital, a pan-African investment firm with over a decade of venture activity on the continent, has announced the launch of Renew Venture Lab: The EmFi Series, a virtual accelerator program aimed at African founders building embedded finance infrastructure. The program was unveiled this morning at GITEX Africa 2026 in Marrakech.

Applications for the program opened today and will close on April 30 for early consideration. The firm stated that its investment team will be actively engaged in the selection process, with the program serving as a pipeline for potential Renew Capital deal flow.

The initiative is centred on the underwriting potential of alternative data. Renew Capital cites a USD 330 B credit gap affecting small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) across the continent, noting that fewer than one in five sub-Saharan African businesses can access traditional bank loans.

The EmFi Series is designed to support startups leveraging AI and transactional data footprints to build credit models for their existing merchant or consumer bases.

“Africa’s most important financial story is not being written by banks,” Renew Capital Co-CEO Matthew Davis said in a statement. “It’s being written by tech founders who know their small business customers better than traditional lenders.”

The program structure will blend self-paced modules with live sessions led by practitioners experienced in scaling lending books and credit models. The firm emphasised a continued focus on operational discipline as a core curriculum metric.

The initiative is backed by government partners, including Morocco’s Tamwilcom, Global Affairs Canada, and Norway’s NORAD.