Private equity player, Ascent, has opened offices in Kampala and is now eyeing Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, by close of the year.
Ascent, which manages the Ascent Rift Valley Fund, raised $50million (Sh4.5 billion) to be invested in growth enterprises in Uganda, Ethiopia and Kenya. Richard Mugera will head the Uganda offices.
Speaking during the launch of Ascent’s Kampala office, Mr. Mugera reiterated Ascent’s commitment to not only bring capital closer to the businesses, but also to learn the unique investment environment.
“Ugandans are natural entrepreneurs. However, the growth of promising Ugandan enterprises is sometimes hampered by lack of access to growth capital and external support. We believe that with this office, our close engagement with the Ugandan entrepreneur, we will be able to navigate the unique investment environment with the focus of providing the right fit of growth capital and significantly contributing to Uganda’s investment landscape,” Ascent is the first regional private equity fund with offices in Kampala, Addis Ababa and Nairobi. The Kampala office allows Ascent to be close to the Ugandan entrepreneurs with a view to identify potential investment partners and, once an investment has been made, to support the investee companies in their rapid growth first in Uganda and then in region.
ARVF targets investing Sh900 million into Ugandan companies in the next 12 months and has already developed a pipeline of opportunities cutting across diverse sectors of the economy. The investment size is between $2million (S180 million) and Sh900 million per company.
The Fund’s investors include Norfund (Government of Norway), OeEB (Government of Austria), family offices and institutional investors such as Kenya Power Pension Fund. The fund is the first East Africa fund to have successfully tapped into local institutional capital, including pension funds, in its first fundraising.
The East African institutional capital contribution to the Ascent Rift Valley Fund currently stands at 10% of total commitments.
Email your news TIPS to Editor@nairobilawmonthly.com, and to advertise with us, call +254715061658 anytime of the day
