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With a $1.2 million co-investment grant from the USAID-funded West Africa Trade & Investment Hub (Trade Hub) (https://WestAfricaTradeHub.com), ShEquity Partners (ShEquity) (https://ShEquity.com), an funding agency that promotes girls’s entrepreneurship in Africa, will put money into and help greater than 100 high-potential women-owned or led companies.
According to Pauline Koelbl, Founder and Managing Director of ShEquity, girls entrepreneurs are integral for Africa’s success, as they function greater than 40 % of small and medium-sized companies on the continent. However, African girls entrepreneurs face the hurdle of collectively rising these companies attributable to $42 billion much less in financing than their male counterparts.
“If Africa is to reach its full economic potential, smart investment for African women entrepreneurs needs to be dramatically increased,” Koelbl says. “The lack of financing, combined with insufficient business support, put potential women entrepreneurs and those seeking to expand their already successful businesses in a growth deficit or low-income trap, widening the gender gap and reinforcing negative biases.”
ShEquity’s USAID Trade Hub-backed challenge addresses these challenges by combining money funding, structured technical help, and entry to high-value networks. Specifically, ShEquity will leverage its $1.2 million co-investment grant to draw at the very least $15 million in personal funding that can be cumulatively used to put money into, scale, and speed up women-owned or led companies working in Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Mali, Niger, and Nigeria. The companies focused will function in one among six key sectors: agribusiness, healthcare, tech-enabled options, renewable power, mobility, and fast-moving client items.
Also, as a part of the USAID Trade Hub challenge, ShEquity will present enterprise growth companies and technical help to 120 women-owned or led companies within the goal markets and in addition choose 12 high-growth, high-impact companies that may every obtain at the very least $50,000 in enterprise capital funding. The mixed investments within the 12 chosen corporations are anticipated to create at the very least 200 jobs and profit round 20,000 folks economically both instantly or not directly, alongside their respective worth chains, by 2024.
To accomplish its challenge targets, ShEquity will leverage its confirmed expertise in championing women-led companies for fulfillment. ShEquity is deliberately constructing an built-in and holistic strategy in the direction of unlocking the potential of African feminine founders. ShEquity’s technique includes combining its ShEquity Business Accelerator (SHEBA) and its Investment Vehicle to help girls to develop their companies. SHEBA offers pre-investment enterprise constructing help to permit entry to a trusted pipeline of potential offers and serves additionally as a post-investment technical help facility.
Started by Koelbl in May 2020 along with her personal seed capital of simply $250,000, ShEquity has since invested in eight companies in Sub-Saharan international locations. Since the launch, ShEquity has been investing as a particular automobile function and is now within the technique of formalizing right into a enterprise capital fund construction. According to Koelbl, ShEquity’s present portfolio of corporations have impacted greater than 13.5 million folks throughout Sub-Saharan.
Commenting on what this partnership means to ShEquity, Koelbl acknowledged, “we are excited about the future, as we hope to see more action towards democratizing access to capital and closing the gender funding gap in Africa. Backing female-led funds is the best strategy to address gender funding gap because of its trickle-down effect: more diversity in capital allocators translates into diversity of businesses getting funded.”
The USAID Trade Hub’s partnership with ShEquity represents its dedication to making sure extra girls in West Africa have the entry to finance, sources, and information wanted to develop their companies and pace financial growth within the area.
“African startups face many hurdles, but those launched by women even more so, despite their drive and determination,” mentioned Robin Wheeler, Chief of Party for the USAID Trade Hub. “The USAID Trade Hub is proud to join with ShEquity to respond to this challenge with a coordinated approach, providing capital as well as operational and technical support to unlock the full potential of the many women-owned businesses in Africa.”
Distributed by APO Group on behalf of ShEquity.
For media inquiries, please contact:
ShEquity
Nana Yaa Arthur
Senior Account Executive
Djembe Consultants
[email protected]
About the Trade Hub:
The West Africa Trade & Investment Hub (Trade Hub) is a USAID-funded initiative that catalyzes financial progress by co-investing with the personal sector to generate new funding, create new jobs, and improve the worth of regional and worldwide exports in West Africa.
About USAID:
The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is the lead U.S.
Government company that works to finish excessive world poverty and allow resilient, democratic societies to appreciate their potential.
About ShEquity:
ShEquity is an funding agency offering good investments for female-led and owned companies in Sub-Sahara Africa. ShEquity’s imaginative and prescient is to shut the gender funding hole in Africa. ShEquity facilitates entry to a pool of de-risked offers to buyers composed of modern, impactful, and scalable female-led and owned companies. ShEquity goals for a triple backside line: monetary, social, and environmental returns that instantly correlate to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). For extra data, please go to the ShEquity web site (https://ShEquity.com).
This Press Release has been issued by APO. The content material will not be monitored by the editorial staff of African Business and never of the content material has been checked or validated by our editorial groups, proof readers or truth checkers. The issuer is solely liable for the content material of this announcement.
