African Business magazine launches event series

The two leading business-to-business information providers announced a partnership to produce and deliver The African Business DealRoom, an initiative designed to expedite the matching of African businesses seeking growth funding with Africa-focused investment institutions seeking deal flow in the region.

The African Business DealRoom will be delivered as a series of exclusive events bolted on to the top-level business conferences and investment forums that take place in the region. The DealRoom events involve the matching of pre-qualified, high-growth companies to global/regional investment firms based on their pre-submitted criteria in face-to-face meetings.

Said Asoko chief innovation officer, Obi Ejimofo: “A lot has been said already about the disproportionate time and cost involved in sourcing unique deal flow in Africa. With Asoko providing reliable coverage of private company information on over 50,000 companies across the region - many of which have shared with us their funding needs and challenges - launching this DealRoom initiative is a natural extension of the value-add that Asoko has been working to bring to the Investment ecosystem over the last few years.”

“The formalisation of our partnership with African Business magazine is just the first of a number of strategic steps that we will be taking this year to help accelerate the pace of deal flow in Africa.”

Pedro Besugo, business development and strategy at African Business, added, “Sourcing alternative forms of funding is critical to accelerating a company’s growth, but being ‘discoverable’ to investors can often a struggle. The African Business DealRoom’s are built around one core objective: to help African businesses secure growth capital in an easier and more seamless way.”

The two organisations piloted the DealRoom initiative over the last 18 months at various high level industry conferences, including the Nutrition Africa Investor Forum for the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN); and the last two editions of the Business for Africa Forum hosted by the government of Egypt and the COMESA Regional Investment Agency. To date, over 150 African companies seeking over $2bn in proposed deals have been shortlisted to participate.

The next DealRoom in the series will be held at the AfDB’s 3rd African Youth AgripreneursForum and is now open to applicants. The selected companies will be flown out to Cape Town to attend AYAF 2019 and participate in the DealRoom. More DealRoom events will be announced in the coming weeks.