AIF’s bankability series moves to attract global capital to Africa

• Showcases innovative approaches
• Cygnum Capital, SEFA present at first roundtable

PHILLIP ISAKPA IN LONDON, UK

The 2024 series of investment roundtables often held ahead of the Africa Investment Forum’s annual Market Days event has taken off with the AIF looking to use the series to advance the bankability of deals and redirect global capital flows towards Africa’s transformative projects.

The investment roundtable series for this year was launched on the sidelines of the African Development Bank’s 2024 annual meetings in Nairobi with presentations by Cygnum Capital and the Sustainable Energy Fund for Africa (SEFA).

A statement made available to Business a.m. described Cygnum as a leading investment banking and asset management firm that serves frontier and emerging markets, while SEFA is a $500 million multi-donor fund managed by the African Development Bank that provides catalytic finance to unlock private sector investments in renewable energy and energy efficiency.

The roundtables are often held ahead of the Africa Investment Forum’s annual Market Days event that brings together transaction sponsors, investors and governments in Board Rooms to move deals toward bankability. This year, they will showcase key players currently focused on project development and bankability in Africa.

They are particularly set up to try to overcome Africa’s project bankability challenges with the goal of ultimately bridging the continent’s infrastructure investment gap.

Speaking in Nairobi during the launch, Chinelo Anohu, senior director, African Development Bank, and head, Africa Investment Forum (AIF), said: “The Africa Investment Forum’s Bankability Series is a testament to our unwavering commitment to advancing the bankability of deals across Africa. By showcasing innovative approaches and fostering collaboration among key stakeholders, we aim to redirect global capital flows towards Africa’s transformative projects. Together, we can unlock the continent’s vast potential and drive sustainable economic growth.”

Anohu also highlighted the additional concessional resources provided by the AfDB Group’s Transition Support Facility (TSF) to enhance private sector growth in eligible African Development Fund (ADF) countries, comprising the 37 most vulnerable African countries to fragility and conflict.

According to her, 10 out of 37 Board Room deals presented at the Africa Investment Forum Market Days 2023 benefited from the TSF.

The Africa Investment Forum is an initiative of the AfDB and seven founding partners, and serves as a platform to advance projects to bankable stages, raise capital, and accelerate deals to financial closure. It has seen over 150 deals showcased on the global stage through the Board Rooms approach since 2018 when it was created.

At the launch in Nairobi, Chris Kandie, executive director, Cygnum Capital, shared insights from a private sector perspective and cited several challenges facing project preparation and development in Africa, including human resource capacity, lack of scale, speed, accessibility, focus, and coordination among project preparation facilities.

According to him, Cygnum Capital provided advisory services for the Kenya Affordable Green Housing Fund (KGAHF), an investment opportunity presented at the 2019 Africa Investment Forum’s Market Days, noting that the fund achieved its first close of $84.5 million in July 2021, attracting investments from local pension funds, DFIs, and the European Investment Bank.

On his part, Joao Duarte Cunha, head of Sustainable Energy Fund for Africa cited several projects that have been presented to investors through the Africa Investment Forum, including the Facility for Energy Inclusion (FEI) which was Africa’s first dedicated off-grid, mini-grid, and small Independent Power Producer (IPP) debt fund.

Cunha also disclosed that a $1 million grant provided by SEFA ultimately helped to raise over $400 million globally across two different funds.

According to the statement made available to Business a.m., another project that featured at Market Days is SPARK + Africa, the world’s first impact investment fund to finance the value chains for clean cooking to expand availability to more Africans.

Business a.m. understands that the Africa Investment Forum will hold follow-up roundtables focusing on the role of technology in enhancing project bankability and development.

In Nairobi, the launch roundtables attracted about 100 attendees including Solomon Quaynor, vice president for private sector, infrastructure and industrialisation, African Development Bank, Yacine Fal, AfDB Group president’s special representative for the Africa Investment Forum, as well as representatives of the platform’s founding partners, Deutsche Bank, African Risk Capacity Group, Japan International Cooperation Agency, KfW, the German state-owned investment and development bank, Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency, International Finance Corporation (IFC), Swiss Re Group, and the Confederation of Chinese investors among others, were also present.

The Africa Investment Forum was founded by a group of eight partners comprising African Development Bank Group, Africa50, Afreximbank, the Africa Finance Corporation, the Development Bank of Southern Africa, the European Investment Bank, the Islamic Development Bank and the Trade and Development Bank.