Venture capital funding globally almost halved in the first six months of 2023, according to PitchBook data, which highlighted a lack of investor enthusiasm as well as falling demand amid rising interest rates. The lack of liquidity in the market, and the sudden difficulties startups used to regularly raising capital are now facing in convincing investors, has hit a certain type of African startup hard. ZumiKenyan B2B e-commerce startup Zumi announced in March it had closed down after failing to secure the necessary funding to continue operations. MarketForce has struggled to raise more capital, announced a bunch of layoffs, and recently turned to crowdfunding to get some cash in the bank. The company announced last month it had reduced its operations outside of Africa, cutting its workforce in Europe and Dubai.

Source: The North Africa Journal December 18, 2023 06:01 UTC