Amsterdam, 05 December 2022 – FSDAi Nyala Facility BV (FNF BV or Nyala) has invested USD 1.5 million in equity into Nigerian based ARUWA Capital Management. ARUWA is a Gender Lens Investing (GLI) Fund which provides capital and post-investment management support to Small and Growing Businesses (SGBs). This investment has brought the Fund to its target size of USD 20 million.

In addition to the investment, Nyala will provide post-investment catalytic support to ARUWA’s team focused on achieving a sustainably investable proposition with a robust team and governance.

This transaction is a high-profile deal in the GLI space. ARUWA Capital Management is a Nigerian GLI fund, founded in 2019 by seasoned investment professional, Ms. Adesuwa Okunbo Rhodes.

ARUWA’s investment thesis is to make healthy returns by investing in female-oriented, female-owned or female-led SGBs in real economy sectors with steep growth curve potentials, thanks to the leverage of technology. ARUWA’s post-investment support to its portfolio companies is also well thought through as it makes use of high-quality finance and administration expertise from a locally renowned consultancy with a strong track record in venture building.

Joris van Oppenraaij, Senior Investment Officer at Nyala Venture stated that “Pre-investment, we closely worked with ARUWA on attracting more institutional investors to speed up the closing of the fund. During that period, I witnessed the swiftness with which ARUWA’s team executes high quality deals, followed by post-investment focused and tailor-made support to their investees”.

“This is Nyala Venture’s first investment and is an excellent fit with Nyala’s catalytic mandate given ARUWA’s focus on Gender Lens Investing and on Small and Growing Business. As part of our mandate, we aim to build a new asset class of Local Capital Providers, such as ARUWA, to further strengthen and deepen the SGB Financing ecosystem in Sub-Saharan Africa” added Bart Schaap, Managing Director at Nyala Venture”

“This marks an important moment to celebrate as we back female fund managers in Africa, future and formidable allocators of capital for our sustainable future” noted Anne-Marie Chidzero, CIO FSDAi.  “This investment builds upon the Collaborative for Frontier Finance’s vision for Africa that Small and Growing Businesses need local capital managers to address the systemic gap in financing these engines of growth and jobs” concluded Drew von Glahn, Executive Director, Collaborative for Frontier Finance.