African Business Angels Network

The African Business Angels Network (ABAN) is a pan-African organization established in 2015, uniting over 5,000 angel investors from 37 African countries and the diaspora. Its mission is to drive angel investing in Africa by increasing the pool of investors supporting promising entrepreneurs and developing the support infrastructure to maximize their impact. ABAN aims to mobilize $100 million in investments across at least 1,000 startups, creating over 10,000 jobs annually.

ABAN's strategy focuses on collaboration, integrity, and empowerment. It works with local investors, networks, and partners to unlock local capital and fuel innovation and inclusive growth across Africa. The organization provides capacity building through training and best-practice development, promotes awareness of angel investing, and engages in advocacy to bolster early-stage investing and lobby for incentives to encourage deal flow. Additionally, ABAN offers matching funds, deal flow and cross-border investment opportunities, education and training, and access to exclusive events for its members.

Over the past decade, ABAN has invested over $35 million in more than 1,200 early-stage startups. The network has also mobilized 10 times the capital through initiatives like the Catalytic Africa matching fund and the cross-border vehicle ABAIV, backing startups in over 15 countries. ABAN's focus areas include making angel investing easier, capacity building, awareness building, advocacy, and collaboration with various ecosystem stakeholders to drive discourse, research, and knowledge sharing for the transformation of Africa’s entrepreneurial ecosystem.