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Africa rises as a startup investment destination, 9th Africa Early Stage Investor Summit (#AESIS2022) connecting 1000+ investors

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AESIS2022

3000+ attendees in total including Entrepreneur Support Organizations, incubators, accelerators and select high-impact startups

AMSTERDAM, Netherlands, November 10, 2022/APO Group/ — 

VC4A (https://www.VC4A.com) and ABAN hosted Africa’s investor community at the 9th Africa Early Stage Investor Summit (#AESIS2022) from 2-4 November 2022. 1000+ investors connected via the virtual summit, 3000+ attendees in total including Entrepreneur Support Organizations, incubators, accelerators and select high-impact startups. 30 cities unlocked for Investor Meetups in 25 countries worldwide. 12 organizations joined the partner list, boosting support for the theme Investing with a Gender Lens & Clean/Green Tech .14 women-led companies presented at the first Women Founder Edition of the VC4A Venture Showcase Africa.

On November 2nd, 3rd and 4th, VC4A and ABAN brought Africa’s investor community together for the 9th Africa Early Stage Investor Summit. The industry leading event, which successfully hosted 3000+ attendees from all over the world.

In a major milestone this edition, 1200+ investors attended the exclusive and in-person Investor Meetups in 30 cities worldwide, more than doubling from 13 cities in 2021. We witnessed many new bonds formed and celebrated the past year with one another as the community continues to grow. Experience moments from the Investor Meetups in the aftermovies (https://bit.ly/3hwYxmj) and look through the picture gallery (https://AESIS2022.myportfolio.com).

#AESIS2022 in highlights

– 89 speakers (55% female)
– 30 investor meetups hosted by partners in 25 different countries
– 60 virtual sessions featuring

  • 8 fireside chats
  • 6 investor panels
  • 4 investor masterclasses as part of the AESIS Academy
  • 3 keynotes
  • 3 research presentations
  • 2 interactive workshops
  • 14 VC4A Venture Showcase companies pitching their Seed/Series A rounds and
  • 6 DFIs joining the Office Hours resulting in 30 1-on-1 meetings

Shining the spotlight on gender inclusive investing

Jessica Espinoza of 2X Collaborative gave the keynote address on gender-smart investing, highlighting that “Gender balanced leadership teams in private equity generate 20% higher net IRR, yet, we don’t find good gender balance in leadership in early stage investing”, adding that “This is a missed opportunity that can be resolved by adopting a gender smart lens.”

In addition, two key research reports were presented by Briter Bridges (https://bit.ly/3NV6td1) and Africa: The Big Deal (https://bit.ly/3Toz4Zq), which highlighted record breaking angel and venture capital investments into Africa early stage businesses. Only $1 out of every $15 of this investment went to women founded and led startups.

14 women-led companies selected for the 2022 VC4A Venture Showcase Africa (https://VentureShowcase.VC4A.com) were invited to pitch as part of the first Women Founder Edition. These founders are all looking to raise their pre-seed to seed and Series A rounds of between USD 250K – 10M, as Venture Showcase alumni have raised USD 600M till date.

At #AESIS2022, the Ecosystem Side Event was launched with the aim to speak to the intersection between entrepreneurship development and early-stage investing. Industry leaders dug into different views around investment readiness and ESO sustainability. The segment was attended by more than 300 delegates, and was hosted thanks to the partnership with GIZ Make-IT in Africa. The panel on Hub Sustainability was powered by FMO Ventures.

AESIS2022 would not  have been possible without the support from our #AESIS2022 partner organizations. We would like to specially thank Strategic partners GIZ Make-IT in Africa and Work in Progress! Alliance, Knowledge partners FMO Ventures and the UNDP – Africa Sustainable Finance Hub (ASFH), and Friends of the Summit – UK South Africa Tech Hub, the Bestseller Foundation, Launch Africa Ventures, Dutch Good Growth Fund, AWS Activate, Flourish Ventures, Afrilabs and Next176 by Old Mutual.

Nine years ago when AESIS first launched, “there was approximately 120M USD in investment to around 30 early stage deals. Now in 2022 the ecosystem has crossed the 4B USD mark in investment in over 200 deals” said Hope Ditlhakanyane, who added that “#AESIS2022 is a good moment for us to reflect on how far we have come as an industry to grow venture investing across the continent”. All recordings of the virtual Summit remain available via www.AfricaInvestorSummit.com.

Looking ahead with great anticipation to the next edition. Join us again next year for the 10th anniversary of the Africa Early Stage Investor Summit at #AESIS2023.

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of VC4A.

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AFRICLOUD Opens Lagos Region and Local-Currency Payments in African Markets

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The company’s third African region keeps Nigerian workloads in Nigeria, and customers from Abidjan to Nairobi can now pay in the currency they earn, without an international card

MIAMI BEACH, United States of America, September 23, 2026/APO Group/ –AFRICLOUD (https://AFRICLOUD.com), a cloud infrastructure company, has opened its third African region in Lagos and now accepts payment in local currency across West, Central, East and Southern Africa. Businesses across the continent can run servers in Nigeria, South Africa or Portugal from one account, and pay for them the way they already pay for everything else.

 




  

Download document (1): https://apo-opa.co/4Ardfz9

Download document (2): https://apo-opa.co/46FWH8Y

Buying cloud infrastructure in Africa has meant living with three compromises: traffic that leaves the continent and comes back, payment in dollars behind a card many businesses do not hold, and data sitting under somebody else’s law.

Lagos answers the first. Compute and storage for Nigerian customers stay in Nigeria, and the region also serves Accra, Abidjan, Lome, Douala and Ouagadougou. Traffic from landlocked West Africa that once reached comparable infrastructure by way of Europe now stays on terrestrial West African fibre. Johannesburg serves Southern and East Africa. Lisbon serves North Africa and Europe, and reaches Brazil over a direct subsea route. Across the three regions, AFRICLOUD’s own continent-wide measurements place 42 of the 53 African countries measured within a best-case round trip of 70 milliseconds, countries home to about 1.28 billion people.

A company in Accra or Abidjan now reaches West African infrastructure without leaving the region, and pays for it in the currency it earns

Payment answers the second. Customers across West, Central, East and Southern Africa pay in their own currency, including the naira, the cedi, the shilling and the CFA francs, by local card, bank transfer, USSD or mobile money, with no international card needed. Mobile money is live in twelve African countries, and cards, PayPal and more than 300 cryptocurrencies are accepted everywhere. The GSMA reports that 74 per cent of the world’s mobile money activity by transaction count took place in Africa in 2024.

Residency answers the third. Nigerian data runs under the Nigeria Data Protection Act, South African data under POPIA and European workloads under EU law, chosen server by server from the same dashboard.

“African businesses have been asked to choose between infrastructure that is close, infrastructure they can actually pay for, and infrastructure that keeps their data under their own law,” said Oluniyi Ajao, Founder of AFRICLOUD. “Removing that choice is the reason we built this.”

“Lagos is the piece that completes the map,” he said. “A company in Accra or Abidjan now reaches West African infrastructure without leaving the region, and pays for it in the currency it earns.”

All three regions run the same platform: AMD EPYC processors with all-NVMe storage, IPv4 and IPv6 on every server, and a new server online in about two minutes. Dedicated Servers are built to order in all three regions. Support is available around the clock by chat and email.

Cloud Servers are available now at https://AFRICLOUD.com.

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of AFRICLOUD LLC.

 

 




 

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Hong Kong outlines strategies for deepening development of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area and enhancing green transformation

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HONG KONG SAR – Media OutReach Newswire – 22 September 2026 – Hong Kong’s Chief Executive John Lee announced the First Five-Year Plan for Economic and Social Development of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) (2026-2030) and his fifth Policy Address on September 16, rolling out measures to further sharpen Hong Kong’s edge amid global competition, consolidate development of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA) and promote green transformation.

Initiatives aim to support high-quality development of the GBA, align rules and mechanisms within the region, and promote cross-boundary collaboration.

 




 
 

“The HKSAR Government will continue its efforts in fostering synergistic development of the GBA,” said Mr Lee. “We will strengthen co‑operation in technological innovation, promote ‘hard connectivity’ in infrastructure, foster ‘soft connectivity’ by deepening the alignment of rules and mechanisms, and achieve ‘connectivity of hearts’ among residents of the three places.”

The HKSAR Government will continue to actively participate in the development of the various major co-operation platforms, including Qianhai of Shenzhen, Nansha of Guangzhou, Hengqin of Zhuhai and the Hetao Shenzhen-Hong Kong Co-operation Zone, to promote mutual benefits.

In terms of “hard connectivity” the HKSAR Government will support Nansha in its role as a high‑standard gateway for opening up, including encouraging the trade to participate in Nansha’s infrastructure development.

“To promote the co‑ordinated development of rail transit in Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macao, we are pressing ahead with the Northern Link Project and the Hong Kong‑Shenzhen Western Rail Link (Hung Shui Kiu‑Qianhai), with target commissioning in 2034 and 2035 respectively, to fully connect the rail transit networks of Hong Kong and Shenzhen,” Mr Lee said.

Regarding “soft connectivity”, Mr Lee said the HKSAR Government will set up a Task Force to explore ways to advance the alignment of rules and mechanisms within the GBA.

To achieve “Connectivity of Hearts” among residents across the GBA, Hong Kong will strengthen co-operation between its higher education institutions and those in other GBA cities by establishing cross‑disciplinary partnerships, facilitating scientific research, knowledge transfer, and commercialisation, with a view to promoting high‑level research.

Hong Kong’s Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs, Janice Tse, noted that the First Five-Year Plan clearly states that Hong Kong will participate in the development of the GBA into an international first‑class bay area and a world‑class city cluster with global influence.

“Hong Kong will forge closer alignment and synergy with the nine GBA cities in Guangdong Province and Macao, making full use of our respective advantages to jointly promote the high-quality development of the GBA,” Miss Tse said.

To foster financial development in the GBA, Hong Kong will continue to capitalise on institutional innovation, financial infrastructure upgrading and enhanced regulatory alignment to encourage the orderly flow of financial elements among GBA cities.

The Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited’s Core Climate, in collaboration with the Guangzhou Power Exchange Centre, is working towards the pilot trading of national renewable‑energy, green electricity certificates in Hong Kong in 2026.

“On connecting the Chinese Mainland and the world, the HKSAR Government will continue to support green technology development through the HK$400 million (aboutUS$51 million) Green Tech Fund, leveraging Hong Kong’s function as a springboard for green technology and assisting national green technologies and products in going global,” said Hong Kong’sSecretary for Environment and Ecology, Tse Chin-wan. “On the development of hydrogen energy, we have participated in drafting national hydrogen energy standards with a view to helping these standards align with international practice.”

To meet the country’s “dual carbon” targets and fulfil Hong Kong’s commitment to achieving carbon neutrality before 2050, the HKSAR Government steered the establishment of a production base for sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) in Dongguan, leveraging the leading position of Hong Kong enterprises in the international SAF industry.

“By combining technology strengths with industrial foundation, Hong Kong and Guangdong will jointly develop a globally influential green industry,” Mr Lee said.

The HKSAR Government will take forward the construction of an SAF blending facility in Hong Kong to build an end‑to‑end SAF value chain and reduce logistics costs to make SAF prices more competitive. The target is to achieve an SAF consumption ratio of 1% to 3% for flights departing from Hong Kong International Airport in 2030.

Hong Kong’s Five-Year Plan promotes the integrated development of culture, sports, and tourism, to develop the GBA into a cultured bay area.

Under the strategic framework of the Agreement on Strengthening of Sports Cooperation and Promotion of Integrated Development, Hong Kong will deepen co-operation, and strive to co‑organise important regional and international single‑sport events. It will also strengthen cultural exchanges, pass on Cantonese opera and the characteristics of Lingnan culture, and promote the sales and cross‑boundary exhibition of Hong Kong publications.
 




 

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Alamein Africa Forum to bring together key political and business leaders

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The forum is to become the continent’s premier gathering where political power meets entrepreneurial prowess, bridging the established engines of African growth with the new sectors defining its future

CAIRO, Egypt, September 22, 2026/APO Group/ –The inaugural Alamein Africa Forum (https://AlameinForum.com/) will take place from October 2-4 in the historic city of Alamein on Egypt’s Mediterranean coast in parallel with the 2026 African Union mid-year summit.

Established in response to a mandate from the African Union, which called for a permanent African Business Forum to convene biennially in Egypt, the inaugural edition will bring together Heads of State and official delegations as well as some key actors in business and finance.
 




 

The forum is to become the continent’s premier gathering where political power meets entrepreneurial prowess, bridging the established engines of African growth with the new sectors defining its future.

The Alamein Africa Forum will serve as a pan-African platform bringing together the private sector, investment and financial institutions

The Presidents of Algeria, Angola, Burundi, Chad, Equatorial Guinea, Ghana, Libya, Senegal, Somalia, and South Africa are expected in Alamein as well as President Al Sisi, President of the Arab Republic of Egypt who is the host of this year’s AU Mid-Year Summit. Business leaders from across the continent have confirmed their participation including Ralph Mupita, MTN; Idrissa Nassa, Coris Bank; Mohamed El Ketani, Attijariwafa Bank; Hichem Eloumi, Groupe Shakira; Wale Tinubu, Oando; and many more. Aliko Dangote, Africa’s biggest industrialist is also expected to attend, with the organisers hoping to set up a Business Advisory Council to help advance private sector priorities and investment throughout the continent.

Bringing together leaders in politics, business and policy from across the continent, the Alamein Africa Forum will provide a unique opportunity to shape Africa’s growth agenda by aligning policy and investment priorities, mobilising partnerships for implementation and strengthening financing and investment pathways. The private sector must become an integral part of Agenda 2063, the AU’s strategic 50 year masterplan to transform the continent.

Co-organised by the Government of Egypt, Afreximbank, the African Union and AUDA-NEPAD, the Forum brings together Africa’s most influential decision-makers in an unprecedented alliance of public and private sector leadership.

Speaking on the imperative of the summit at a joint press conference by the government of Egypt and Afreximbank on Thursday, September 17 2026, Dr. Badr Abdelatty, Minister of Foreign Affairs, International Cooperation, and Expatriates Abroad said (https://apo-opa.co/4ygiQag): “The Alamein Africa Forum will serve as a pan-African platform bringing together the private sector, investment and financial institutions, and representatives of various productive and service sectors, to strengthen direct links between companies and markets and decision making at the highest level.”

Continuing, he noted that the Alamein Africa Forum is part of a series of high-level African events that Egypt will host in early October, stressing that holding the forum reflects Egypt’s commitment to advancing continental economic cooperation

In his own comments, Dr. George Elombi, President and Chairman of the Board of Directors of Afreximbank described (https://apo-opa.co/4ygiQag) the Alamein Africa Forum as a pan-African platform for promoting intra-African trade and investment and connecting the business community and financial institutions with priority projects and investment opportunities in the continent.

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of Alamein Africa Forum.

 




 

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