Africa’s technology investment landscape is beginning to change, with investors increasingly looking beyond fintech to businesses tackling some of the continent’s biggest challenges, including energy, agriculture, infrastructure, logistics and industrial production. While fintech remains Africa’s largest technology investment sector, growing interest in cleantech and other real-economy businesses suggests that the next wave of major opportunities could come from solving everyday problems rather than simply building financial apps.
African technology companies raised $4.1 billion in equity and debt funding in 2025, representing a 25 per cent increase from the previous year, according to Partech. Fintech attracted $1.49 billion, accounting for 37 per cent of the total, but cleantech recorded a significant jump, attracting $1.18 billion, nearly twice its 2024 figure. Kemi Olajide, Principal at Africa Climate Ventures, said the trend points to a broader investment opportunity as entrepreneurs apply technology to critical sectors of the economy.
According to Olajide, the next generation of major African technology companies will likely focus on areas such as energy, agriculture, food systems, mobility, logistics and manufacturing. She said artificial intelligence would also play a major role in the next investment cycle, but warned that investors should not back companies simply because they use AI. Instead, the technology must deliver measurable results through lower operating costs, higher productivity, reduced downtime, better credit decisions or stronger customer retention.
Africa’s limited digital infrastructure, however, remains a major hurdle to unlocking this potential. Despite accounting for about 18 per cent of the global population, the continent has less than one per cent of the world’s data-centre capacity, according to the GSMA. Olajide identified reliable electricity, fibre networks, last-mile connectivity, data centres and computing capacity as key investment opportunities, while also pointing to rising demand for professionals in engineering, data, cybersecurity, product management and hardware maintenance. Partech reported that cleantech equity funding alone reached $550 million in 2025, up 186 per cent, with 74 equity deals recorded during the year.
Beyond attracting investment, Olajide said Africa must ensure that more of the intellectual property, technical expertise and economic value created by its technology ecosystem remains on the continent. The bigger opportunity, she argued, is not simply for African companies to build products locally, but to develop technologies and infrastructure capable of competing globally. If that happens, Africa could gradually move from being mainly a consumer of imported technology to becoming a producer of innovative businesses that make essential services cheaper, better and more reliable.
source: punch
