Venture Capitalists: The Unknown Leapfrogs for Thriving in the Increasingly Lucrative African Markets

 

By

Professor Okanga Boniface 

London, United Kingdom, 3 March, 2026

Venture capitalists are the other Africa’s unknown or ignored leapfrogs for thriving in the increasingly lucrative African markets. Venture capitalists are important providers of capital. They come into a valuable investment that does not have adequate capital finance. Venture capitalists are strategic financial market players that focus on evaluating, identifying and funding brilliant business ideas that could have performed well, but lack adequate capital. From the deal, the venture capitalist recoups the cost of investment plus profits, as the owner of the business solves the capital inadequacy problems if the business is successful. If the business is successful, the owner of the business also gains by taking over a more well-established entity than it was before. Venture capitalists do not only offer capital finance, but also advise that improves the business’ effective performance. Venture capitalists advise, advertise, market, promote and even sometimes, manage the business with the understanding that if the business succeeds and performs well, they can recoup the cost of investments (Adam, 2024). On recognizing that the novel business concept can perform well, venture capitalists invest all the required financial resources to ensure the business becomes a success. Venture capitalists are often on the hunt for the emerging new business concepts that are most likely to perform well. It is through the promotion of the new venture to a successful stage that the venture capitalists earn their profits (Wright & Robbie, 1998). Given the challenges of financial capital inadequacy which are marring the effective performance of most African businesses, venture capitalists can be very good strategic saviours. However, even if that is so, the African venture capital market still remains underdeveloped, ignored and unattractive. It is such shortfalls that motivate this study to undertake relevant analysis with the motive of spotlighting the concept of venture capitalism, its importance and roles for responding to the funding gaps in most of the African markets. During business development, venture capitalists often take up the initiative of funding very risky businesses. They put all the effort, resources and time to ensure that the novel business concept becomes a success. Because if the novel business concept is a success, it enhances their ability to easily recoup the costs invested in the promotion of the novel business concept.

Though its usage has just gained prominence in recent years, the concept of venture capitalism was discovered as early as the 1800s. In the 1800s, Niftyhontas (2023) highlights the first concept of venture capitalism to have arisen from Queen Isabella’s sponsoring of Christopher Columbus’ voyage to the Americas. When seeking to go to the Americas, Christopher Columbus was venturing into the unknown world of expedition. From his project, no government, non-governmental organisation or any business organisation expected to gain anything. Hence, all his applications for the sponsorship of the project were rejected by all governments and monarchs at the time. It was only Queen Isabella of Spain who took up the sponsorship of the project on the assumption that if it was a success or a failure, so let it be. Fortunately, Christopher Columbus’ expedition to the Americas led to the discovery of the West Indies. This inspired the Spanish government that later became more interested in investing in different forms of expeditions and explorations around the world.

Following the embracement of Christopher Columbus’ exploration project by Spain, Queen Isabella was able to take 90% of the profits due to the engagement in a high risk venture that did not have any clarity or assurance of reward. Besides Christopher Columbus’ narrative, Tom Nicholas, the Harvard Professor, reveals the history of the current venture capitalism to be traceable to the 1800s’ whaling expeditions. In such expeditions, financial backers or funders would come up and fund the whaling expedition into the wilderness of the sea. The agreement was that in the event that the whales were captured, the financiers of the expedition would first recoup their cost of investments plus the predetermined percentage of profits (Niftyhontas, 2023). Thereafter, the sailors would be given daily stipends and a share of the remaining venture’s profits.

These practices unfolded and became acceptable as the best approaches for funding whaling expeditions. However, the best epitome of the actual case of venture capitalist approach and behaviours came to be depicted in General Georges F. Doriot’s notion of venture capitalism. Inspired by the need to respond to the needs of businesses that had brilliant ideas, but no adequate capital finance, General Georges F. Doriot, a Professor at the Harvard Business School influenced the creation of the American Research and Development Corporation (ARDC). In addition to Harvard Business School, ARDC was also created by Karl Compton – the President of MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), Merrill Griswold – Chairman of Massachusetts Investors Trust, and Ralph Flanders – President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.

Following its establishment, ARDC did not take long before identifying, funding and promoting some of the best business ideas. In the period between the 1940s and 1990s, ARDC acting as the venture capitalist, financed several novel innovation ideas not with the motive of creating a successful firm. Instead it aimed to create a more successful industry. It was such an initiative that led to the creation of several successful firms that came to constitute the new industry known as Silicon Valley. Driving innovation and the embracement of some of the best business practices, Silicon Valley has produced some of the top blue-chip companies of the world. Situated in the southern San Francisco Bay area of California and stretching from San Jose to Palo Alto, Silicon Valley hosts some of the major world’s disruptors like Google, Microsoft, Apple, Meta and Twitter. From such successes, ARDC became known as one of the major reputable venture capitalists driving transformation in most of the American tech world.

In the same trenches, some of the other revolutionary venture capitalists that also became reputable to complement ARDC’s venture capitalism activities included the likes of the Rockefellers, Whitneys and Vanderbilts. These new venture capitalists emerged as some of the wealthy families identifying, funding and promoting some of the best business ideas (Adam, 2024). Following the successes of these various venture capital activities, the concept of venture capital emerged as one of the acceptable practices for funding different ventures in the United States. While struggling with financial capital-related issues in the 1990s, Google’s Sergey Brin and Larry Page received a $25 million venture capital funding from Kleiner Perkins and Sequoia Capital. This enabled Google to improve the scale of its search engine infrastructure development, hire the best engineers and improve the efficacy of its AdWords.

In the global hospitality sector, though creative, Airbnb’s entrance into the US hospitality market was undermined by the challenge of inadequate financial capital for expansion. This was solved using the venture capital funding received from Sequoia Capital and Y Combinator. This enabled Airbnb to build and improve its state of infrastructure and international operations. It also enabled Airbnb to develop, build and improve its international payment systems. Due to the lack of internet coverage across the world at the time, the venture funding also enabled Airbnb to meet the costs of advertisement, promotion and marketing across the world. In the early years, Jeff Bezos’ attempt to use his own capital to finance most of his business’ growth improvement initiatives was notable. But still, due to the surging expenditures, he had to seek venture capital funding from Kleiner Perkins. Since the selected businesses are often very risky, venture capitalists fund businesses not with the hope of recouping the cost of investment. Instead they fund the business with the faith and belief that all will be successful. If not successful, they are also prepared to accept and embrace the losses. Venture capitalists use insurance to underwrite losses so that if the business fails, they are covered and if it succeeds, they are then lucky. Given the high risks in the African markets, it seems it is the African markets that can offer more attractive grounds for venture capitalists’ operations. Unfortunately, some economists still think the African market has not yet grown to be attractive enough.

 

African Market

Even if it does not appear to be growing and improving, Africa’s economy is increasingly improving and becoming attractive. One may not easily recognize it. And we are not going into the nitty-gritties of statistical figures, like – is it GDP growth, GDP per capita, balance of payments, unemployment rate, inflation rate, or poverty reduction statistics, metrics and indices. Sometimes, critics argue that such statistics are often cooked, doctored, fabricated or whatever you may call it because the improvement of the statistical figures is not supported by the monies going into the ordinary citizens’ pockets. But the actual truth is that Africa’s economy is steadily growing and improving irrespective of whether or not money is flowing into your pockets. Money may not be flowing into your pockets due to the failure to do the right things. The notion that Africa’s economy is improving is accentuated in different physical and not statistical indicators that we see every day. Among such physical indicators are the increasing business activities and productivity of most African airports.

African airports like Lusaka, Entebbe, Addis Ababa, Abuja and Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam International Airport in Mauritius that used to handle only a few travellers are increasingly experiencing a surge in the millions of criss-crossing travellers. Airports cannot all of a sudden become busy if the continent does not have business. It’s common sense and no econometrics or statistics are needed to accentuate such a statement. Likewise, cities cannot become overpopulated without catalysing increased demands for different products or services. The logic of purchasing power parity argues that without money, the purchasing power reduces. However, Prahalad’s (2006) “Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid” Theory still cautions that operating in a market where multitudes of poor people have at least a dollar to spend on an item every day far surpasses the fortunes of operating in New York, where the rich spend thousands of dollars once a week or even just once a month.

Drawing from the cases of China and India that gained super-economic-power status by serving the poorest global population, Prahalad advises the major global business players not to ignore the lucrative opportunities and fortunes of operating in the least developed markets. In the African markets which are considered as some of the emerging markets of the world, cities that used to be underpopulated have become very populated and are offering more lucrative markets. Unless there is something wrong with the mindsets and the approaches being used, African cities cannot become overpopulated and yet there are no markets for the African products. The reality is that Africa is economically evolving and improving, but the problem is that when one has been in poverty for a very long time, changing the poverty mindset is another thing. Because one has been in poverty for a long time, it becomes difficult to see things in the new way even if things change to present new opportunities. When in poverty, one often develops the strategy of how to cope and that creates the comfort zone that prevents one from waking up to take up the emerging new opportunities, even if things change to present new opportunities. In South Africa, when the white minority government ended in 1994, some of the black South Africans expected the new Nelson Mandela government to distribute free money, housing and even food. In the other parts of Africa like the Kibera slums in Kenya, Bwaise, Kanyanya and Kasokoso slums in Uganda, Hillbrow, Cape Flats and Alex in South Africa, Makoko, Agege and Mpape in Nigeria, Old Fadama and Jamestown in Ghana and New Bell in Cameroon, it’s not uncommon to hear the ordinary slum-dwellers lamenting that “at least if this government can change we can get something.” Most of the people in the slums often wake up and start drinking or smoking weed from morning to sunset, as the rest of the population hustle with salon businesses, mobile money businesses, Uber, boda-bodas (okadas in Nigeria) or their tomatoes or potatoes market stalls. However, it’s often the ones doing nothing that expect something big from the change of government. It’s often those who are on weed 24/7, drunk and robbing people in townships or slums that expect something big if the government can change. It’s not that things are bad for those in the slums.

Some have opted to be there after running away from school even if the parents or guardians had school fees. Some have stolen and run away from the factories where they were working. Some have committed crimes and run away from their neighborhoods or up-country homes to hide in slums. Some are engaged in illegal businesses like drug selling and therefore the slums are the best lawless places to operate from. Some don’t want to be under the control of anyone, parents, guardians or bosses at work, leave alone the control of the police and government. Hence, the slums are the solutions. Even if there are work opportunities, most are never willing to work. And if they are to work, complaints become part of work or they can even do a very bad something. The late Tamale Mirundi-the former media adviser to Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni, once said if you give 1 million Ugandan shillings to the one selling in the market and you come back after one year, he or she will be having three stalls. But if you give the same amount to the unemployed commerce graduate and you come back after one year, you will be shocked to find him in the worst state than before.

With such mindsets even if venture capitalists are to invade the African markets, they may still influence the success of nothing. Though African governments are often blamed, it is better that the African population must first start by asking the difficult big question as to whether they as ordinary African citizens are doing the right things to succeed. The African population needs to put government aside, and start to have honest conversations amongst themselves on how they can solve their individual problems. They need to discuss how they can help each other to solve their individual problems without calling out the name of government. Social entrepreneurs operating in townships and slums need to be supported to conduct different forms of community education programmes that enable local residents to change and participate more meaningfully in the socio-economic growth and development of the country. Social workers, psychologists and criminologists operating different community education programmes need to be supported to awaken the communities with different programmes that insinuate to local residents that things are not the same anymore and have changed for the better. Practical community education and vocational programmes will need to be conducted in areas like bakery, landscaping, tiling, roofing, bricklaying, saloon, community policing and security, pre-school teacher education, salon, tailoring, baby-sitting and home management, basic nursing for disabled children, the elderly and those with chronic diseases, and fashion designs business operations etc.

Sometimes, the name of government is scapegoated as an excuse for individual failures. Such conversations must also evaluate how some African people can accept to be helped because there are people that have problems, but are not willing to be helped and told that they have problems. It’s difficult to fathom that the one that doesn’t have direction and can’t get himself or herself in order or out of poverty can also become a good leader. Given such insights, some may argue that one is not empathetic with the poor. But sincerely, Africa will need to be honest with certain issues in order to invent new insights that can change the African continent’s condition and position in the world. With these conditions and mindsets, it implies that even if the African economic conditions are changing for the good, some sections of the redundant population may never wake up to take maximum advantage of the emerging new opportunities. Even with the spiraling African growth, some sections of the population may never emerge as critical venture capitalists or champions that spur the improved pace of Africa’s socio-economic growth and development.

Yet as a result of the incremental improvement in the African markets, cities that used to have vast commercial spaces are increasingly experiencing limited commercial spaces, thus fueling the growing demand for prime commercial spaces and mall construction. Cities that used to stretch across just a few rivers and hills are now stretching across several rivers, landscapes and hills. Given the boom across sectors like construction, manufacturing, hospitality, agriculture and food production, tourism and travel, different forms of businesses are being created to respond and tap the opportunities arising from the different forms of the surging demands in the African markets. Just in the period between January and December, statistics from Uganda Civil Aviation Authority indicate 2,247,145 travellers to have passed through Entebbe International Airport. Higher levels of productivity at an airport are part of the indicators signifying the attractiveness of a particular economy. People don’t just travel unless they have businesses to attend to.

Despite poor corporate governance causing wastage and losses affecting profitability, this demonstrates the kinds of opportunities that Uganda had been sleeping on without revitalizing Uganda Airlines that had been down since 1988. A surge in passenger travel is also noted to be accompanied by the spiraling increase of cargo inflow and outflow to signify increasing levels of trade (Kamoga, 2025). The surge in passenger travel via Entebbe is also attributable to new routes that have been added. To get Uganda Airlines off just the Eastern African routes, management included the other routes like Harare–Zimbabwe, Gatwick Airport–London and Kinshasa–Democratic Republic of the Congo. Just like the passengers’ surge at Entebbe, Jomo Kenyatta International Airport managed the onboarding and off-boarding of 8.93 million passengers. Of course, JKIA cannot be compared with Entebbe because JKIA is a point in Africa for handling a lot of different connecting flights to the other parts of Africa and the world. But still the increment of the international travellers from 8.6 million in 2024 to 8.93 million in 2025 suggests an increment in economic activities that insinuate the increasing attractiveness of the African markets.

In 2024, Addis Ababa Bole International Airport in Ethiopia handled 12.5 million passengers. O. R. Tambo International Airport in South Africa also played the instrumental role of handling 18.3 million passengers in the same year. It is not only these that depict the increasing attractiveness of the African market. Instead it’s also the trends from Kotoka International Airport–Ghana that onboarded and offboarded 3.4 million passengers in 2024, as Cameroon airports of Yaoundé and Douala handled 1.77 million passengers and Kigali International Airport–Rwanda saw an increment of travellers from 1.3 million in 2024 to 1.5 million in 2025. In Nigeria, Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport–Abuja handled 5.48 million passengers in 2024. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ndjili International Airport documented 1 million passengers every year.

Despite indicating which airports are doing well, this comparative analysis also insinuates the increasing attractiveness and growth of the African air travel business. It also indicates the increasing attractiveness of the African tourism industry as well as the magnitude and scale of productive economic activities across the African continent. Before influencing the improvement of GDP growth and GDP per capita, these increasing air travels also come with smaller benefits for the other smaller business operators in the segments like Uber, restaurants, bars, hotels and Airbnbs, guest houses and lodges. Of course, recently, the protracted Kenya aviation workers’ strikes frustrated some progress just like the US–Israel strikes in the Middle East that have affected most travellers. But still these are good physical indicators of the African economy which is no longer the same as the African economy of the 1970s (Wasike, 2026).

Besides the performance of the African air travel industry, the other indicator of a thriving African economy is also explained in the balance of payments deficits. Yes, a BOP deficit of –US$4.16 billion. Quite often, the normal interpretation of a BOP deficit is that things are bad and the country or the continent has performed badly by spending more on imports than it exported to generate the required foreign exchange earnings. That is correct. But the inverse argument that a deficit or the increment of a deficit indicates market attractiveness is also correct. Consumers will consume all that you have in the economy and if you don’t have the right quantity and quality, they will buy from the external market. That is what is happening in the African market. The increasing African population is increasingly unlocking additional demands. But the investors are not increasing the scale of production to respond with the required quantity and quality of goods.

Remember the majority of the current African consumers are young, educated, informed, integrated with the global economy, global in thinking, sophisticated, proud and choosy. Hence, businesses that think that responding to the growing African demand is just a matter of producing without paying keen attention to quality are wrong. If the products or services are not of good quality, the younger African consumers will avoid purchasing and opt to import. This explains how the current deficit of –US$4.16 billion insinuates the increasing attractiveness of the African market. Things are improving in the African market, but the local producers are not responding accordingly. Thus a surge in imports. Most of the things that are imported into Africa are mainly cars, electronics, industrial machines and equipment, construction materials and equipment and clothing and apparel.

These imply that if Africa is to increase its production and encourage intra-African trade, it can easily convert this deficit of –US$4.16 billion into export earnings for some African countries. But in the process of achieving that, the question of how to deal with inadequate capital problems may remain lingering as most of the emerging new African businesses explore different funding options. Despite some of the African businesses having some of the best business ideas, inadequate capital finance is still a problem. In response, the commercial banks across the relatively oligopolistic African financial markets have funded and funded several businesses and got tired. African governments have also invented different forms of emerging business funding and have got tired. However, in all these, the roles of venture capitalists have been quite limited, unknown and unrecognised.

The concept of venture capitalism is not widely known and recognised as instrumental for filling the funding gaps left by the commercial banks and governments in the African markets. Because the commercial banks are tired, they tend to introduce some stringent conditions that most of the emerging businesses fail to comply with. In the name of mitigating risks, they introduce unimaginable restrictions that only a few established businesses are able to meet. To respond to this gap, most African governments have introduced different forms of funding for the emerging businesses in sectors like manufacturing, agriculture, mining and tourism.

African governments like the Nigerian government have introduced a section for SMEs’ long-term financing in the Development Bank of Nigeria. Through that section, funds are channeled to commercial banks for financing SMEs without the use of stringent requirements that the commercial banks often require. In addition to the other small business financing initiatives, the Nigerian government also introduced CBN (Central Bank of Nigeria) SME Intervention Fund where the Central Bank of Nigeria lends to commercial banks to in turn lend to the SMEs below market rates. This is typical of the approach used in China where the Chinese government introduced a range of different low-interest and interest-free loans for the emerging new businesses.

In South Africa, the government introduced the Industrial Development Corporation to finance industrial establishments and the growth of the emerging new businesses. The Development Bank of South Africa mainly funds the SMEs engaged in different infrastructure development businesses. These are integrated with the establishment of the Small Enterprise Finance Agency that offers loans and business finance to all forms of the emerging new businesses that qualify. The Land and Agricultural Development Bank of South Africa offers loans and financial support for all forms of the emerging new agricultural businesses. Combined with the Guarantee Schemes that guarantee loans for risky small businesses, these different forms of government funding have responded to funding gaps left by a very weak venture capital market.

Uganda has the Microfinance Support Centre, Uganda Development Bank (UDB)–SME Kazi Loans that offer financial support for improving SMEs’ competitiveness, productivity and performance. Other funding initiatives include SB4U–Sustainable Business for Uganda that supports SMEs in meeting the costs of compliance, quality management, e-commerce and access to the European markets. These are integrated with the Uganda Women Entrepreneurs Programme, MSE–Micro and Small Enterprise, and Small Business Recovery Fund. Other initiatives include the presidential initiatives like Emyooga, Parish Development Model (PDM) and recently the MK Fund for Entrepreneurs.

However, due to the higher politicisation of funding, the weaknesses of most presidential initiatives for funding small businesses have been the tendency to provide funds to even people that do not own businesses. Funds from most of the presidential initiatives are often received by non-businessmen and drunk there and then in bars. Hence, causing the cyclical problems of funding where the same groups of people again make noise and get the funds while the actual businessmen and real players in different economic arenas get nothing. Vetting and identifying the actual critical catalysts in different sectors of the economy will be essential for identifying and funding real businessmen and entrepreneurs that can help the government change things once and for all.

There is little vetting to assess whether or not the applicant has a business. If so, how is the business doing and if it is doing well, has the applicant received government funding in the past. If so, has he or she used the funds well and what are the prospects of his or her business’ growth. For these weaknesses, it seems that in the entire African market, it’s only in Uganda that even non-entrepreneurs are able to get entrepreneurial funding without even demonstrating any evidence of being engaged in business or possessing the capabilities of managing a business. Across the other African markets like Ghana, Kenya and Tanzania, similar funding options have been introduced to address the weaknesses in the African venture capital markets.

 

But still, most African governments have also got overwhelmed. This creates a huge market in the venture capital world. In this venture capital world, some other new forms of lenders like moneylenders and other social entrepreneurs have come in to fund the emerging businesses by avoiding the stringent requirements of the commercial banks. However, still, there are mistakes, governance-related issues and unscrupulousness issues that leave the concept of venture capitalism less effective, unknown and unrecognised in most African financial markets. The venture capitalism concept remains ignored, unknown and unused in most of the African markets. Yet even if that is the case, the African market still presents a lot of risks that should have presented a more viable investment ground for venture capitalists that are always looking for high-risk projects.

Venture Capitalists

Venture capitalists never go for low-risk projects. In an article titled “How Venture Capital Works,” Bob Zider (1998) explicates in the Harvard Business Review that for venture capitalists, higher risks and uncertainties are the defining criteria for capital investment. They prefer projects where nothing is taken for granted because that is where they can reap the highest returns. Not only financial returns, but also social returns for improved reputation and branding for navigating and succeeding in the innovation project that previously, no investor dared to explore. Venture capitalists never use the stringent requirements typical of the demands of the commercial banks. Just technological feasibility and the commercial viability of the innovation project are enough for making decisions on whether or not to fund a particular venture.

When advancing their money, venture capitalists never analyse the payback period, internal rate of return, the return on investment, the discount rate and the accounting rate of return of the project. Instead it is the elements of the commercial viability of the project that matter. It’s the attractiveness and capabilities of the project to create and deliver the desired differential values that matter. Venture capitalists evaluate the talents and technology that the inventors have to successfully execute the project. If the inventor has all these, venture capitalists construe that all innovation projects irrespective of their initial attractiveness require a lot of hard work in order to be successful (Bob-Zider, 1998). In stark contrast to such insights, some businesses often assume that if one is innovative, the relationship between creativity, innovativeness and improved market performance also becomes linear. Unfortunately, in the physical real-world of innovation, that is often not the case. In most cases, unless the appropriate strategies are applied, the relationship between creativity, innovativeness and a firm’s improved market performance is often non-linear.

Even if the innovation project was initially appearing attractive, it can still fail during the development stages or immediately after market launch. Failure of the novel innovation product to attract market attention can cause failure. Immediately after market introduction, the novel product may perform well, but still a slight mistake can cause its failure. Attempts to modify a novel product which was initially performing well can cause mistakes that instigate the product’s failure. It can cause the introduction of new features, attributes and functionality that customers don’t like. It can cause the introduction of costly modifications that increase product costs to affect its cost competitiveness. It can instigate the over-engineering of the product in a way that affects its user-friendliness, cost-effectiveness, usability and functionality. When BlackBerry phones were over-engineered to introduce more complex QWERTY keyboards that became less user-friendly, all customers know what happened to BlackBerry when Apple emerged with the more user-friendly smartphones.

The relationship between creativity, innovativeness and better market performance is often not necessarily linear. In the process of developing the product, the inventors and product developers can run out of ideas for taking the project forward. This can cause failure or just the prolonged duration of new product development. Due to such lack of linearity, it often remains the initiatives of the inventors or innovators to make improvements that enhance the realization of the desired business results. This renders the world of innovation very uncertain and unpredictable. It also renders the world of innovation not only uncertain and unpredictable, but also unknown. Most innovators operate in the largely unknown world of innovation. Innovators venture in the development and promotion of a business concept that has never been known before. Inventors work on products that have never been known and tested by the customers. No one knows any details. There are no customers to test with and ask how they want the product. All things are for the imaginations and assumptions that may be true or not even correct.

When computers were invented, the global telecommunication market was introduced to button phones and then smartphones. But no customer ever suggested or motivated Apple, the original inventor of the smartphone, to develop a smartphone. It was just through the process of imagination and re-imagination that Apple created the concept of a smartphone. It was an imagination and a gamble that the customers would want them. If the customers had refused them as they did to BlackBerry, Apple’s smartphone concept would have been a failure. That explains the kinds of the unknownness of the innovation world.

In the innovation world in which the modern innovation players operate, nothing is certain and predictable. All things are obscured. Today is clear, but no business executive knows what tomorrow brings. Inventors operate in the world where there is no frame of reference reflecting the principles of what would work or not work. Most activities are based on imaginations, assumptions and trial and error. Even the most brilliant inventors are often unsure as to whether the innovation will be a success. In the physical world of innovation, nothing may appear to be certain until it is certain. It is in the inner-unseen world that the inventors and innovators believe and trust their instincts. They rely on their inner insights and voices. If the inner voice says success, then they believe in the concept even if the entire world turns against them. Even if the entire world turns against them, they keep glued to their novel innovation vision because they know at the end of the day, the entire world will glorify them for the created novel values.

It is in that process that innovators become venture champions that exert enormous commercial and social influence to ensure the success of the venture. Innovators or venture champions are strong believers in themselves. They trust their inner instincts. They listen to their inner voices (Tidd & Bessant, 2021). In fact, innovators are dictators that listen less to others than to themselves. This is because they often believe in and see what the world is not seeing. Inventors think and do things in ways that the world does not do them. They work and think in ways that the world has never thought and worked before. It’s such approach that disconnects innovators from the physical world in which even what the inventors are working on is considered as impossible.

 

Innovators and inventors are disconnected from the physical world. The physical world of innovation believes and trusts only what it has seen, used and tested before, not some novel abstract concepts being introduced in the market for the first time. Jesus Christ says “Blessed are those who believe without seeing, for the kingdom of heaven is theirs.” As long as one has ideas of the technology and methods required for doing something, inventors and innovators often believe in their inner instincts even without seeing. It is such reasoning that inventors and innovators use to emerge with the previously unknown business concepts. Such novel unknown business concepts are then pursued to create and deliver the previously unknown values. But even if Jesus Christ says believe without seeing, the physical world is still often at loggerheads with the inventors’ very sane hallucinations, imaginations and tendencies to believe and trust the previously unseen and unknown business concepts. Unless experimented, tested, tried and found to be working, they are never sure of the effectiveness of the concept being introduced and used.

When the Wright Brothers ventured in the development of the first aircraft, they had no frame of reference. No one had ever before developed an aircraft. Apart from theories on how to defy the laws of gravity and the aircraft toys that the Wright Brothers’ dad had bought for them, the Wright Brothers did not have any frame of reference. If things were not working, it was just the Wright Brothers and the aircraft which was under construction or development. This is the nature of the unknownness of the innovation world in which most inventors and innovators operate. Thriving in such worlds requires a lot of guts and bold decisions. It requires inventors and innovators to be more courageous and motivated not only to others, but also to themselves in order to influence the success of the new business concept. It is in that process that venture champions often emerge. Venture champions are not necessarily inventors or innovators. Venture champions can even be any of the employees or venture capitalists that take interest and play a central role in the execution of all the essential innovation activities. Even if there is a proper organisational leadership, venture champions often still emerge to play more unique roles that aid the faster success of new products’ development.

Venture champions are uniquely talented individuals that arise from their unique capabilities to accomplish activities that are not easily accomplished by others in ways that enhance the attainment of the best business results. Venture champions become venture champions because they possess unique insights and capabilities. They see what others are not seeing. Things or business concepts that have been abandoned by other market players are often taken up as the most valuable by the venture champions. Inversely, things that are treasured by the major market players are often disregarded by venture champions. In line with Kim and Mauborgne’s (2005) articulations, venture champions are blue-ocean thinkers. Blue-ocean thinkers seek to create and deliver value that the world has never seen before. It is such capabilities that make venture champions to be venture champions.

Venture Champions

Venture champions do things that the world has refused to do. They are risk-takers that venture into the worlds and markets that everyone is unprepared to enter. Venture champions are the unique players in the global market where every player is the winner. They are antidotes to the diseases of fear, hesitation and procrastination. Even if everyone is fearful, venture champions make bold decisions that eliminate fear and hesitation. Venture champions believe that it is in taking the highest risks that a business can be able to get the best and the highest rewards. They differentiate the innovation concept from those of rivals. Even if the innovation concept was bound to fail, it fails to fail because the unique attributes introduced by venture champions often unlock the best aspects of the product. In the world where no investor or anyone else is willing to commit the required resources, finances, talent and time to a particular unknown venture, venture champions often convince them to ignore even the more glaring risks.

Venture champions do the unimaginable and the unthinkable. Such insights echo Wright and Robbie’s (1998) elucidation that the venture may not appear lucrative to most players. But venture champions may still motivate investors to invest in even the most unattractive innovation ventures. When Elon Musk’s Tesla had run out of funds as a result of overspending an enormous amount of dollars on R&D (Research and Development), it was venture champions like Elon Musk that played the instrumental role of convincing new investors to consider investing their money in the electric car project that did not exhibit any well-known returns on investment.

The innovation of the electric car project was still in its embryonic state without clearly known returns on investments, accounting rate of returns, internal rate of returns, payback period and the discounted rate of returns. For all novel innovation projects, it is the lack of such accounting information and clarity on these financial returns that render the innovation world relatively unknown. Investors are obsessed with profits! Profits! Profits! and profits. Any insinuation of a potential investment venture is often immediately followed by the “What will I get?” question. The “What will I get?” question is the biggest impediment to innovation success. Before even a factory is constructed, one is already talking about the payback period and the accounting rate of returns. It is such thinking that prevents most businesses from venturing into the unknown world of innovation. In the unknown world of innovation, it is not the potential financial returns of the project that influence the investment decisions. Instead it is the potential unique value of the project.

When William George Armstrong ventured into the pioneer unknown world of developing the hydroelectric power generation plant, the potential financial returns of the project were less clear than the potential value. In terms of value, it was quite clear that the hydroelectricity project would offer enormous value when completed. In contrast, the expected financial returns were unclear because of the lack of adequate financial data for assessing the potential returns of the project (David Deeds, 2025). Investors that are prepared to lose and invest for nothing are often the most successful. Because they take financial gambles and risks that most investors are unwilling to take.

As Tesla was venturing into the wilderness of electric car production, Elon Musk as one of the venture champions was still able to convince investors to put their money in a project with costs of investment that may never be recouped. This is what differentiates venture champions from ordinary innovation leaders. For innovation leaders, transformational leaders are often smarter. But still venture champions are players in the innovation world that use a mix of all leadership styles and tactics to move the innovation from the unknown world of innovation into the relatively well-known world of innovation. Venture champions are smooth operators that become venture champions because they are able to convince the world to believe in even the most unbelievable things or products. However, venture capital problems are not only a challenge in Africa, but also in the other advanced financial markets like the UK capital markets.

 

Venture champions convince the world to believe in and adopt concepts that defy or debunk the existing conventional logic. Even if investors lose and fail to recoup their investment costs, venture champions are still good at handling such disappointments. In such situations, they are quick to make the losing investors recognize that failure is part of success. For venture champions, failure is recognized as part of a very important experiment. Failure is part of the learning curve that elicits new insights for success. While seeking to thrive in the global markets where there are no winners, venture champions motivate subordinates to generate and select the best-value creating solutions. But in that process, venture champions are not necessarily transformational leaders.

Though using some aspects of transformational leadership, venture champions are not transformational leaders. Venture champions can in certain cases become autocratic, democratic, transactional or even situational leaders. Despite their charisma for doing extraordinary things that achieve extraordinary value-creating results, they are not necessarily transformational leaders. Venture champions are akin to situational leaders that use almost Hersey–Blanchard’s (1969) “Situational Leadership Approach”. Instead of using just one leadership style for all situations, Hersey–Blanchard’s “Situational Leadership Approach” suggests the need for the diagnosis and application of the leadership approach that suits the dynamics of the unfolding situation. Depending on the circumstances, venture champions may tend to be transactional if any forms of rewards and exchanges are essential for driving the employees to achieve the best outcomes. If the situation requires a directional leadership approach or the use of an autocratic leadership approach, the participative or democratic leadership styles, venture champions may also tend to do as required. Drawing from Ljungkvist and Boers’s (2023) articulations in the Theory of Venture Capital for Family Business, venture champions do not believe in the efficacy of any leadership style.

Depending on the situation, they use any leadership style for as long as it enables them to attain the best innovation results. Venture champions are often transformational. Though not all the time, venture champions tend to be transformational because they influence an enterprise to venture into the unknown world. They convince investors to spend their money in the unknown investment world without the hope of recouping it. Venture champions convince subordinates to defy the existing logic and do things in ways that have never been done before. For that reason, the four aspects of transformational leadership that include idealized influence, inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation and individualized consideration are also used quite often by venture champions. Venture champions never achieve outstanding results that enable them to become venture champions unless they inherently possess some embodiment of idealized influence.

Regarding idealized influence, venture champions often set the best examples reflecting the highest standards as the practical ways of getting the subordinates to achieve the best. By leading using the best examples, venture champions prompt the ordinary employees to ask questions like—“if our leader can do and achieve it, what prevents us from doing so and also achieving the best results?” In order to thrive in the areas that other businesses have failed or have never imagined or known, venture champions use inspirational motivation. They use logic and reason to motivate the other equally influential leaders to see value that others are not seeing. Venture champions use effective communication to clearly outline the vision and direction that the business must pursue if it is to succeed in the terrains where others have failed or have often avoided. Even if money is also used to inspire, venture champions still engage in debates and brainstorming as part of the intellectual stimulation techniques (Rode, 2025). This provokes subordinates to think and believe in themselves to sail through all risks and achieve the best innovation results.

Venture champions challenge subordinates to come out of their comfort zones and question the status quo in order to achieve the best results. The status quo may be the existing state of industry performance or practices that need to be disrupted for the business to perform well. Or it could also be the existing state of the business performance and practices that need to be disrupted using self-disruption for the business to excel in the context of the constantly changing trends. To excel, venture champions encourage employees to always engage in self-evaluation and explore if what they are achieving are the best results. If not, it still challenges the ordinary employees to think and evaluate the best methods, resources, technologies and procedures that can be used for the innovation venture to achieve the best results. While using intellectual stimulation, venture champions use individualized consideration to diagnose and respond to all the individual needs of the employees. They evaluate every detail and respond to all the individual needs and demands of the employees. This makes the individual employees feel valued and recognized as an important part of the strategic value-creating resources of the innovation venture. It motivates the ordinary employees to think and explore the best ways of accomplishing the allocated tasks so as to achieve the best results (Greene et al., 1999).

Though venture champions use aspects of transformational leadership, venture champions are still venture champions and not necessarily transformational leaders. In one aspect, they are transformational, in another, they are autocratic just for the sake of getting hard things done in the way that the venture champion believes is essential for achieving the best results. In the quest to get extraordinary things done for the achievement of extraordinary results, venture champions never copy operational approaches from others. They never copy the ways of doing things from others. They never copy new product concepts from others. Instead they invent their own things and do things in their own ways for the purpose of achieving the best results that the world has never known. Even if the concept of venture champion just emerged in recent years when the notion of innovation became a buzzword in most business organisations, the notion of venture champion had been known as venture capitalists. Venture capitalists are specialist profit-seeking entrepreneurs that focus on identifying and promoting novel business concepts that would have performed well, but lacked adequate capital.

For that reason, the venture capitalists often do more than just the initiative of providing the required capital finance. They promote, market and encourage consumers to try the new products of the new innovation venture. Venture capitalists do everything possible to ensure the success of the innovation project. It’s from the commitment of venture capitalists that the concept of venture champion emerged. In the past, most venture champions often came from outside in the form of venture capitalists. But with time, new ventures also started producing internally groomed venture champions. This created the conditions and leadership capabilities for new ventures to grow and influence the attainment of the best results. Before venture capitalists became venture champions, they were actually known as venture capitalists. Though venture capitalists play instrumental roles in promoting the development, evolution and growth of a new venture, they are not commonly used in most African markets. Locally, most African investors have avoided becoming venture capitalists because of inadequate capital, high risks, the perceived unattractiveness of the African market and high economic and political uncertainties in some African markets. In effect, most of the players in the African venture capital market are often from the United States, Europe and a few from the Middle East. This affects the exposition of the emerging African businesses to different forms of funding. And it also implies that to thrive, the improvement of the effectiveness and attractiveness of the African venture capital market is one of the options. In addition to a range of different funding options that are currently being used, the African governments need to inter alia use:

• • Interest-Free or Low Interest Loans: Allocate more resources for interest-free or low interest loans for the emerging new businesses. Usage of low interest is better than the use of grants where monies are distributed once and for all without being recouped for distribution to other new players.

• • Engage the World Bank/EU: To grant specific financial support for Africa’s Entrepreneurial Development.

• • Multinational Corporations’ Contribution to Africa’s Entrepreneurial Development Fund: Given the increasing competition between the EU, China and the US for dominance of the African market, every mineral exploitation agreement signed must be accompanied by the designation of an additional percentage for the Africa’s Entrepreneurial Development Fund.

• • Multinational Corporations/Foreign Governments winning major infrastructure development projects or major mineral/natural exploitation contracts must offer additional percentages of payment/contribution as funds for Africa’s Entrepreneurial Development.

• • Payment/contributions to Africa’s Entrepreneurial Development Fund must be part of the mandatory corporate social responsibility for multinational firms in Africa just like it is the case for the prevention of ecological environmental damage.

Without the contribution by multinational corporations to Africa’s Entrepreneurial Development Fund, the ongoing exploitation of these minerals/natural resources will lead to the complete depletion of some natural resources. Some African countries assume that the natural resources will not get depleted. Great Britain once had oil, but where is it now? Natural resources’ depletion will leave Africa without alternative sources of income, industries and businesses to rely on for sustainable employment opportunities and incomes.

Further readings

 Adam, F. (2024). The evolution of venture capital: Trends, challenges and future directions. Entrepreneurship & Organization Management. https://www.hilarispublisher.com/open-access/the-evolution-of-venture-capital-trends-challenges-and-future-directions-111900.html

Bob Zider, B. (1998). How venture capital works: Before you can understand the industry, you must first separate myth from reality. Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/1998/11/how-venture-capital-works

Deeds, D. (2025). The role of the champion: Practical guidance for venture managers. New York: EIX Entrepreneur & Innovation Exchange. https://eiexchange.com/content/the-role-of-the-champion-practical-guidance-for-venture-managers

Greene, P. G., Brush, C. G., & Hart, M. M. (1999). The corporate venture champion: A resource-based approach to role and process. Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 23(3), 103–122. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/104225879902300307

Hersey, P., & Blanchard, K. H. (1969). Life cycle theory of leadership. Training and Development Journal, 23(5), 26–34.

Kim, W. C., & Mauborgne, R. (2005). Blue ocean strategy: From theory to practice. California Management Review, 47(1), 105–121.

Kamoga, J. (2025). Passenger traffic at Entebbe surges as Uganda’s aviation industry records strong recovery. Karibu Travel Magazine. https://www.kaributravel.co.ug/passenger-traffic-at-entebbe-surges-as-ugandas-aviation-industry-records-strong-recovery/

Ljungkvist, T., & Boers, B. (2023). A theory of venture capital family business: A governance trajectory. Journal of Family Business Management, 13(2), 503–522. https://doi.org/10.1108/JFBM-08-2021-0096

Niftyhontas, I. (2023). Journey through time: A comprehensive history of venture capital. Atlanta: Venture Capital. https://www.goingvc.com/post/journey-through-time-a-comprehensive-history-of-venture-capital

Prahalad, C. K. (2006). The fortune at the bottom of the pyramid: Eradicating poverty through profits. New Jersey: Pearson.

Rode, N. (2025). How Switzerland can go from research powerhouse to venture champion. Bern: Schroder Investment Management (Switzerland). https://www.schroders.com/en-ch/ch/professional/insights/how-switzerland-can-go-from-research-powerhouse-to-venture-champion/

Tidd, J., & Bessant, J. (2021). Managing innovation: Integrating technological, market and organizational change (7th ed.). Chichester: John Wiley & Sons.

Wasike, A. (2026). Passengers stranded at Kenya’s main airport as aviation strike enters 2nd day. https://www.aa.com.tr/en/africa/passengers-stranded-at-kenya-s-main-airport-as-aviation-strike-enters-2nd-day/3832422

Wright, M., & Robbie, K. (1998). Venture capital and private equity: A review and synthesis. Journal of Business Finance and Accounting, 25(5–6), 521–570.