During a long holiday weekend in the States, international startups took advantage of the domestic attention lapse and ended November with strong numbers.
Through October, startups outside the US had raised only 27% of total VC dollars in 23.5% of venture rounds recorded in CrunchBase.
In November, that split evened considerably to over 37% of total investment dollars for startups based abroad. The ratio is the most even for a single month in 2014, both in the total amount and number of rounds – over 25.5%.
US startups managed to raise over $3B this month, but that monthly total is the lowest since February. The rest of the world finished November with $1.8B in venture investing- the most since July, and second-highest total of 2014. As seen below, November’s investment dollars were also widely dispersed geographically.
A large part of this anomalous month is of course due to Flipkart’s enormous appetite for cash. Their $600M Series H round brings their total 2014 fundraising to a ridiculous $1.8B+. The latest round, valuing the company at over $10B, was financed mainly by existing investors DST Global, Naspers and Tiger Global.
Of the 25 venture rounds allotted to India this month, a majority were of the growth variety. Sequoia’s investment in Zomato was the second largest round at $60M for the restaurant discovery service. Vy Capital and Info Edge co-invested in the Series H round. New Delhi real estate advisor PropTiger also raised $30M in a first for News Corp in the country, while Gurgaon payments platform MobiKwik was rumored to raise their own $30M Series B.
Tiger Global complemented their Flipkart deal with a second big e-commerce bet in the form of a $10M round for Unicommerce eSolutions. That deal marked their 29th venture deal in India and 15th this year according to CrunchBase.
While the pace and size of venture deals in India may not be a surprise, a number of recent deals across Africa this month were equally remarkable. Jumia, Africa’s e-commerce equivalent of Flipkart (or Amazon) closed a €120M Series C this month from existing investors. The Rocket Internet-backed company is based in Cairo and Lagos and operates across nine countries in Africa.
In Cape Town, shoe retailer Tekkie Town raised $65M in growth capital from Actis along with Magnetic Software’s angel round earlier this month. The two investments equal a dozen in South Africa to date.
Finally, in a sign of significant confidence in Nigeria’s growing economy, Carlyle Group invested $147M in Lagos-based commercial lender Diamond Bank.
So far in 2014, African VC investments have totalled $582M over 42 rounds, compared to just $120M over 28 rounds in 2013. Last time we checked in, cities like Lagos and Nairobi were emerging as regional tech hubs. And as we predicted, they’ve already combined to secure 18 investments this year – more than all of South Africa.
As e-commerce startups like Jumia and Konga ($65M raised in 2014) grow, expect to see more regional seed investors sprout up alongside Africa’s most active funds like The Savannah Fund and 88mph. Eventually, the institutional money will come to invest heavily in Africa’s top transformative e-commerce platforms, much like what we’re seeing now in India.
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Image via Flickr user Peter-Ashley Jackson.
