Brightmore Capital’s Ndeye Thiaw on impact investing in West Africa
Ndeye Thiaw, managing partner and co-founder of Brightmore Capital explains how the investment management and advisory firm channels smart capital into businesses improving and democratising access to services and goods in francophone West Africa.
Ndeye Thiaw, managing partner and co-founder of Brightmore Capital begins by explaining how the investment management and advisory firm channels smart capital into businesses improving or democratising access to services and goods in francophone West Africa (02:14). Ndeye goes on to discuss how Brightmore Capital are serving the needs of the Francophone emerging middle class by investing in companies innovating to address gaps in the consumer market (04:18). 70% of the investment management firms pipeline is in Senegal and Cote d’Ivoire with the remaining 30% residing across nine other West African, francophone markets (05:15). She tells of the opportunities and challenges faced by francophone companies entering new markets in anglophone African countries (07:17).
Brightmore Capital places an even emphasis on both financial and social impact analysing the sector and company size among other factors to determine impact and financial return (15:32). Ndeye mentions two companies in the firm’s portfolio currently creating impact across the education and cold-chain sectors addressing multiple SDGs (18:15). She then finishes by expanding on how the firm embraces women led, and women owned businesses into their portfolio especially in the agribusiness space whereby women tend to dominate the sector (21:20).
