About This Fund
The Speedinvest MEA Fund is the first dedicated Middle East and Africa vehicle of Speedinvest GmbH, the Vienna-based pan-European venture capital firm with over €1.4 billion in assets under management. Formally launched in April 2026 and targeting €200 million (approximately $230M), the fund is anchored by three institutional cornerstone investors: Mubadala Investment Company (Abu Dhabi's sovereign wealth fund), Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), and EIB Global — the development finance arm of the European Investment Bank, which committed €40 million in December 2025. The fund formalizes Speedinvest's engagement with the region, which began informally more than a decade ago through opportunistic investments, and places it among a small group of European VC managers operating dedicated Africa and Middle East vehicles. The fund is led internally by partners Deepali Nangia and Rana Abdel Latif, with a planned local Africa office to complement Speedinvest's European hub infrastructure.
The fund targets early-to-growth-stage startups — primarily Series A and B equivalent rounds — with initial tickets of €2–5 million and reserves for follow-on. Approximately 50% of the portfolio is expected to be concentrated in fintech and embedded finance, reflecting both the region's structural financial-inclusion gap and Speedinvest's global strength in the sector; the balance covers AI, health, climate technology, consumer platforms, and digital infrastructure. Geographic deployment spans North Africa (Morocco, Egypt, Tunisia), Sub-Saharan Africa (Nigeria, Kenya, South Africa, Ghana, Côte d'Ivoire, Cameroon, DRC, Tanzania, Uganda), and the broader MENAPT corridor covering the Middle East, North Africa, Pakistan, and Turkey. The fund carries a formal gender mandate: a minimum of 30% of capital is allocated to companies that support women as founders, employees, or consumers.
Speedinvest has made at least 13 Africa and Middle East investments prior to the launch of the dedicated MEA Fund, building a pre-existing regional portfolio that informed the fund's sector thesis and deal sourcing model. Notable existing regional investments include Moove (asset-backed vehicle financing, Nigeria), FairMoney (digital lending and neobanking, Nigeria), Khazna (financial super-app, Egypt), Abhi (earned wage access, Pakistan), Flow48 (revenue-based financing, UAE/MENA), Pemo (corporate spend management, UAE), and Leta (last-mile logistics, Kenya). The broader Speedinvest platform, which has backed more than 300 companies across 15+ years, gives the MEA fund access to portfolio synergies, a network of more than 40 investment professionals organized by sector, and in-house operational expertise in areas including fintech regulation, growth marketing, and cross-border commercial development.