A new specialist venture fund, First Circle Capital, is targeting $30 million to invest in what it calls one of the most “underserved but strategically vital” segments of Africa’s tech scene: pre-seed and seed-stage fintech.
With offices in Uganda and Casablanca, the fund is making a concentrated bet on the continent’s booming financial technology sector.
The investment thesis is simple: Africa’s traditional banking sector, while one of the most profitable globally, has been notoriously slow to adapt to the continent’s dynamic, fast-growing, and digitally-native consumer base. This inertia has created a massive market gap that fintech startups are aggressively filling.
First Circle is citing a 2023 report from BCG and QED Investors to back its play, which projects that Africa’s fintech revenues will grow 13-fold by 2030—the fastest pace of any region in the world.
The Strategy: Go Deep, Not Wide
To capture this opportunity, First Circle is avoiding the broad, multi-sector “spray and pray” approach. Instead, it’s using a “highly thematic, sector-led” strategy. This means the fund is only focused on fintech, allowing it to build deep sector knowledge and network access.
The fund is led by a team with serious credentials. Founder Selma Ribica is a former M-Pesa executive and fintech investor whose personal angel portfolio reportedly delivered a 33x multiple on invested capital (MOIC). That portfolio includes Qonto, the French fintech valued at $5 billion, and Expensya, a Tunisian startup that was acquired by Medius.
She is joined by co-founder Agnes Aistleitner Kisuule, a Uganda-based emerging markets entrepreneur. The core team also includes three other professionals with experience investing and operating in tech ecosystems across Africa, Europe, and Southeast Asia.
The plan is to build a concentrated portfolio of just 24 companies, and then concentrate follow-on capital around its “high-conviction bets.”
More Than Just a Check
First Circle claims its key differentiator is a structured, hands-on model designed to get its portfolio companies “Series A ready.”
For pre-seed and seed-stage founders, this means the fund gets directly involved in operational support often unavailable at such an early stage. The firm says it works closely with its startups on business development, investor readiness, go-to-market strategy, data structuring, and operational discipline. The stated goal is to build a stronger pipeline of companies that are prepared for major institutional follow-on rounds, not just for First Circle, but for the wider investor ecosystem.
The fund isn’t starting from zero. It has already made 15 investments across eight African markets. According to the firm, 30% of these companies are led or co-founded by women, and 50% are already operating in multiple countries.
The Backers
The fund’s specialist approach has attracted significant institutional backing.
In 2025, the International Finance Corporation (IFC) made a $6 million commitment. Notably, $2 million of that capital comes from the Women Entrepreneurs Finance Initiative (We-Fi), a clear validation of the fund’s female leadership and stated focus on gender equity.
The fund has also received approval for an additional $3 million from DGGF.
Other institutional backers include FSD Africa, MSMEDA, and the Axian Group. A number of prominent tech entrepreneurs and angel investors have also joined the cap table, including Jens Hilgers, Tim Schumacher, Peter Steinberger, and Steve Anavi.
