# Top 25 Retail Startup Investors in South Africa in June 2026 ## Flourish Ventures - Type: VC Fund - Location: Redwood City, California, United States - Relevant deals: 3 - Stages: Series A, Seed, Series B - Focus: FinTech, Financial Services, Finance We are an early-stage global venture capital firm investing in fintech founders. ## TLcom Capital Partners - Type: VC Fund - Location: London, England, United Kingdom - Relevant deals: 3 - Stages: Series A, Seed - Focus: Software, Mobile, Information Technology TLcom Capital, is an Africa focused tech VC, with offices in Lagos, Nairobi and London. TLcom had been investing since 1999 in Tech, Media, Mobil and Internet companies across Europe, US and Africa, which is the exclusive focus of its most recent TLcom TIDE Africa funds. TLcom manages total commitments of approximately 300 million USD in thesesectors via a series of dedicated investment vehicles. Our investment strategy is to identify, back and assist world class entrepreneurs and management teams with disruptive technologies and business models, compelling intellectual property and deep market knowledge. We primarily target companies focused on Africa as a prime market, in the following investment themes: Access to Data Service; Financial Services; eCommerce; B2C applications (including but not limited to: health, education, energy, media and entertainment); and Software solutions to corporates and SMEs. ## Vinny Lingham - Type: Angel - Location: San Francisco Bay Area, California, United States - Relevant deals: 2 - Stages: Seed, Angel - Focus: Blockchain, Internet, Software Vinny Lingham is the Co-Founder and CEO of Rumi.ai(Waitroom). He previously worked at YPO as a Member. Vinny Lingham attended Harvard Business School Executive Education. ## Savannah Fund - Type: VC Fund - Location: Nairobi, Nairobi Area, Kenya - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Seed, Series A, Pre-Seed - Focus: E-Commerce, FinTech, Software Savannah Fund is a seed capital fund specializing in US$25,000-US$500,000 investments in early stage high growth technology (web and mobile) startups in sub-Saharan Africa. Initially focused on East Africa, the fund aims to bridge the early stage/angel and venture capital investment gap that currently exists in Africa. The Fund expects toachieve this objective by combining capital with mentor networks both in the region and from Silicon Valley via an accelerator program and a follow-on independent seed fund.The fund is managed by an experienced and technology savvy team that have founded companies or are actively involved in angel investing or having run successful accelerator programs in past but also understand the unique Subsaharan African environment. They are backed and supported by both local, regional and international networks of angels,venture capitalists whose expertise we can draw on to help startups succeed and scale to fully fledged regional or global companies.They believe in the potential for Africa to become a global technology innovator by creating sustainable for profit companies that create jobs and make an impact. ## Leonard Stiegeler - Type: Angel - Location: Lagos, Lagos, Nigeria - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Seed, Angel, Pre-Seed - Focus: FinTech, Financial Services, B2B Leonard Stiegeler is an entrepreneur & investor in projects unlocking potential. Educated in Europe, he founded companies across EMEA and is now investing globally. He is passionate to develop opportunities with & for others. The companies he co-founded include Jumia, now a leading eCommerce company in Africa and Pulse, now a leading mediacompany in Africa. His investments include Paystack, Flutterwave, Scalable Capital, Conversion and many more. Dedicated to creating trusted connections to enable potential, he founded two networks - Africa Collective, focused on elevating the continent's role globally, and Counder, focused on enabling visionary leaders embrace emerging trends & regions collectively. ## Ignition Partners - Type: VC Fund - Location: Los Altos, California, United States - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Series B, Series A, Series C - Focus: Software, Enterprise Software, SaaS Ignition is a venture capital firm dedicated to helping the best entrepreneurs seize opportunity. With over $2B under management, Ignition invests in emerging and future leaders in enterprise software.Ignition brings together an unparalleled combination of domain focus, technical expertise, and global operational experience. Ignition'spartners are proven business leaders who have built some of the world's most successful businesses of the last two decades, including Microsoft Windows and Office, McCaw Cellular Communications, AT&T Wireless and Starbucks.Ignition helps entrepreneurs by turning their early idea into a business, to hiring the right team, providing the right industry and functional insight and connections, to growing the business strategically, globally, financially, to realizing the best ultimate outcome, Ignition is ready to go the distance. ## Icon Ventures - Type: VC Fund - Location: Palo Alto, California, United States - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Series C, Series B, Series D - Focus: Software, Information Technology, Enterprise Software The road to success is long. Re-defining an industry requires passion, perseverance, and true grit. At Icon Ventures, we help entrepreneurs with true grit navigate the journey to become icons of tomorrow. ## Llew Claasen - Type: Angel - Location: Cape Town, NA - South Africa, South Africa - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Seed, Series A - Focus: Logistics, Retail, Health Care Llew is the Managing Partner of Newtown Partners, an early-stage venture capital firm that actively invests in emerging, disruptive technology startup businesses. Founded and run by internationally successful entrepreneurs, Vinny Lingham and Llew Claasen, Newtown Partners has an entrepreneurial focus that goes beyond investment. The team operatesout of offices in Cape Town, South Africa and Sunnyvale, California (Silicon Valley).Llew is a go-to-market strategist with almost two decades of senior management experience in cryptoassets (since 2012), digital product management and digital marketing.He co-founded Clicks2customers (rebranded to www.nmpidigital.com) with Vinny Lingham, now a global digital marketing agency with annual billings in excess of $100 million and Synthasite (rebranded to www.yola.com).Llew is also the former Executive Director of the Bitcoin Foundation, the original, the oldest and the largest Bitcoin advocacy organization globally, headquartered in San Francisco, U.S.Llew has a Masters degree in the Management of Technology & Innovation and lives in Cape Town, South Africa. ## Oliver Merkel - Type: Angel - Location: Berlin, Berlin, Germany - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Seed, Angel, Pre-Seed - Focus: Fashion, Retail, Banking Oliver Merkel is the Co-Founder of Flink Food. ## Crossfin Technology - Type: VC Fund - Location: Cape Town, NA - South Africa, South Africa - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Series A, Private Equity - Focus: Payments, Financial Services, Software Crossfin invests in FINTECH solutions to enable growth for economies in Africa and beyond. Crossfin invests in high growth and established cash generative businesses, offering investors a blended exposure to technology investments in Fintech. ## Garage Capital - Type: VC Fund - Location: Waterloo, Ontario, Canada - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Seed, Series A, Pre-Seed - Focus: Software, Information Technology, Artificial Intelligence Built by founders, for founders. Garage Capital helps best-in-class companies jump from garage to growth. ## Tushar Ahluwalia - Type: Angel - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Seed, Pre-Seed, Angel - Focus: Retail, InsurTech, Insurance Tushar Ahluwalia is based out of Germany and is the CEO and Co-Founder of GeneralMind. Tushar previously worked at Razor Group as a Co-CEO and Co-Founder. Tushar Ahluwalia attended London Business School. ## CRE Venture Capital - Type: VC Fund - Location: New York, New York, United States - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Seed, Series A, Pre-Seed - Focus: Financial Services, FinTech, Software Founded in 2015, CRE Venture Capital invests in early stage tech companies that are levered to Africa. CRE is headquartered in the New York metro area, with a regional office in Lagos, Nigeria. ## Presight Capital - Type: VC Fund - Location: Los Angeles, California, United States - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Seed, Series A, Series B - Focus: Biotechnology, Health Care, Financial Services A simple static landing page for Presight Capital. ## Newtown Partners - Type: VC Fund - Location: Cape Town, NA - South Africa, South Africa - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Seed, Series A - Focus: Logistics, Health Care, Pharmaceutical Newtown Partners is a venture capital firm that actively invests in emerging, disruptive technology startups. ## Michael Jordaan - Type: Angel - Location: Stellenbosch, NA - South Africa, South Africa - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Seed, Series A - Focus: SaaS, EBooks, EdTech Michael Jordaan, the former banker now heads up a private investment company, Montegray Capital and lends a strategic-hand to various businesses, including as Chairman of Wines of South Africa (WoSA), Chairman of consumer data buro, Compuscan and as Director on the JSE. Michael also actively invests as a partner in AngelHub Ventures, a SouthAfrican based Venture Capital Fund.In 2014 he co-founded a coding apprenticeship program, ProjectcodeX, to grow highly skilled software developers to fuel the digital economy. ## Polo Leteka - Type: Angel - Location: Johannesburg, NA - South Africa, South Africa - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Seed, Series A, Series B - Focus: Retail, Internet, Logistics Polo Leteka is the Founder and Chairman of IDF Capital SA. She previously worked at Standard Bank of South Africa. Polo Leteka attended the University of South Africa/Universiteit van Suid-Afrika. ## Vumela Fund - Type: VC Fund - Location: Hyde Park, Newtownabbey, United Kingdom - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Seed, Debt Financing - Focus: Education, Software, E-Commerce Vumela was established in 2009 by FNB Business Banking and Edge Growth. The objective was to create an innovative model for the development of a sustainable and a financially and operationally independent investment business which invests in high growth small, medium and micro size enterprises with good economic and impact returns.Vumela wascapitalised in 2010. Within the first four years, we’d invested R90 million into eight high growth SMEs, and created a total of 400 jobs. They launched their second fund in 2015, after a further investment of R100 million from FirstRand and R127 million from the Jobs Fund. Within the first year of launching this second fund, we’ve committed R43 million to five investments that are expected to create over 1800 new jobs.The first fund of its kind in South Africa, Vumela’s main goals are to invest in and develop entrepreneurial companies in order to help alleviate poverty in South Africa by creating jobs, and to generate a return for its beneficiaries: the Shalamuka Foundation and the FirstRand Group. ## FJ Labs - Type: VC Fund - Location: New York, New York, United States - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Seed, Series A, Series B - Focus: Software, E-Commerce, Financial Services FJ Labs is a stage-agnostic investment firm that focuses on marketplaces and consumer facing startups. ## Vikram Chopra - Type: Angel - Location: Gurgaon, Haryana, India - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Seed, Series B - Focus: Internet, Fashion, Training Vikram Chopra is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of CARS24. He is a former Co-FOunder of FabFurnish and Investment Analyst of Sequoia Capital and was Business Analyst at McKinsey & Company.Mr. Chopra received a BTech and MTech in Engineering at Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, and earned an MBA in Finance at the Universityof Pennsylvania - The Wharton School. ## Mato Perić - Type: Angel - Location: London, England, United Kingdom - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Seed, Series A, Pre-Seed - Focus: Financial Services, FinTech, E-Commerce Mato invests in technology companies globally. His portfolio companies have raised over US$ 5 billion in capital, employ >15,000 people and have operations in 35 countries across six continents. ## Daniel Funk - Type: Angel - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Seed - Focus: Retail, Fashion Daniel Funk ## Jean-Paul Zammitt - Type: Angel - Location: London, England, United Kingdom - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Seed - Focus: Retail, Fashion Jean-Paul Zammitt ## Proparco - Type: VC Fund - Location: Paris, Ile-de-France, France - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Debt Financing, Seed - Focus: Financial Services, Finance, Energy Proparco is devoted to private sector funding in the sustainable development sector. ## Partech - Type: VC Fund - Location: Paris, Ile-de-France, France - Relevant deals: 1 - Stages: Series A, Seed, Series B - Focus: Software, E-Commerce, SaaS Partech is a global venture capital firm with offices in San Francisco, Paris, Berlin and Dakar. Partech invests in Internet and information technology startups at seed, venture and growth stages.