Pan-African contrarian investor P1 Ventures reaches $25M first close for its second fund
Summary
Hajjar cited Egypt-born Instabug and BioNTech-subsidiary InstaDeep as examples of such African-founded software and AI businesses with customers in the U.S., Europe and globally.P1 Ventures, which has offices in Lagos and Cairo, recently began an Entrepreneur In Residence program, under which Nkoloso.ai received funding. Both partners utilize their skills and expertise as past operators to manage this venture studio, which plans to incubate four more startups in the next four years headed by founders capable of achieving product-market fit and scaling the product.During the interview, Hajjar proudly highlights his firms contrarian approach to VC investment in Africa. It is evident that P1 Ventures likely provided small checks during subsequent stages of expansion for companies such as Yassir and Egyptian fintech MoneyFellows, owing to the limited size of its first capital. This value is primarily attributed to the partners multistage, multisector expertise and extensive networks across the U.S., Europe, and Asia.Im the first Mauritanian to launch a fund; as you can appreciate, this comes with a deep sense of meaning. On the other hand, Hajjar, a Stanford MBA graduate and engineer, held roles in Google, Zum, and Areva.Along with the partners, P1s advisory group also consists of investors and operators, including Emil Michael, the former chief business officer of Uber, and Bernard Dalle, a founding team member of London-based Index Ventures.