A new index wants to prepare African startups for London IPOs

In January, a group of African investors and executives, including Tomi Davies, the founding president of the African Business Angel Network (ABAN), and Babs Ogundeyi, CEO of Nigerian neobank Kuda, smiled for pictures at the London Stock Exchange to launch the Africa Tech 50 Index (AT50), a quarterly, rules-based benchmark measuring how prepared African startups are for public listings.

The AT50 assesses companies using a six-pillar framework covering valuation momentum, revenue strength, liquidity, corporate governance maturity, expansion strategy, and broader market signals. 

“The goal is to make Africa’s most scaled private companies visible through a framework global capital can see, trust, and price,” said Karima El Hakim, a partner at Plug and Play and a member of the AT50 Governance Council. 

An independent governance council oversees the index to ensure discipline and uniform application of its rules. “It’s exciting because it gives a lot of awareness to African companies,” said Ogundeyi, adding that African startups could potentially list on the London bourse. 

The search for exit pathways in African tech has now set eyes on the London Stock Exchange, after a decade in which billions of dollars from U.S. and European development finance institutions and venture capital firms poured into African tech, with few comparable exits.

Since 2019, over 20 African startups, including MNT-Halan, Flutterwave, Wave, and M-KOPA, have raised mega rounds and are now approaching a decade in operation without listing publicly. A benchmark such as the AT50 could help bridge that gap, giving mature startups greater visibility with later-stage investors and creating clearer pathways to growth capital or eventual exits.

“If a company comes in on the AT50, they are potentially on the pathway to being able to raise capital on the private market of the London Stock Exchange,” said Sir John Lazar, the president of the Royal Academy of Engineering. “What we want is an IPO in London of an African tech company.”

For this week’s Ask an Investor, I spoke to Gbite Oduneye, who chairs the AT50, via email to understand why now is a good time for the index, what African startups have missed when exiting globally, how the index requires disclosures, the business model behind the index, and what this could change for African tech. 

This interview has been edited for length and clarity. 

You’ve described AT50 as market infrastructure, not hype. What specific market failure are you correcting?

Africa does not have a capital shortage. It has a capital translation gap. Private companies scaled. Public markets did not receive a structured, comparable pipeline. AT50 builds the missing institutional layer between private scale and public capital.

African tech companies have raised billions privately. Why do you think it hasn’t translated into public-market pathways?

Private markets priced momentum. Public markets’ price discipline. Growth was funded. Governance maturity was not institutionalised early enough. AT50 introduces that discipline before listing, not after.

What changed in the last 24 months that made this index necessary now?

The reset exposed the difference between narrative and durability. Capital became selective. Exchanges became proactive. Secondary liquidity became structural. Infrastructure had to catch up with maturity.

What is the biggest illusion in African private tech valuations today?

Valuation is negotiated. Readiness is audited. That gap explains much of the friction.

Governance maturity is one of your pillars. How do you measure it?

The AT50 measures this through observable institutional signals. The first is board structure and independence, auditing readiness and reporting cadence, committee architecture, the startup’s regulatory posture, and its disclosure behaviour. Governance is not opinion. It is structure.

Will AT50 require companies to disclose metrics that they previously kept private?

We do not compel disclosure, but we reward verifiable transparency. Signal strength increases with disclosure discipline.

What level of financial transparency should African late-stage companies realistically be prepared for today?

Audit-grade reporting. Consistent metrics. Board-level oversight. Institutional cadence. Public markets are not allergic to growth. They are allergic to opacity.

You referenced credible liquidity pathways. What does ‘credible’ mean in the AT50 context?

Credible means structured and defensible. IPO readiness. Dual listing feasibility. Regulated secondary liquidity. Strategic exits with institutional governance. Not aspiration. Preparation.

Are you envisioning IPOs in London or dual listings, or domestic exchanges? 

Venue is secondary. Standards are primary. Africa’s growth story must be priced locally but recognised globally. Stronger domestic listings aligned to international comparability create long-term depth.

Is there enough depth in African public markets to absorb scaled tech listings today?

Depth grows with supply quality. Markets do not deepen from sentiment. They deepen from repeatable issuer readiness.

What would have to change structurally for Lagos, Nairobi, or Johannesburg to host meaningful tech IPOs?

Issuer preparation must begin earlier. Listing rules must accommodate growth companies. Analyst coverage and liquidity support must improve. Governance enforcement must be consistent. Preparation cannot begin at filing. It must begin years earlier.

International investors often price Africa with a structural risk premium. Can an index realistically reduce that?

An index does not eliminate risk. It reduces uncertainty. Uncertainty is what inflates pricing friction. Repeated comparability reduces uncertainty over time. AT50 is governed under the IOSCO-aligned benchmark discipline. That matters because global allocators understand those standards.

How do you compare fintech in Nigeria to SaaS in Egypt to mobility in Kenya within one index?

We do not compare sectors. We compare readiness architecture. Revenue strength, governance maturity, liquidity visibility, strategic expansion, valuation momentum, and market signal. Sector nuance is contextualised, not flattened.

What is the long-term business model behind Indexa Exchange Group?

Indexa Exchange Group operates as a benchmark infrastructure platform. Our revenue streams include institutional subscriptions, index licensing, and exchange and capital markets partnerships. Commercial scaling follows institutional credibility.

What revenue threshold makes a company realistically IPO-ready in this environment?

There is no magic number. IPO readiness is the convergence of durable revenue, governance maturity, audit discipline, and market timing. Revenue without structure does not list.

What mistakes did previous African tech listings make?

Premature listing. Inconsistent reporting. Insufficient investor education. Overvaluation relative to public appetite. Public markets punish the volatility of narrative.

If the AT50 works, what changes five years from now?

Listings become normalised. Exchanges engage earlier. Companies prepare earlier.

Capital prices with greater confidence. African tech transitions from episodic listings to repeatable public pathways.