CardinalStone Capital Advisers secures $76 million for West Africa growth fund

CardinalStone Capital Advisers (CCA) has announced a $76 million first close for its CCA Growth Fund II. The fund is designed to provide growth capital to small and medium-sized businesses across West Africa, specifically targeting companies in Nigeria, Ghana, Côte d’Ivoire, and Senegal.

The fund’s investor base includes development-finance institutions such as the International Finance Corporation (IFC) and British International Investment (BII), alongside Nigerian pension managers including Stanbic IBTC Pension Managers, Access ARM Pensions, and FCMB Pensions.

In other regional developments, South African AI startups have announced new milestones. Dataseka has launched a suite of AI data analysis products for the financial advisory and wealth management sectors. Additionally, South African-founded Verascient raised $1.2 million in its initial funding round to expand its enterprise AI offerings and engineering team.