According to Nhleko, capital funding looks at the opportunities, but over and above this, it looks at the environment from a regulatory perspective, in terms of the flow of funds in-and-out – how easy it is and so on.
Dusek stated it would ease the flow of capital to the continent if exchange control rules were not so complex and difficult to navigate. “It’s very off-putting, from a foreign perspective, to think about ‘you’re going to control where my money can come in and go out’. It’s difficult to wrap your head around it and the rules are complicated.
“Last year, we saw a total of $4 billion invested in Africa, up from $1.3 billion the year before. The comparable amount being invested into the US for the same year was $134 billion, so we have a very long way to go. Even Latin America was at about $15 billion last year. “It [IP registration] is so complex and makes it so expensive for start-ups to register and protect their IP. They then start to look at structures outside the South African jurisdiction to try and make sure they can scale and go global.
Nhleko pointed to smaller countries like Rwanda, Swaziland [eSwatini] and Botswana as being possible contenders. “I think they should be leading the charge of creating the Delaware kind of environment. To illustrate her point, Dusek explained that her company has an investment in eSwatini, adding that it’s difficult to do business there.