As a recently christensed âsoulless profit seeking corporate baddieâ who is fond of private equity, I had to explain to Abraham Augustine (
@signorabraham ) of Techcabal what I keep hammering about African VC moving closer to PE than the Silicon Valley form of paramutual gambling which Charlie Munger described in his talks with great disdain.
@rossbaird the founder of Village Capital was the first person after Charlie Munger I read who made a very good case against VC in emerging markets in his bestselling book Innovation Blindspots. Village Capital doesnât play the power law game where many lose and a few win. Over 80% of those they back are successful and thriving. It is because they understand that supporting innovation is not an investment game.
Full disclosure, I am on the advisory board of the IBM and Village Capital Hyperprotect accelerator. Working closely with them has made me see the benefits of their approach.
We can keep pretending to be another Silicon Valley or we layer successful ventures and create sustainable ecosystems. I believe that PE does that in Africa but VC only pays lip service to it.
Anyway, I will be talking less on this. Let the results show what works best. I am betting more on PE and Corporate Venture Capital in Africa. You canât compound from gambling and surfing, you must build and sustain.