Franc was established in 2018 by Sebastian Patel and Thomas Brennan. The startup is a robot-advisor largely focused on helping people who are new to equity funds in the market.

The startup is currently operating in South Africa. It is reported that another South African fintech startup AuthGate is seeking to raise capital. It is a self-funded startup and is preparing to raise its first capital, media reports said.

Fintech is rapidly evolving in the country and more international investors are considering to put their money into new startups. It appears that Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa have attracted $3.9 billion venture capital deals during the period between 2012 and 2019, media reports said.

In fact, a report titled Venture Capital in Africa: Mapping Africa’s start-up investment landscape noted that 2019 was the best year for venture capital investments in Africa since 2014. In this context, AVCA’s board Chair, ‘Tokunboh Ishmael, told the media, “Africa’s VC industry continues to grow from strength to strength and we expect 2020 to be another strong year despite global macroeconomic headwinds. The continent’s VC ecosystem showcases the best of African innovation and entrepreneurship, which has the potential to be a key source of solutions to Africa’s intractable problems and a gamechanger for the continent’s development trajectory. AVCA remains committed to supporting the VC industry by charting its growth and providing authoritative research on the asset’s fundraising, deal, and exit activities.”

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Divyesh Vithlani, managing director at Accenture and head of financial services in the Asean region, told the media that, “As we’ve seen in other parts of the world, fundraising is shifting to support the scaling up of challenger and collaborative fintech, which will cause lumpiness in some rounds as the market becomes more mature.” 

Angel and seed funding largely focused on raising early stage capital for startups increased 66 percent to $442 million. That said, the number of fintech deals almost remained stable in the first nine months of 2018. 

Investments in payment startups represent 34 percent of fundraising in Singapore fintech startups. Meanwhile, the lending segment accounted for 20 percent and insurtechs covered 17 percent of the fintech investment in Singapore. 

This year, the number of payment deals doubled to $251 million from $117.5 million. It has made the biggest contribution to the sector this year, according to Accenture report. 

Accenture has closely worked with the Monetary Authority of Singapore to study fintech investment, global venture finance data and analytics. The investment data was supported with insights from 2015 through the first nine months of 2019.

A previous Accenture report showed that fintech investments in Singapore quadrupled to $453 million in the first half of 2019, compared to $118 million in the same period last year. 

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