Deal Origination
  • Deal Sourcing
  • Deal Facilitation
  • Buy-side Advisory
Corporate Advisory
  • Investment Appraisal and Due Diligence
  • Valuations
  • Investment Structuring
  • Management Advisory
  • Tailored Business Development
Deal Placement
  • Investment Promotion
  • Growth Capital Fundraising
  • Sell-side Advisory

about us

ACI is an independent corporate advisory boutique with an entrepreneurial approach to African M&A

ACI was established to capitalise and contribute on the emergence of the African consumer class driven by strong economic growth, demographic trends and urbanisation. Our team is made up of industry professionals who understand local markets and have backgrounds in private equity, corporate finance, M&A, strategic advisory and portfolio management.

We are headquartered in London and have offices in Johannesburg and Cape Town. ACI’s operations are supported by an international network of sector-specific advisors and consultants. ACI, in partnership with Invest Africa (IA), is in direct contact with, or is one degree of separation from, key decision makers in both the private and public sector across the continent.

view our track record

sector focus

Sector agnostic but with a focus on the sectors driving the new African economy

consumer

market context

Household consumption is expected to grow at 3.8% a year to 2025 reaching $2.1trn

Opportunity

A fast-growing consumer class with an immediate demand for a wide variety of locally manufactured and international goods

POWER & ENERGY

market context

$60bn-$90bn annual investment required to address Africa’s power supply shortfall

Opportunity

Falling technology costs, resource abundance, maturing governments and support of DFIs driving roll out of new power infrastructure

FINANCIAL SERVICES

market context

Only 22% of companies in Africa have a loan or line of credit vs 43% in other emerging markets

Opportunity

Commoditise banking technology to open loan and insurance products to the newly “banked” African consumer

TMT

market context

Number of mobile subscriptions across Africa reached 1 billion in 2016

Opportunity

Technology is the tip of the arrow for growth in Financial Services, Education, Healthcare and more

SERVICES

market context

42% of Africa’s population currently live in urban areas. That figure will be 62% by 2050

Opportunity

Gradual maturing of specific countries through intellectual and financial capital will create developed market style ‘service economies’

HEALTHCARE

market context

Africa has 15% of the worlds population and less than 5% of its medical facilities

Opportunity

Capture outbound medical tourism market and complement public sector services with high quality private offering

  • Africa contains 60% of the world’s unutilized but potentially available cropland, as well as the world’s largest reserves of vanadium, diamonds and gold

  • Half of Africa’s population is under 25 years old, making it the youngest population; fastest growing middle class with the world’s fastest urbanizing region

  • Africa is skipping traditional technology: Africa has the fastest take up of ‘mobile money’

  • The continent has 400 companies with revenue of more than $1 billion per year, and these companies are growing faster, and are more profitable in general than their global peers

  • FDI into SSA increased from c. $5bn in 2000 to c. $50bn in 2013 to $57bn in 2016

  • It is estimated that the continent could double its manufacturing output in just ten years, thereby boosting GDP and productivity growth

Robert Hersov

Cape Town

Rob is the founder and a Director of ACI

  • He also serves as Advisor to the Chairman of Vistajet and is Chairman of Adoreum Partners
  • Previously Executive Director of Enic plc, a holding company listed on the LSE that invested primarily in the sports and media sectors
  • Prior to this, Rob was an Executive Director of Richemont, the luxury goods and media group listed on the SWX and has held senior roles at Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs
  • Holds a B.B.S. from the University of Cape Town and an MBA from Harvard Business School

Gianpaolo Pera

London

Gianpaolo is the Chief Executive Officer and a co-founder of ACI

  • Prior to founding ACI, Gianpaolo was an Associate Director at Marwyn Investment Management, a specialist investment firm with over USD1.5bn of investments and a 9 year track record of 25% IRR across its portfolio
  • He started his career at PriceWaterHouseCoopers (PwC) in the Corporate Finance team specializing in real estate and financial services and completed over 15 transactions across a broad range of industries
  • Gianpaolo is a Chartered Accountant and Chartered Financial Analyst
  • Holds a MSc in Finance from the London School of Economics and BA (Hons) in International Finance & Accounting from Regents Business School London

Gareth Thomas

London

Gareth is the Chief Financial Officer & Compliance Officer at ACI and Invest Africa

  • Prior to joining ACI, Gareth was a Portfolio Finance Director at Marwyn, a specialist investment firm with over USD1.5bn of investments and a 9 year track record of 25% IRR across its portfolio
  • Previously Gareth headed up the Fund Accounting team at Hermes Fund Managers, a multi-asset manager with over GBP30 billion of AUM and a stewardship arm advising on £264 billion of assets, before moving to the EMEA Funds division at BlackRock Asset Management
  • Started his career at PriceWaterHouseCoopers (PwC)
  • Gareth is a Chartered Accountant

© African Capital Investments Limited authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (“FCA”), with a FCA registration number 706522
ACI is an authorised Financial Services Provider (“FSP”) in South Africa and is regulated by the Financial Services Board (“FSB”), with FSP number 47979

TERMS OF USE


Your authority to use this website

By using this website, you are representing to us that you have the power and authority to accept these Terms of Use and to enter into this agreement with us, that you are capable of assuming and do assume any risks related to the use of this website and its content, and that you understand and accept the terms, conditions and risks relating to their use. If you are dissatisfied with this website or its content, your sole and exclusive remedy is to stop using it. African Capital Investments Limited website is not directed to any person in any jurisdiction where by reason of that person’s nationality, residence or otherwise, the publication or availability of the website is prohibited or restricted for whatever reason. Persons in respect of whom such prohibitions apply must not access this website

No Offer

Nothing on this website should be construed as a solicitation or offer, or recommendation, to provide investment services or advice to acquire or dispose of any investment or to engage in any other transaction.

Intellectual Property Rights and Disclaimers

African Capital Investment Limited’s grants to you a limited non-exclusive, non- transferable license to view, copy and print the material on this website (other than the design or layout of this website) for your non-commercial or personal use only. All copies that you make must retain all copyright and other notices that are on this website. Our status and that of any identified contributors as the authors of material on our website must always be acknowledged. Except as provided in the previous sentence, you may not use, distribute, sell, modify, transmit, revise, reverse engineer, republish, post or create derivative works (where applicable) of the trade-marks, trade names, logos, patent, information, software or other intellectual property, material or content in these Terms of Use, referred to (collectively, as the "content") of this website without African Capital Investment Limited’s prior written permission. You acknowledge and agree that this website, its content including all software used on this website are the property of African Capital Investment Limited, its affiliates or their respective service providers, suppliers or licensors and you will not acquire any rights or licenses in or on this website or in its content. This website and its content are protected by copyright, both individually and as a collective work or compilation and by trade-mark law, patent law and other applicable laws.
The content of this website is for information purposes only. African Capital Investments Limited has taken care in preparing the content of this website. However, except as set out below, African Capital Investments Limited and each of its affiliates, licensors, service providers and suppliers shall not be liable for any inaccurate, delayed or incomplete information, or any omission nor for any actions taken in reliance thereon. This website could include technical or other inaccuracies or typographical errors and it is provided to you on an "as is" basis without warranties or representations of any kind.

The information contained in this website provided by any third party, including without limitation, the information obtained through any link, has been supplied without verification by us. Neither African Capital Investments Limited nor any of its affiliates, makes or has made any recommendations or endorsements regarding the products, investments or services of any third party mentioned or referred to in this website. Commentary and other materials posted on our site are not intended to amount to advice on which reliance should be placed.    

Trademarks

The African Capital Investments Limited (Logo), and other marks used on this website belong to African Capital Investments Limited. You are not permitted to use any of the trademarks displayed on this website (including without limitation those listed above) without the prior written consent of African Capital Investments Limited or the third party that owns the trademark.  

Changes to Terms of Use

African Capital Investments Limited reserves the right to update and revise these ‘Terms of use’ at any time without notice to you. You are bound by such updates and revisions so we encourage you to visit this page frequently to keep yourself updated. Your continued use of this website will mean that you agree to any changes.  

Viruses, hacking and other offences

You must not misuse our website by knowingly introducing viruses, Trojans, worms, logic bombs or other material which is malicious or technologically harmful. You must not attempt to gain unauthorized access to our website, the server on which our website is stored or any server, computer or database connected to our website. You must not attack our website via a denial-of- service attack or a distributed denial-of- service attack.  

By breaching this provision you will commit a criminal offence and we will report any such breach to the relevant law enforcement authorities and will cooperate with those authorities by disclosing your identity to them. In the event of such a breach your right to use our website will cease immediately.  

We will not be liable for any loss or damage caused by a distributed denial-of- service attack, viruses or other technologically harmful material that may infect your computer equipment, computer programs, data or other proprietary material due to your use of our Website or to your downloading of any material posted on it or on any website linked to it.  

This website (excluding linked sites) is controlled by African Capital Investments Limited from its offices. By accessing this website, you and African Capital Investments Limited agree that all matters relating to your access to, or use of, this website shall be governed by the statutes and laws of the England and Wales, as applicable, without regard to the conflicts of laws principles thereof. You and African Capital Investments Limited also hereby submit to the exclusive jurisdiction and venue of the courts of the England and Wales with respect to any and all matters arising in connection with these Terms of Use.  

Privacy policy

WHO WE ARE

This privacy policy sets out how African Capital Investments Limited uses and protects any information that you give African Capital Investments (ACI) when you use its website or services.

ACI may change this policy from time to time by updating this page. You should check regularly to ensure that you are happy with any change.

Our registered office is at 8-10 Hill Street, Mayfair, London, W1J 5NG and we are a company registered in England and Wales under company number 08775924.

We are registered on the Information Commissioner's Office Register; registration number CSN2427780, and act as the data controller when processing your data.

We are authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority; registration number 706522 and by the Financial Services Board: registration number 47979.

Our designated Data Protection Officer is Gareth Thomas, who can be contacted at 8-10 Hill Street, Mayfair, London, W1J 5NG, tel: 020 7 399 3950, email: gareth.thomas@aci.africa.



INFORMATION THAT WE COLLECT

In summary, the personal information we collect may be used by us to pursue our legitimate business purposes.

We are an African focussed corporate advisory boutique and the majority of the personal information relates to individuals in their professional capacity which is provided to us in the course, and in connection with, our services. We may occasionally use external lead generation organisations to provide us with the contact details of people who may be interested in our services. Occasionally, we may come into possession of personal contact details, such as personal email address. In any event, we use such information only in connection with our normal business activities, i.e. providing our advisory services.

We process your personal information to meet our legal, statutory and contractual obligations and to provide you with our products and services. The personal data that we collect from you may include

  • contact information, such as your name, job title, postal address, including your home address, business address, telephone number, mobile phone number, and email address;
  • information collected from publicly available resources, integrity data bases and credit agencies;
  • personal information, as required by relevant laws or regulations, such as:
    • Your date of birth, nationality, country of birth, country of residence, employment status and tax identification number (i.e. National Insurance Number);
    • Passport details, driving licence and utility bills;
    • Details of the services you request from us;
    • Any records held by financial crime prevention agencies, on the Electoral Register and by providers of utility services; and
    • Details of your employment status, income and source of wealth.
    • payment data, such as data necessary for processing payments and fraud prevention, including credit/debit card numbers, security code numbers and other related billing information;
    • other personal data regarding where it is relevant to advice or services that we provide.



HOW WE COLLECT YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION

We may collect personal information about you in a number of circumstances, including when you apply to use any of our services, become our client, or contact us in person, by telephone, by email or by post.

In some circumstances, we collect personal data about you from a third party source. For example, we may collect personal data from your organisation, other organisations with whom you have dealings, government agencies, an information or service provider or from a publicly available record.

LAWFUL GROUNDS FOR PROCESSING OF PERSONAL DATA

Under the Data Protection Laws we need a lawful basis to collect and use your personal data. The law allows for six lawful bases to process people’s personal data, and one of them allows personal data to be legally collected and used if it is necessary for a legitimate interest of the organisation – as long as it is fair and balanced and does not unduly impact the rights of individuals.

Due to the nature of our business and the size of our database, it is not practical for us to ask every individual for his/her consent. We have assessed our interests in carrying out our business activities and we have carefully considered the impact the collection and use of personal data could potentially have on individuals’ rights. Our database contains mainly data about individuals solely in their business capacity, which is used for the purposes of our normal business activities. Such activities are unlikely to affect the fundamental rights and freedoms of individuals concerned. We have therefore concluded that the most appropriate lawful ground for the processing of your personal information is our legitimate interest in maintaining our business database, and promoting, running and managing our business.

SHARING AND DISCLOSING YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION

All information you provide to us is stored on our secure servers located in the United Kingdom. The data we collect may be transferred to, and stored at, a destination outside the United Kingdom. It may also be processed by staff operating outside the United Kingdom who work for us or for one of our suppliers. We will take the necessary steps to ensure that your data is treated securely and that any such transfer outside the United Kingdom is in accordance with the Data Protection Laws.

Keeping personal information secure is very important to us and we take appropriate precautions to protect against the loss, misuse and alteration of personal information. However, no data transmission over the internet can be guaranteed to be totally secure. As a result, whilst we strive to protect your personal information, we cannot ensure or warrant the security of any information which is send via the internet.

We may disclose your personal information to any of our affiliated companies, to our suppliers, agents or representatives or to other users for the purposes associated with our legitimate interests (see above). We may also disclose your personal information to third parties where this is necessary in connection with the services we provide or our legitimate interests. If our services are provided in conjunction with, or by involvement of third parties, such third parties may need to have your personal information in order to fulfil your request.

We do not sell, trade or rent personal information to third parties.

HOW LONG WE KEEP YOUR DATA

We only ever retain personal information for as long as is necessary and we have strict review and retention policies in place to meet these obligations. We are required under UK tax law to keep your basic personal data (name, address, contact details) for a minimum of 6 years after which time it will be destroyed.

Where you have consented to us using your details for direct marketing, we will keep such data until you notify us otherwise and/or withdraw your consent.

YOUR RIGHTS

you have the following rights:

  • right of access to personal data that we process about you, which includes the right to obtain confirmation as to whether or not we process any of your personal data and if this is the case, you have the right to request a copy of your personal data, and the details of our processing of your personal data;
  • to require us to correct any inaccuracies in your data;
  • to object to our processing of your personal data (including for direct marketing purposes) or to withdraw your consent if you have previously given us your consent;
  • in certain circumstances you may have the right to request erasure of your personal data (often referred to as the “right to be forgotten”), for example if we no longer have any legal ground for processing your personal data, e.g. we no longer need it for our legitimate interests (as set out above);
  • instead of erasure, you can request restriction of processing of your personal data (i.e. limit the use of your data by us), for example when the accuracy of your data is being verified by us, or if we no longer need your data for our legitimate interests but we need to hold some of it for the purpose of legal proceedings; and
  • you may request the transfer of any personal data you have provided to us to a different organisation.



If you wish to exercise any of the above rights, you should put your request in writing and email it to us at info@aci.africa and;

  • include proof of your identity and address (e.g. a copy of your driving licence or passport, and a recent utility or credit card bill). This is to allow us to verify your identity and prevent disclosure to unauthorised third parties; and
  • provide the details of the request that you are making, for example by specifying the personal data you want to access, the information that is incorrect and the information with which it should be replaced.



LODGING A COMPLAINT

We only process your personal information in compliance with this privacy notice and in accordance with the relevant data protection laws. If, however you wish to raise a complaint regarding the processing of your personal data or are unsatisfied with how we have handled your information, you have the right to lodge a complaint with the supervisory authority.

CHANGES TO THIS POLICY

We may change this Policy from time to time. The current version of this Policy will always be available from us in hard copy or on our website. We will post a prominent notice on our website to notify you of any significant changes to this Policy or update you by other appropriate means.

This Policy was last updated on 30 September 2021.