Madica, the pre-seed investment programme backed by US venture firm Flourish Ventures, has received $6 million in fresh capital from Flourish to back 25 to 30 more African startups over the next three years.
Each startup will still get up to $200,000, plus 18 months of mentorship, executive coaching and investor-readiness support. All $6 million will go into new pre-seed and seed deals, and none is set aside for follow-on rounds, Madica said in a statement shared with TechCabal on Tuesday. The company said a separate budget pays for founder support but did not disclose the figures.
Madica’s new backing comes as early-stage funding becomes harder to secure. African startups raising between $100,000 and $1 million fell from 179 in the second half of 2025 to 100 in the first half of 2026, a 44% decline, according to Africa: The Big Deal, a funding tracker.
Yet, most of the money that does flow stays in four countries. Nigeria, Kenya, Egypt and South Africa took 82% of startup funding in 2025, though they are home to about 30% of Africa’s people. Madica’s $200,000 cheques are in the range investors are pulling back from, and it goes looking for founders outside those four markets
When Flourish launched Madica in October 2022, it set aside $6 million to back 25 to 30 startups over three years, with an equal amount for founder support. Madica has backed 18 startups in 10 countries so far, and its first investments came in 2024.
“Three years have given us valuable lessons and encouraging early signals, but building enduring companies and assessing venture outcomes takes longer,” said Emmanuel Adegboye, Head of Madica.
Madica says its portfolio companies have gone on to raise, on average, twice its investment from other investors. On a $200,000 cheque, that is about $400,000 in follow-on funding per company, signalling its early-stage bets are drawing the follow-on capital that most African pre-seed startups struggle to find.
In its statement to TechCabal, Madica described this as a portfolio average, so some companies have raised less, and the figure says nothing about investment returns.
Every company in the portfolio is majority African-owned. More than half have at least one female co-founder, and 39% have a female CEO. In September, Madica made its first investments in Algeria and Cameroon. Adegboye told TechCabal at the time that Madica now co-invests in most deals because a $200,000 cheque alone often isn’t enough.
Madica said it will judge the extension by whether its startups turn early traction into lasting growth and show they can deliver venture returns. It wants other investors to copy what works. If they do, more early money could reach founders outside Nigeria, Kenya, Egypt and South Africa, where 40% of Madica’s applications already come from.
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