Recent continental assessments of business environments have reinforced this shift, with Namibia emerging as a standout example in startup market perception which has been ranked first in Africa for startup market perception by continental assessments of business. The announcement, shared publicly by the Namibia Investment Promotion and Development Board. The recognition has drawn attention not because Namibia is the continent’s largest economy, but because it demonstrates how regulatory clarity, political stability, and deliberate engagement with founders can shape investor confidence in tangible ways.
Global South Pole engaged Stephene Chikozho, Chief Executive Officer of Africa Business Inc in South Africa.
The business executive said the evolution unfolding across African ecosystems runs deeper than rankings. He noted that a structural mindset shift is underway, with founders increasingly designing solutions for African realities rather than copying external models. According to him, credibility is now being built through results, policy predictability, and systems that reduce friction rather than through market size alone.
"There is a lot of shift in terms of mindset and I think now what is happening is unlike what we had ten years ago and we have founders now that are actually solving African problems with African-built solutions. Initially, if you look at a few years ago, designing local solutions was based mainly on copying Silicon Valley solutions. And now the shift that we are seeing is we are having a rise of what I would like to call in this interview an ecosystem memory. And by this, I mean they are second and third-time founders. And they're also angels who are reinvesting from earlier exits. And thirdly, they're operators who have learned what works and what doesn't. So, unlike the yesteryears, we now have people that have learned from African experiences that have come up with solutions that are really much easier to implement now and I'm also seeing a lot of collaboration which is increasing, for example, cross-border founder knowledge sharing," Chikozho said.
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