Editor’s note: African-Startups is a sister publication of EU-Startups, bringing trusted coverage of startups, venture capital, and innovation across Africa.
Dublin-based impact investor Small Foundation has announced an investment in Unmarkets, a Nairobi-based venture builder that partners with established, African-owned companies to launch new food and agriculture businesses in Kenya.
Small Foundation said it is investing in Unmarkets alongside other backers to fund the launch of four new ventures, taking them from the design stage into trading, a phase that involves buying equipment, contracting supply, testing products and hiring teams.
“We’re delighted to welcome Small Foundation as an investor. We believe Africa’s next generation of agribusinesses will be built by combining the strengths of established local companies with products and brands designed for regional and global markets, supported by long-term capital,” said Milan Samani, founder and CEO of Unmarkets.
Rather than helping founders build businesses from the ground up, Unmarkets co-creates ventures with established agricultural firms that already have production facilities, brands, supplier relationships and customers. It was founded in 2023 by Samani to close the gap in rural finance.
Under the model, the partner company contributes its expertise, access and its own capital while staying involved in running the venture while Unmarkets provides additional capital and leads the design of the new business, including recruiting management teams and developing brands and products for regional and global markets, alongside shared finance, strategy and operational support.
On its website, Unmarkets says it invests through a $12 million capital vehicle backed by Shell Foundation and values-aligned family offices, with its portfolio aimed at improving incomes and climate resilience for 200,000 smallholder farmers.
The Dublin-based foundation said the deal builds on a grant it gave the startup in 2024 to help resolve questions its model had not yet answered, particularly around the legal and corporate structure that would hold as the business grew, and how ownership and incentives should work between the holding company and its venture partners. That earlier support, Small Foundation said, made the model “clearer, stronger and ready for investment”, and it is this refined model the foundation is now backing.
The investment falls under Small Foundation’s work on startup capital and technical assistance, which examines which combinations of funding and hands-on support make rural enterprises commercially viable.
For the foundation, the investment in Unmarkets offers an opportunity to test that question in a segment of agriculture that “rarely fits the startup mould”, specifically probing whether building alongside established operators produces stronger businesses than backing founders alone.
“Together, we’re excited to demonstrate how stronger businesses can create reliable markets for smallholder farmers and lasting prosperity across rural communities,” Samani added.
While neither party disclosed the investment amount, Small Foundation said that if the venture-building approach succeeds, it could have ripple effects across the rural economy: crops bought from smallholder farmers under longer-term arrangements, processing carried out closer to where crops are grown to keep value local, inputs available to nearby farmers, and jobs created in areas where they are currently scarce.
Earlier this month, Small Foundation announced its support for AgDevCo Ventures, a vehicle providing patient finance to early-stage agribusinesses across East Africa.
