NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

VC firm Tofino Capital has completed the first close of US$5 million of a US$10 million fund focused on investing in early-stage companies in Africa, Latin America, Asia and the Middle East.

Founded by by Eliot Pence and Aubrey Hruby, Tofino Capital has secured funding from limited partners that include large family offices, top-tier venture funds and HNWIs, and will invest between US$$50,000 and US$1 million in pre-seed and seed companies across all sectors, but with a particular focus on B2B. The fund builds off Pence and Hruby’s own angel investments in startups like Sabi, SeamlessHR and Eksab.

“We were driven by a question we didn’t think the venture community had answered. ‘Why do some of the fastest growing markets have the lowest per capita availability of venture financing?’ Egypt, Philippines, Nigeria and Bangladesh, for example, have on average US$5 per capita of venture investment, whereas China is above US$40,” Pence said.