Alexis Caude
Interview with Alexis Caude
MANAGING PARTNER, ADENIA PARTNERS
Lives in: Mauritius
Earlier than changing into an investor in Africa, French-born Alexis Caude was a profitable entrepreneur. At age 36, he was ready to retire after promoting his on-line publishing enterprise, however went on to begin a number of different firms. He finally moved to Mauritius and have become a managing associate of Africa-focused funding agency Adenia Companions. How we made it in Africa editor-in-chief Jaco Maritz spoke to Caude about his entrepreneurship journey, his funding successes on the continent, and the way he manages his private cash.
In 1999, Alexis Caude launched his first enterprise creating web sites for well-known soccer gamers in France. He modelled the corporate on an American agency that constructed platforms for NBA and NFL stars, anticipating that the US enterprise would purchase his operation when it expanded into Europe.
However the thought didn’t work out as anticipated. Though he efficiently satisfied soccer gamers to arrange web sites, the corporate struggled to generate income from them.
The connections established throughout this challenge allowed him to pivot. He started producing tv content material that includes the athletes, which he bought to broadcast networks.
Nevertheless, this enterprise misplaced momentum following the 2002 FIFA World Cup. France was eradicated within the group stage, failing to win a single match or rating a single aim. Within the wake of the match, tv stations misplaced curiosity in broadcasting content material that includes soccer gamers.
Three years into his entrepreneurial profession, Caude was again to sq. one.
Following these setbacks, a chance arose when the web site sports activities.fr went bust. He determined to purchase the enterprise and its small workforce of journalists at a “distressed worth”, intending to construct a sports activities media firm.
As demand for on-line media exploded, the web site shortly turned common, producing income from promoting and content material gross sales.
Caude credit the corporate’s success to a mix of excellent timing and a selected deal to offer sports activities content material to the French cellular community operator Orange. This contract gave the corporate the vital mass to pay for journalists, whereas additionally bringing substantial visibility to the model.
In 2006, his on-line publishing enterprise, Newsweb, went public on the Paris inventory trade and was subsequently acquired by the Lagardère Group. The transaction offered Caude with sufficient cash to retire.
“I used to be, I bear in mind, 36, so I used to be comparatively younger once I bought my firm,” he says. “I finished [working] for nearly one yr … loved life.”
Following this hiatus, he returned to enterprise, co-founding the sports activities betting firm Betclic, which was bought two years later. In 2008, he launched one other on-line publishing enterprise – this one centered on monetary info – which was additionally later acquired.
In 2010, Caude and a good friend based a resort firm known as Valuestate. They purchased their first resort in Marseille, and have since expanded to a number of different cities. The benefit of the resort enterprise, he notes, is that it’s simple to get financial institution loans as a result of the constructing serves as collateral. “Hospitality is the one trade the place it’s tough to lose cash,” he explains. “Even when you’ve got one or two dangerous years, you may at all times negotiate with the financial institution to [repay] a little bit bit later.”
A brand new chapter: investing in Africa
In 2015, Caude relocated his household to Mauritius, primarily for his spouse’s profession. She is a scientist and wished to begin a laboratory there. “I stated, ‘Okay, I’ll retire and we’ll transfer to Mauritius,’” he explains.
“The youngsters have been so glad to be on the seaside after college. My spouse was extraordinarily glad having her dream job,” Caude recollects. However after about six months – and after ending quite a few books he had by no means discovered the time to learn – he grew bored.
His subsequent chapter was sparked by Antoine Delaporte, who based the Africa-focused non-public fairness agency Adenia Companions in 2002. Delaporte persuaded him to affix the agency.
As a managing associate of Adenia, Caude oversees the agency’s investments within the Indian Ocean, East Africa and South Africa. The opposite managing associate, Stephane Bacquaert, is predicated in Morocco and handles actions in North and West Africa.
Concentrating on Africa’s small and mid-sized companies
Adenia just lately raised $180 million for its new fund, Adenia Entrepreneurial Fund I. The fund focuses on small and mid-sized companies in Africa, which characterize the biggest but most underserved a part of the continent’s non-public sector. It invests between $10 million and $20 million per firm.
The agency’s earlier fund was a lot bigger – at $470 million – requiring a minimal funding of not less than $30 million per firm. Caude explains that many companies in Africa are just too small to soak up that a lot capital. The brand new fund opens up a wider pool of firms, permitting Adenia and its groups on the bottom to shut extra offers.
The fund has already deployed capital into Maymana, a Morocco-based meals firm specialising in baked items, speciality groceries, and connoisseur catering companies.
Adenia has invested in Moroccan meals firm Maymana.
Promoting photo voltaic after South Africa’s blackouts ended
In 2021, Adenia made its first South African funding in Herholdt’s, a distributor of renewable power tools like photo voltaic panels, batteries, and inverters. On the time, South Africa was grappling with continual electrical energy shortages, identified regionally as load shedding, which left some areas with out energy for as much as 10 hours a day in extreme cases. This drove many households and companies to undertake solar energy options. Within the first three years of Adenia’s funding, Herholdt’s income grew about tenfold.
Nevertheless, by March 2024, load shedding largely stopped due to improved efficiency on the nationwide utility Eskom’s energy crops, mixed with decreased demand as so many households and companies had already switched to photo voltaic. So the place did the sudden finish of blackouts go away Herholdt’s?
Caude says the enterprise has historically been break up between two segments: retail shoppers and company purchasers. Whereas demand from households has slowed, the corporate has doubled down on business and industrial consumers – a section that continues to carry out effectively.
Caude factors out that solar energy in South Africa is extra economically viable than in markets like Europe. He notes that self-generated renewable energy is less expensive than shopping for electrical energy from Eskom.
Winners and losers
When requested about Adenia’s prime offers, Caude highlights Quickmart. In 2019, Adenia invested within the Kenyan grocery store chain and merged it with Tumaini Self Service, a neighborhood retail operation it had acquired the earlier yr.
On the time of the acquisition, Quickmart and Tumaini had a mixed community of 25 shops. Right now, the unified chain has 67. “It is going to proceed to develop,” Caude says. “In all probability the kind of progress you may solely discover on the African continent.”
Caude highlights Kenyan retailer Quickmart as certainly one of Adenia’s most profitable investments.
One other standout deal is Mauvilac, a paint and coatings producer in Mauritius, which the agency has since exited. Adenia acquired a 95% stake within the enterprise from its founding household. Below Adenia’s possession, the corporate was professionalised and scaled up, resulting in a profitable sale in 2020 to the Dutch paint producer AkzoNobel.
Not each funding has gone in response to plan. Caude cites DDP, an out of doors promoting firm in Ghana. As a result of Adenia invests in euros and {dollars}, a pointy depreciation of the Ghanaian cedi meant the enterprise underperformed in hard-currency phrases.
How he invests his private cash
Caude takes a considerably conservative method to his private investments. He continues to spend money on the hospitality sector in Europe and the US, an trade he is aware of effectively.
He additionally holds gold and US equities, leaning towards worth shares slightly than the technology-driven momentum class. In terms of equities, he buys each index funds and particular person shares.
Referencing Warren Buffett, Caude explains that if one doesn’t have the time to check particular person shares, it’s higher to purchase an index. Nevertheless, he does purchase particular person shares himself. “I additionally purchase shares instantly once I assume that I’ve an edge or once I assume that I do know the trade effectively,” he says. “Then I attempt to apply the identical technique that we do in non-public fairness: analyse the return on invested capital, analyse the aggressive positioning of the corporate, understanding the value [and] the long run progress.”
As a result of he’s additionally an investor in Adenia’s funds, he must preserve liquid property readily available to contribute capital each time the agency makes a brand new funding. Because of this, he holds Swiss francs, a forex he favours for its potential to retain its worth.
His investments additionally embrace an artwork assortment, which connects on to his private ardour for portray.
Begin early and simply strive
Caude advises younger folks to strive what they wish to do, slightly than not making an attempt in any respect. He doesn’t consider that profession success calls for absolute ardour, arguing that individuals can thrive in fields they don’t seem to be completely enthusiastic about. For aspiring entrepreneurs, his message is to begin as early as doable.
