Lisk, the Web3 infrastructure project, has launched a $15m venture initiative, the Lisk EMpower Fund, to invest in startups across Africa, Latin America (LATAM) and Southeast Asia.
The fund is a counter-play to the highly competitive and often saturated venture scenes in Europe and the US. It will focus on what it calls “frontier economies,” providing early-stage capital and hands-on support to founders in markets with proven high adoption rates for new financial technologies but limited access to institutional funding.
Its first investments include a South African digital supply chain venture, an agritech platform, an Indonesian stablecoin and a gold-backed lending company.
The Strategy: Finding Mispriced Opportunity
Lisk’s thesis is that while Western VCs see risk in these markets, the real opportunity is being overlooked. The EMpower Fund will provide up to $250,000 in capital per startup, combined with advisory on regulatory compliance, tokenisation and fundraising strategy to get them “Series A-ready.”
“Founders in Africa, LATAM, and Southeast Asia are already proving they can build products with real adoption despite limited access to venture dollars,” says Gideon Greaves, Head of Investments at Lisk. “Where Western VCs see ‘risk,’ we see mispriced opportunity. Emerging markets aren’t unstable — they’re undercapitalised, misunderstood, and scaling faster than the West.”
Lisk argues that founders in these regions, often forced to bootstrap their way to significant traction, are more resilient. The fund aims to partner with these companies once they have demonstrated product-market fit, reducing investment risk while providing the necessary support to scale.
First Bets: From Agritech to Stablecoins
The fund has already backed four companies, reflecting its focus on financial infrastructure and real-world asset solutions:
Lov.cash (South Africa): A digital supply chain venture.
A digital supply chain venture. Afrikabal (Rwanda): An agritech platform focused on streamlining agricultural supply chains.
An agritech platform focused on streamlining agricultural supply chains. IDRX (Indonesia): A company issuing a stablecoin pegged to the Indonesian Rupiah.
A company issuing a stablecoin pegged to the Indonesian Rupiah. SigraFi: A platform for gold-backed lending.
Oghenetejiri Jesse, CEO of Afrikabal, said the investment provided more than just capital. “The Lisk EMpower Fund gave us capital, credibility, and community, transforming Afrikabal from a local pilot into a global infrastructure contender.”
A Tokenised Fund for a Web3 World
In a move to practise what it preaches, the EMpower Fund features a tokenised structure for its limited partners (LPs). By digitising LP shares, Lisk introduces potential liquidity to an asset class that typically requires capital to be locked up for a decade or more.
Greaves says this is a key differentiator and a test of faith for investors in the Web3 space.
“Tokenization doesn’t create new risk — it simply digitises an old, clunky process. The token is tied directly to a real fund share, so it’s not speculative in nature. It’s just a better wrapper,” he explains. “If VCs truly believe in Web3, they should prove it by adopting it themselves.”
This structure could allow smaller investors to participate and potentially enable secondary market trading for LP stakes down the line.
Lisk’s $15m fund is a modest start, but its strategy is sharp. By deliberately turning away from the overheated markets of Europe and North America, it’s placing a bet on a well-documented trend: the rapid adoption of digital financial tools in emerging economies. The focus on startups that have already achieved traction with minimal capital is a classic, de-risked approach to finding resilient founders.
The most innovative element, however, is the tokenisation of the fund itself. This isn’t just a gimmick; it’s a direct challenge to the traditional, illiquid model of venture capital. By offering a potential path to liquidity for its own investors, Lisk is using Web3 tools to solve a Web2 problem. While the fund’s success will depend on the performance of its portfolio, its structure could serve as a blueprint for other VCs looking to innovate on the fund management side, not just the investment side. The key question is whether this model will attract a new class of LPs who value liquidity as much as long-term returns.
[SRC] https://launchbaseafrica.com/2025/10/02/lisk-launches-15m-web3-fund-targeting-africa-and-latam-inks-first-deal-in-south-africa-rwanda/
