Part 7 of 8 · Private capital
Specialist Trade Financiers and Private Equity for Trade Businesses
Below the banks sits a tier built for exactly the deal banks decline. Money here arrives in days, not months — and costs accordingly.
Section 8Specialist and fintech trade financiers
This tier exists for the first big purchase order, the young company with real contracts but thin financials, and the working-capital spike a credit committee cannot process in time. Typical pricing runs at an effective 2–4% per month, or profit-share models that take a quarter to a third of a transaction’s gross profit.
The honest framing: this is bridge capital that wins you deals and builds your track record. It is not a permanent capital structure, because at these rates it will eventually consume the margin it initially rescued.
| Provider | Core product | Practical notes |
|---|---|---|
| Merchant West | Confidential invoice discounting (advances up to ~80% of the book); PO and imported-stock finance | One of the largest privately owned working-capital and asset financiers; suits established SMEs and mid-caps with a real debtor book |
| Sasfin | Trade and debtor finance for SMEs (bank-licensed) | Decades-long specialist franchise in financing trading businesses; structured trade and equipment heritage |
| ProfitShare Partners | Purchase-order funding, ~R250k–R5m per transaction | Profit-share model rather than interest; decisions in 24–48 hours; delivery channel for Standard Bank’s SME PO offering |
| Sourcefin | Purchase-order funding, tender-focused | End-to-end support including supplier payment and delivery logistics; ~48-hour funding decisions |
| Spartan | SME working capital and PO finance, once-off or revolving | Independent financier with a four-decade track record; structures around the entrepreneur’s timeline |
| Bridgement | Digital invoice finance and revolving credit facilities | Fast online origination against invoices; suits smaller, digitally banked businesses |
| Lula | Online SME loans and revenue-based facilities | Speed over price; useful for short, sharp working-capital gaps |
| Payabill / Bizcash | Trade finance, supplier payments, invoice discounting | Smaller-ticket supplier-payment and discounting solutions for trading SMEs |
Section 9Private equity and private credit
Private equity answers a different question from everything else in this guide. Grants fund activities; trade finance funds transactions; private equity funds the company itself — its capacity, its acquisitions, its shareholder changes — in exchange for ownership, governance rights and an exit within roughly three to seven years at target returns in the mid-twenties percent and above.
It is the most expensive money in this guide and the least suited to funding a single shipment. It is also the only money that buys you a partner with networks, discipline and follow-on capital when a trading business is ready to become an industrial one.
When PE fits an import–export business
- Scale threshold. Institutional PE typically wants sustainable EBITDA from roughly R20 million upward (growth funds go earlier); below that, the specialist and DFI tiers are the realistic audience.
- A capacity story, not a cash-flow story. PE funds plants, cold chains, fleets, acquisitions and regional expansion — the infrastructure behind an order book, never the order itself.
- Exit visibility. The investor must be able to imagine selling — to a trade buyer, a larger fund or management — within the fund’s life. Businesses structured around one irreplaceable founder or one concentrated buyer struggle here.
- Mezzanine as the middle path. Where owners want capital without ceding control, mezzanine debt — subordinated, higher-priced, lightly diluting — sits between bank debt and equity, at indicative pricing in the high teens to low twenties.
Who is actually investing
| Firm | Focus | Trade-relevant evidence |
|---|---|---|
| Metier Private Equity | Mid-market growth and buyout; industrial, logistics, sustainable capital | US$20m investment in 2026 into Bisedge, an electric forklift-leasing platform serving logistics operators across Nigeria, South Africa, Kenya and Tanzania |
| Phatisa | African food value chain: agri-inputs, processing, cold chain, storage, logistics, distribution | Food Fund 3 reached an US$86m first close backed by BII, IFC, Norfund, FinDev Canada and Swedfund; 2026 acquisition (with a consortium) of agri-inputs group Zaad Holdings |
| Vantage Capital | Mezzanine debt and structured equity, African mid-market including manufacturing | Africa’s largest mezzanine fund manager — the reference name for control-preserving growth capital |
| RMB Corvest | Mid-market private equity within FirstRand; minority and majority stakes | 2026 acquisition (with Alito Fund 2) of a majority stake in flexible-packaging manufacturer Packaging World |
| Agile Capital | SA mid-market services and manufacturing buyouts | Active acquirer of niche industrial and services businesses with export potential |
| Sanari Capital | Founder-friendly growth capital, lower-mid market | Growth-stage cheques for owner-managed businesses professionalising toward scale |
| Old Mutual PE / Sanlam PE | Large-cap SA buyouts and platforms | Institutional capital for businesses at the top of the mid-market |
| Adenia Partners | Pan-African control buyouts, including South Africa | Control investor with operational playbooks across African consumer and industrial businesses |
| DFIs as direct or anchor investors (IFC, BII, Norfund, DEG, Proparco) |
Food, agri, industrial and trade-enabling platforms | Anchor the funds above and write direct tickets for larger export-oriented projects |
