Essay series · 8 min read
Rewiring Entrepreneurial Ecosystems
Why ecosystems fail when they are assembled as a collection of programmes, and what it takes to build the connective tissue between founders, finance and markets.
Read more →Ideas
Ideas for building a more enterprising Africa.
Writing and conversations drawn from the experience - on building stronger businesses, unlocking capital, strengthening food systems, and creating the conditions for businesses and communities to thrive.
Perspective · 6 min read
The Missing Middle Is a Design Problem
Small and growing businesses are not too risky for capital. Most capital is simply not designed for them.
Perspective · 2 min read
We don’t have an entrepreneurship problem in Africa.
Africa does not have an entrepreneurship shortage; it has an ecosystem design problem. Despite significant investment in training, funding, and enterprise support, too few businesses progress from participation to sustainable scale, investment readiness, and meaningful job creation. This article argues for a shift from fragmented interventions to intentionally designed ecosystems that align capability, capital, and enabling institutions around the goal of producing transformational enterprises.
Perspective · 6 min read
Food Systems as Economic Infrastructure
Treating agriculture as an investable system — not a welfare category — changes who gets funded and what gets built.
Essay · 7 min read
Leadership for Systemic Change
Institutions outlive programmes. Leaders who build systems accept slower recognition in exchange for longer consequence.
Research note · 5 min read
Enterprise Support After the Grant
What actually persists in a business two years after a support programme ends, and how to design for that from the start.
In conversation
Interviews, talks and podcasts.
Founder conversations
Madiba Unfiltered
Nelson's space for candid conversations with founders, investors and builders - about what building actually costs, what capital really asks of you, and what leadership looks like when nobody is watching.
Keynote
Building ecosystems that actually work
On why entrepreneurship support must be judged by what survives it - delivered to entrepreneurs and partners in Accra.
SPEECH
Financing Africa's food systems
A conversation on capital, nutrition and the economics of the agribusiness value chain at the launch of GBHUB Africa.
Media enquiries
For interviews, press biography, photography or comment, please get in touch through the contact page.
Themes
- Entrepreneurship ecosystems
- Private-sector development
- Enterprise support
- Investment
- African economic transformation
- Leadership
- Social innovation
- Agriculture and food systems
Build what matters. Build it to last.
Connect with Nelson to explore ideas, partnerships, speaking opportunities or ways to build something that matters.