News
Small Foundation is pleased to announce our investment in Unmarkets, a venture builder that creates new food and agricultural businesses in Kenya in partnership with established, African-owned companies.
Much of the support available to early-stage businesses in sub-Saharan Africa has been designed around tech startups. However, much of the rural economy runs on businesses whose value lies elsewhere: in machinery, processing capability and physical distribution, such as millers, processors, aggregators and input suppliers.
These businesses are harder to start, for reasons that are practical rather than abstract. A processor has to buy and commission equipment, secure reliable supply from thousands of smallholder farmers, meet food safety standards and establish routes to market before it has anything to sell. Most of the money goes in at the outset, revenue builds slowly, and the knowledge needed to get it right is specific to a region and a crop. Founders therefore need access to both capital and practical expertise. In most markets the two arrive separately, if at all, and few businesses of this kind reach the point where commercial investors will back them.
Unmarkets was founded in 2023 by Milan Samani. Instead of supporting founders to assemble businesses from scratch, Unmarkets co-creates new ventures with established agricultural companies that already have production facilities, brands, supplier relationships and customers. The partner company contributes that expertise and access, invests its own capital, and stays involved in running the venture. Unmarkets provides additional capital and leads the design of the new business, recruiting management teams, developing brands and products for regional and global markets, and providing shared finance, strategy and operational support.
In 2024, Small Foundation provided a grant to help the team answer questions that its model had not yet resolved around the legal and corporate structure that would hold as the business grew, and how ownership and incentives should work between the holding company and its venture partners. That work made the model clearer, stronger and ready for investment, and it is the model we are now backing.
Small Foundation is investing in Unmarkets, alongside other investors, to fund the launch of four new ventures, moving them from design to trading: buying equipment, contracting supply, testing products and hiring teams. The investment sits within our work focused on startup capital and technical assistance. This work asks which combinations of funding and hands-on support genuinely make rural enterprises viable.
Unmarkets is letting us test that question in a part of the agriculture sector that rarely fits the startup mould and specifically asks whether building alongside established operators produces stronger businesses than backing founders alone. If successful, the benefits will reach across the rural economy and lead to crops being bought from smallholder farmers under longer-term arrangements, processing occurring near where those crops are grown so more value stays local, inputs farmers can buy nearby, and jobs created where they are scarcest.
“We’re delighted to welcome Small Foundation as an investor. We believe Africa’s next generation of agribusinesses will be built by combining the strengths of established local companies with products and brands designed for regional and global markets, supported by long-term capital. Together, we’re excited to demonstrate how stronger businesses can create reliable markets for smallholder farmers and lasting prosperity across rural communities.”
Milan Samani, Founder & CEO of Unmarkets
