Aries Media Ventures Fund I Targets Sub-Saharan Media-Tech

Aries Media Ventures Fund I has begun deploying capital into three media-technology startups serving Sub-Saharan Africa. The fund's initial portfolio covers Aktivate, HustleSasa, and Book Mahali.

Founding General Partner Alykhan Kaba announced the vehicle this week. He has held senior roles at Live Nation, Entertainment One, Activision Blizzard, and NBCUniversal, where he serves as Vice President of Content Strategy for unscripted content. Kaba is a Canadian national of Indian heritage whose parents grew up in Tanzania.

What gap does the fund target?

Africa's creative and media sector is a $59 billion market, according to a 2026 industry analysis cited by the firm. That segment receives less than 1 per cent of total venture capital deployed across the region. In 2022, African startups raised over $6.5 billion in aggregate. Digital media ventures captured less than 1 per cent of that total. Fintech alone took nearly 40 per cent.

"The investors who understand media don't understand these markets, and the investors who understand these markets don't invest in media," Kaba said in a recent interview. Kaba has separately argued that capital should follow innovation in underserved markets, rather than the reverse.

Aries Media Ventures began in 2023 as Aries Media Project. It operated as a professional network linking media and entertainment startups in emerging markets with investors and operators in Los Angeles, New York, and London. After three years of introductions, the group pivoted to direct investing.

What does the fund actually buy?

Fund I writes cheques at the angel, pre-seed, and seed stages. The mandate targets tech-enabled businesses at the intersection of media, entertainment, and commerce. The firm will not back record labels, production companies, or film and television content itself. Kaba wants startups with a scalable software layer, not content rights.

Aries sources deals through two channels. The first tracks founders already building around large market opportunities. The second partners with established media companies to surface operational pain points in international expansion, then matches those problems with technical founders capable of building solutions.

What do the first three bets look like?

Aktivate markets itself as a "creator operating system" for Africa. Founder Akinbola Asalu built the platform to replace the spreadsheets and direct messages brands previously used to manage influencer campaigns. Since 2023, Aktivate has onboarded more than 50,000 verified creators across Nigeria, Kenya, Ghana, and South Africa. It has served over 800 businesses. Earlier reporting described the company as a bootstrapped venture with $5,000 in monthly recurring revenue, charging brands $250 per month and agencies $500 per month, plus a 1 per cent commission on milestone payments. Backers include The Baobab Network and The Jobtech Alliance, alongside a partnership with Access Bank on SME creator marketing.

HustleSasa sells ticketing, mobile-money and card payments, marketing, check-in, and merchandise tools to event organisers. Peng Chen and Michael Denuh founded the company in 2021 through the Antler accelerator in Nairobi. The platform has processed more than 520,000 tickets and served over 4,000 clients across Kenya, Ghana, Tanzania, Rwanda, Uganda, and South Africa. Earlier investors include Musha Ventures, Microtraction, and Best Nights VC, the venture arm of Mast-Jägermeister. German investor Impacc took a stake in a recent undisclosed round tied to the company's expansion into payments, commerce, and event-organiser financing. Impacc has noted that HustleSasa data shows roughly one gig worker employed for every ten tickets sold, spanning security, catering, and technical crews.

Book Mahali runs a marketplace for venue and equipment rentals in Kenya. The platform handles discovery, payments, and paperwork. Hosts keep the majority of each booking. It is the youngest and most consumer-facing of the three portfolio companies, sitting closer to hospitality than pure media technology.

Who else is putting money into this space?

The fund enters a small but growing cohort of vehicles explicitly targeting Africa's creative economy. Nigerian music and entertainment group Chocolate City launched a $1 million Founders Fund in 2025 for creative startups. Founders Fund Africa runs a $50,000 creative-economy accelerator, a cheque roughly equivalent to 200 monthly brand subscriptions at Aktivate's published rate. Creative-sector employment accounts for roughly 8 per cent of jobs across Sub-Saharan Africa, by some estimates.

Sony Innovation Fund Africa, the Africa-focused arm of Sony Group Corporation's venture capital unit, has made a limited number of media-technology investments. In August 2025, it backed Twiva, a Kenyan creator monetisation platform spanning influencer marketing, social commerce, skills development, embedded finance, and livestreaming. The same month, it co-invested alongside the International Finance Corporation in Filmmakers Mart, a Nigeria-based production platform connecting creatives with location scouting, logistics, catering, and permit acquisition. Sony's African investments extend beyond media-tech, including participation in a $40 million round for stablecoin infrastructure provider Yellow Card in 2026.

What happens next?

Aries has not disclosed Fund I's size or the individual investment amounts in its first three portfolio companies. The firm faces a test familiar to every emerging-market media-tech vehicle. Institutional capital has historically treated the segment as small or speculative. Kaba has acknowledged the mixed reception he gets from prospective limited partners. "I tell someone the thesis and they say, yes, this makes sense, I'm so glad you're doing this. Or they'll say I don't believe that there's growth in Africa," he said. The commercial trajectories of Aktivate, HustleSasa, and Book Mahali over the next 18 months will show whether the bridge between global media capital and African founders can carry meaningful traffic in both directions.