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Fund Design & Management
Ayani designs, promotes and implements performance-based social impact, blended finance and challenge funds, and applies a market-led methodology to financing and capacity building. The firm’s experience with investment and challenge funds spans the whole trajectory from concept to implementation, and from management to exit, including linkages to and coordination with effective capacity building.
Ayani is actively engaged in the evolving best practices related to both commercially run investment and non-commercial grant-making funds throughout Africa. Such best practices include:
- Ensuring market-appropriate tools (e.g., a combination of debt, equity and quasi-equity);
- Providing support to leverage development-targeted concessional financing to attract and de-risk private investment;
- Financial structure alignment with desired transaction and exit timeline;
- Linking investment to technical support (including seconding management positions); and
- The need for highly efficient systems when more numerous and smaller-scale transactions are anticipated.
EXPERTISE
Ayani’s fund experience includes:
- Market and feasibility assessments
- Determining strategic orientation through facilitation of stakeholder discourse
- Program development and identifying an appropriate range of products and services
- Defining a strategic and efficient mix of financing instruments
- Arriving at a shared vision among diverse stakeholders
- Capital planning, policy and procedure development
- Development of reporting templates to facilitate subsequent monitoring
- Set-up of funds/trust including formation of board, and
- Management and execution of fund activities and reporting.
SIGNATURE PROJECTS
Learn more about Ayani’s work in this area:
Capacity Building for Sustainable Rural Development Fund
Ayani has been supporting the National Fund for Sustainable Development (FNDS) since late 2018 in establishing itself as a credible and effective institution in promoting rural finance and development in Mozambique. Ayani provides capacity building to the fund with an annual budget of over $100 million to design and support implementation of grants scheme as well as rural development investment strategy and products. This includes revising the lender’s business plan, mitigating risk, adjusting systems and internal controls, designing products that meet market demand and ensuring efficiency and sustainability. By the end of the project, FNDS will have the financial instruments and integrated solutions necessary to increase access to rural finance by households and agri-SMEs in rural areas.
Feasibility study for the microfinance challenge fund in Rwanda
AFR commissioned a study to explore the various options available for a second phase of the Microfinance Challenge Fund. Ayani conducted the study that elaborates the business case around the two-component program, namely an MFI capacity building fund within AFR and an MFI investment fund.
The MFI Investment Readiness Fund focused on institutional strengthening and the development of robust systems within MFIs. The main aim of the fund was to develop MFIs to the stage where they were ready to take on external investment. The MFI Investment Fund was set up as a separate entity and attracted capital from investors who were interested in supporting the MFI sector in Rwanda (the social return), while making an acceptable financial return on their capital.
Aurora fund management in Sierra Leone
Aurora Foundation engaged Ayani to support its development activities in promoting livelihood and employment creation in Sierra Leone, through a fund that would work through financial institutions to finance growing MSMEs.
Ayani created a pipeline and undertook a due diligence of potential investees, as well as assisted in the fund’s loan documentation once investments were approved by Aurora. Ayani also conducted monitoring of the fund’s investments, provided ad hoc advisory services and reported on the performance of investees.
With Ayani’s close monitoring and specific advice, the investor agreed to disburse when it was most needed during the Ebola epidemic.
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