Africa Will Be Web3’s Biggest Growth Market, Says Lisk’s Head of Investments

Africa is not only catching up in Web3, it’s setting the tempo. This is the argument from Gideon Greaves, Head of Investments at Lisk, who spoke to BeInCrypto through the ETHSafari 2025 in Nairobi.

Greaves believes the continent’s distinctive combine of necessity-driven innovation, grassroots entrepreneurship, and rising VC (enterprise capital) curiosity is popping it into the world’s most genuine crypto progress story.

Forget Silicon Valley, Africa Is Web3’s Real Testbed

Shopkeepers faucet away on smartphones to simply accept crypto funds in Nairobi’s bustling markets. In Lagos, freelancers choose stablecoins over the naira to guard their earnings from inflation.

Farmers additionally join instantly with patrons in rural Ghana by way of blockchain-powered apps that run on fundamental telephones.

Lisk has lengthy positioned itself as a gateway to Web3. From his perspective as COO, Dominic Schwenter sees Africa as central to this mission.

“Africa represents what occurs when Web3 bypasses the hypothesis part and goes straight to fixing actual issues. Many areas acquired caught up in DeFi yield farming and NFT buying and selling. Still, African founders are constructing fee rails, provide chain transparency, and monetary entry instruments as a result of they need to,” Schwenter defined.

According to Schwenter, the mobile-first tradition and entrepreneurial necessity create situations the place blockchain technology finds real product-market match. These confirmed use instances then grow to be templates for adoption in all places else.

While regulators in Washington and Brussels debate how to define digital assets, Africa is already residing the Web3 experiment. This isn’t a surprise for Gideon Greaves, Head of Investments at Lisk.

“Africa has the very best entrepreneurship fee on this planet—one in 5 adults owns their very own enterprise,” Greaves began in his interview with BeInCrypto.

According to the Lisk govt, African founders can’t afford to chase hype, as they construct as a result of they’ve to resolve issues.

Indeed, information tells its personal story, with a latest Chainalysis report exhibiting stablecoins accounted for 43% of crypto transaction volume in Sub-Saharan Africa in 2024. That dominance is not any accident.

Against this backdrop, Greaves highlights stablecoins as digital greenback accounts accessible to anybody with a cell phone.

In economies the place inflation erodes financial savings and remittances eat into family incomes, they aren’t a speculative instrument however a lifeline.

“It’s not about hypothesis—it’s about survival,” he added.

Small companies protect worth in stablecoins, households reduce transfer fees, and freelancers demand fee in digital {dollars}. In Africa, crypto shouldn’t be a “future” use case; it’s the current.

With Conviction, Nothing Beats a Problem-Led Builder

That sense of urgency shapes the taking part in area for startups. Unlike in Silicon Valley, the place initiatives usually launch tokens first and seek for customers later, African Web3 firms flip the mannequin.

“They’re problem-led, not token-led,” Greaves articulated.

In this regard, Michael Lawal, accomplice at AyaHQ, agrees, noting that conviction is one of the important thing elements for a founder’s success. AyaHQ is one of the most important Web3 founders’ incubation packages in Africa.

Meanwhile, Web3 firms in Africa are equity-backed companies with reside customers. Tokens solely seem in the event that they serve a transparent function.

That founder-first philosophy resonates on the bottom. Ikenna Oriza, founder and CEO of Jamit, advised BeInCrypto that he selected Lisk regardless of being courted by a number of ecosystems.

“Every main blockchain pitched us, and we even examined just a few, however we picked the chain that confirmed up. Lisk already has what the others have and the sting that issues essentially the most for us: intentional, hands-on assist for African founders constructing for a world viewers,” Oriza mentioned in an unique assertion to BeInCrypto.

Among different highlights, Oriza is famend for pioneering the African digital music period.

The outcomes are merchandise that work in low-connectivity environments, allow cross-border commerce, and unlock entry to credit score for the underbanked.

Could Lisk’s VC Eyes Turn to Africa?

Greaves, who brings over a decade of expertise as an entrepreneur, investor, and advisor in rising applied sciences, has seen this shift firsthand.

When he began investing in crypto in 2017, Africa barely registered with venture capital. That modified through the 2021 bull run, when world curiosity flickered. Now, he says, the momentum is actual.

“Investors are realizing Africa is not only a future story however a gift alternative,” he defined.

With mature markets saturated, the continent gives differentiation and the possibility for outsized returns.

“Capital follows perform. The cash comes for those who’re fixing an actual, pressing downside,” Greaves identified.

Lisk COO Dominic Schwenter agrees, including that the blockchain’s method to rising markets goes past technical assist.

While many different ecosystems give attention to onboarding builders and new customers, Lisk is tailor-made particularly to founders dedicated to building a real business utilizing Web3.

“We additionally transcend merely offering protocol-level assist for technical integration. With boots on the bottom in every of our goal markets, we work hand in hand with native companions to offer founders a large spectrum of worth,” Schwenter.

For instance, Lisk presently has greater than 5 native incubation programs globally, which give founders with tailor-made mentorship for his or her native market, in addition to entry to capital and a like-minded neighborhood.

Lisk Bets on Africa as A High-Growth Continent for Web3

Lisk is positioning itself on the coronary heart of this wave, offering actual alternatives past Lisk’s Layer-2 (L2) technology, mentorship, and in-house assist.

It can be constructing the rails for payments-first dApps (decentralized applications), stablecoin settlement, and on/off-ramp integrations.

Greaves highlighted incubator packages run with CV Labs, the place most startups don’t subject tokens.

“That exhibits how utility-driven the mindset actually is,” he mentioned.

Looking forward, Greaves believes Africa might play the identical position for Web3 that India did for IT companies, delivering a progress engine too highly effective to disregard.

He imagines a world the place stablecoins are the default for commerce and remittances, crypto fades into the background of on a regular basis apps, and small companies entry tokenized commerce finance that shortens money cycles.

Regulation, too, will mature, with licensing frameworks and sandboxes enabling compliant progress.

Looking three to 5 years forward, Schwenter defines success in Africa as seamless adoption.

He initiatives that founders and startups which have come by way of the Lisk ecosystem will probably be worthwhile, scale throughout a number of nations, and genuinely enhance how folks entry monetary companies and take part within the world financial system.

These remarks align with assertions from Gideon, who predicted an equally vital progress trajectory for the continent.

“Africa will probably be to Web3 what India grew to become to IT companies…And that can show what this trade was at all times about—fixing real-world issues, not chasing hype,” he concluded.

Based on conversations with Lisk and feedback from founders on the bottom with the Ethereum-based L2 blockchain, Africa’s Web3 story shouldn’t be one of catching up.

It’s a narrative of necessity, ingenuity, and resilience. And if Gideon Greaves is true, it might be the story that defines the long run of blockchain itself. Stay tuned for extra attention-grabbing tales because the Safari continues.

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