Philosophy
At Timon Capital, we have tremendous respect for the entrepreneurial journey—especially in emerging markets. As former entrepreneurs, we’ve built companies and gone through the frustration of trying to manage wayward investors. We decided to hold ourselves to a higher standard and named ourselves Timon: a Greek word that means ‘the one influenced by honor’ as well as ‘fairly priced.’
Capital in Africa is scarce—which means entrepreneurs need to be very efficient. We aim to work with the companies we back to make smart choices for the founders, their teams, and the market. Sometimes that means coaching them how to speak the language of Silicon Valley, sometimes that means helping them get buttoned up for private equity, and sometimes that means helping to chart a course to financing future growth out of cashflows.
We are patient. We are our own biggest investors, which means less drama driven by external pressures. No one knows how exits are going to happen in emerging markets or how long they will take. We are happy to work patiently with the companies we back. We are also happy to be at work building the entire ecosystem: bringing in multinationals, helping arrange secondary transactions, and bringing global talent to share what they’ve learned.
Say hello: @timoncap
“The team at Timon Capital has been an incredible partner as we continue to scale and grow. Through their extensive network - including strong family ties to West Africa - they have assisted Lori with some of our key customers. They have been amazing thought partners and have been instrumental in our strategic direction we have achieved to date.”
—Josh Sandler, Founder of Lori Systems
“Timon Capital is the investment house, but Nikos and Chris are your friends. They represent the epitome of how investors in African companies should be. Local market knowledge, readily available and most importantly they believe your vision to build a unicorn.”
—Angela Essien, Founder of Schoolable