Oral East Africa>Helios, France and World Bank eye African entertainment and sports complexes At the hut of the story

Written by Oral East Africa

The explosion of Gen Z into the public space is triggering investments in the creative, entertainment and sports spaces, and the World Bank private arm the International Finance Corporation (IFC) wants in on the action.

IFC have announced a partnership with French development finance institution Proparco, a subsidiary of the Agence Française de Développement Group (AFD Group), and Helios Sports and Entertainment Group to invest in development sites for mixed-use sports, recreation and entertainment properties in the major urban centers in Africa.

Helios set up the Africa focused sports fund last year eyeing the African market; the youngest in the world, with 15 and 24 year olds constituting 19.4 percent of the total population, while children under 15 years are nearly 41 percent.

The young and rapidly urbanizing population, eager for diverse content and audiovisual entertainment industry could contribute $20 billion to Africa's combined GDP and create over 20 million jobs according to UNESCO .

“The creation of the Helios Sports and Entertainment Group is a demonstration of our unwavering passion for Africa and its people and the continuation of the Helios investment strategy, creating unique investment opportunities in sports and entertainment across a broad spectrum from seeding start-ups to providing companies with growth capital and expertise, building profitable and responsible private enterprises,” said Tope Lawani, Co-Founder and Managing Partner, Helios Investment Partners LLP..

Market gap

African governments have not upgraded old sports infrastructure in line to meet their growing youthful populations while some of the planned communal spaces have been overran and grabbed for real estate.

This has meant Africa’s unplanned cities have sprawled without sufficient sports infrastructure which have left talents unexplored and instead devastated communities with crime and drug abuse.

The private sector are filling these gaps with play areas incorporated in some of the modern mixed use apartments set up with communal spaces, sports complexes and malls for entertainment spots.

Africa is a key market in IFC's creative industries strategy, targeting many verticals, such as e-commerce, arts and craft, fashion, audiovisual content, technology, and now sports and entertainment.

Although these sectors are promising routes to accelerate growth and scale innovation on the continent they remain underexploited due to the nature of structured traditional bank finance that tends to avoid these kinds of risks, especially without collateral.

Lucrative space

According to the IFC investing in sports complexes could earn investors $129 for every dollar and $9 for every dollar put in the entertainment business.

The investor estimates the global sports market, valued at $480.12 billion in 2023, is could reach $629.81 billion in 2028 while, the entertainment sector is projected to reach $2.9 trillion by 2027 from $2.1 trillion in 2023, driven by technological advancements and increased content consumption.

IFC said the partnership with Helios Sports and Entertainment would offer an opportunity for IFC and Proparco to jointly address a long history of limited financing in Africa's creative sectors, including sports and entertainment, and catalyze private sector development in the region.

IFC however did not disclose its stake in the Helios Fund which the private equity put in $6,000 in seed capital and bought Cooper Ltd; a company used for acquiring, owning, developing, investing in, and operating development sites for mixed-use sports, recreation and entertainment properties.