Venture Capital Analyst Program (Mercy Corps Ventures)

Job Description

Location: Nairobi, Kenya 🇰🇪 (In-person)

Position Status: A year-long analyst program with the opportunity to extend and transition into a permanent hire post the program.

Summary

Whether you have a burning desire to dive into venture investing or you already have some venture investing experience and are looking to hone your VC craft, this role is for you.

Join one of the most active global, early-stage impact venture firms, and help them find and back the most disruptive trailblazers in fintech, web3, climate-tech, and ag-tech across Africa and around the world

This is the role for you if:

• You are excited to dedicate the next year (and hopefully longer!) to an intensive, up-close program which will allow you to dive deep into the industry and advance your journey into VC with a top-tier investor that is actively deploying and will give you significant transaction exposure

• You are passionate about entrepreneurs and share the belief that high-impact startups are the best engines for driving sustainable, equitable, and resilient impact at scale

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ABOUT VENTURE FOR AFRICA

Venture for Africa offers immersion programs designed to immerse top local and global talent in the African startup ecosystem.

We enable experienced talent who might be new to the startup space or the particular market they’re looking to enter, to soft-land and gain context while working with a startup or venture fund that's hiring.

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ABOUT MERCY CORP VENTURES

Mercy Corps Ventures invests in and catalyzes venture-led solutions to increase the resilience of underserved individuals and communities. Founded in 2015 as the impact investing arm of global development agency, Mercy Corps, they've supported 41 early-stage ventures to scale and raise over $333.9 million in follow-on capital. The fund's portfolio is 51% female-founded and centres around resilience-building solutions in adaptive agriculture and food systems, frontier fintech, and climate-smart systems so that those living in frontier markets can withstand disruption and plan for the future. Through capital and support, piloting new approaches, action-oriented insights, and rigorously managing impact, we catalyze the ecosystem toward smarter, more impactful investments.

Select investments include Payhippo, Complete Farmer, Ndovu, Pula, Goldfinch, Ejara and two of Venture for Africa's startup partners, Wasoko and Turaco.

MCV has significant capital to deploy and the team is actively sourcing and closing new investments, with a target to close approximately 10 investments in 2023. They will also be launching new investment vehicles in the coming 24 months.

For more information, please refer to their Website, Annual Impact Report, Resilient Future Thesis, and Full Portfolio.

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Engagement Description

Mercy Corps Ventures is looking for an Investment Analyst to join its growing Investment Team. You will play a supporting role in building out MCV's portfolios and be integrated into all aspects of the investment process from origination to closing.

During this engagement, you will work with the team's other investment professionals to screen, perform due diligence, negotiate, and close seed and early-stage direct investments.

While you will have access to venture capital training and resources over the course of the immersion experience to build out the essential competencies necessary to succeed in VC, the focus of the experience will be to provide you with live training through direct exposure to transactions as they progress in real-time.

This position is a 1-year, full-time analyst program. You will be expected to commit to the entire program, with the expectation that high performers may extend for an additional period or join the team in a full-time role.

MCV is growing significantly over the next 24 months, so there will be a variety of career growth paths within the fund.

Essential Responsibilities

Pipeline Analysis & Due Diligence (80%)

You will support the investment team in progressing investments through the entire investment cycle, from initial screening to due diligence and closing. This includes:

• Landscaping & Pipeline Analysis: Support the mapping of investment opportunities in specific priority sector(s) for Mercy Corps Ventures.

• Screening: Support on screening investment opportunities through review of pitch decks, participation in live demo days, meeting entrepreneurs, pouring through data rooms, and management of our inbound deal flow.

• Due Diligence: Support the investment team to conduct detailed data room analysis and interviews with relevant industry experts and partner investors to review and analyze business plans, validate assumptions, stress-test financial forecasts, gain an in-depth knowledge of a company’s unit economics, and address key due diligence inquiries and investment risks.

• Investment Research: Conduct and present research as needed in areas such as analysis of market opportunities, threats, competitive differentiation, and potential headwinds to emergent sectors or markets, as necessary to support investment decisions.

• Investment Documentation: Attend all investment team meetings and investment committees and support investment professionals to lead deals through the investment process, including drafting investment memoranda, identifying and explaining key investment risks, coordinating legal and financial DD, structuring and negotiating transaction agreements, and presenting investment opportunities to senior decision-makers.

• Investment Recommendation: The opportunity to support the investment team in making recommendations on and presenting investment opportunities to the Ventures Team, Investment Committee, and Board for debate and approval.

• Deal Structuring and Execution: Assist in the preparation of investment documentation and other transaction documents, as applicable, and support the coordinated onboarding of closed investments into Mercy Corps Venture’s investment portfolio with applicable handoffs to the Platform Team.

Research & Insights (10%)

• Content Generation: Support the investment team and work with Mercy Corps Venture’s Communications team to develop curated content through insight pieces to be shared externally.

Pipeline & Partnership Development (10%)

• Work with the investment team to grow and foster new relationships with strategic partners such as incubators, accelerators, peer investors, and other ecosystem actors in target geographies and sectors.

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Accountability

• Reports directly to: Investment Partner, Mercy Corps Ventures
• Works directly with: Investment team members, entrepreneurs, co-investors, and ecosystem partners, with exposure to the broader Mercy Corps Ventures team

Analysts will be paired up with a member of the investment team at each stage of the internship in order to gain exposure to and have a chance to develop the full curriculum of skills needed to be an impact investing professional.