TLcom Capital, the Africa-focused venture capital firm, has added TurnStay, the South African travel payment platform, into its early-stage portfolio.
Turnstay was added into TLcom’s dedicated $5M pre-seed fund dubbed TAPSI [TIDE Africa Pre Seed Investments] which was launched in 2022 for pre-seed stage companies.
According to Eloho Omame, Partner at TLcom Capital, “Pre-seed investments allow us to expand our portfolio and allocate capital across multiple stages of a company’s lifecycle. Our goal is to create massive value in underserved markets and collaborate with African founders to build from the start all the way to exit; be it an acquisition or in the form of an IPO.”
“This is by no means easy for any start-up, in any sector; building in Africa is not for the faint-hearted. However, the likelihood of success significantly increases if we support and work with founders earlier on in their journeys and we grow alongside them,” Omame added.
TAPSI provides up to $200,000 in funding alongside access to the firm’s global network, operational expertise, and over two decades of experience in African venture investing.
TAPSI acts as an upstream feeder vehicle for TLcom’s core $154M TIDE Africa Fund II, enabling portfolio companies that perform well to progress to larger funding rounds.
Which has just closed a $2M seed round, TAPSI has now deployed 50% of its capital.
Apart from Turnstay, the TAPSI has also invested into Nigeria’s Talstack, Sudan and Ethiopia’s Bright Financial, Egypt’s Tradehub and Kenya’s Agrails.
The fund also invested in First Check Africa, which focuses on delivering early-stage capital to female founders. TLcom expects to close on up to ten additional pre-seed investments before the end of 2026 via TAPSI.
TLcom boasts one of African tech’s most impressive early-stage portfolios, including Pula, uLesson, Autochek, FairMoney, Educatly, HUB2, ILLA, Littlefish, Seamless HR, and Andela.
With approximately $250 million under management, including the $154M TIDE Africa II, TLcom is dedicated to empowering ambitious entrepreneurs who are solving critical challenges in large, underserved markets.
Eloho Omame concludes, “With TAPSI as a dedicated pre-seed arm of our investment platform, TLcom is uniquely positioned to back companies across their entire growth journey from ideation and product-market fit to scaling and maturity, reinforcing our role as a long-term partner to Africa’s most ambitious founders. As we progress with this fund, we look forward to speaking with and supporting more early-stage start-ups from across the continent”.