Research Database

A research database for people putting money into African companies.

Pick a market, a sector, and the question you are trying to answer. The tool returns what is actually recorded about it: the regulation, the numbers, and what an operator who has worked there would tell you. Where there is no record, it says so.

Who is this for?+

Anyone assessing an African company. Investors and lenders running diligence, founders checking whether a market works the way they assume, analysts who need the regulatory position before a call. You do not need to know the region already. The tool explains what it returns.

What does it give me?+

Three things, always separated so you know which is which: source documents from central banks and regulators, read in full rather than summarised. Verified figures tied to a specific country and sector. And operator observations, things practitioners working inside these markets have said that are written down nowhere else. Every claim shows which record it came from.

What will it refuse to do?+

Invent an answer. If there is no record covering your question, the tool returns nothing and logs the gap rather than producing something plausible. It will also tell you when a claim rests on a single conversation rather than measured data, so you know what weight to put on it.

verified market figures

regulations read in full

unpublished operator signals

markets covered

Add an access key to query live records

Growing weekly. Each new market makes the comparisons sharper.

How this gets built. I use AI to push the search into places I would not have thought to look: adjacent regulators, filings in languages I do not read, market parallels I had not connected. It surfaces candidates fast and at a scale no individual could match. Then the part that cannot be automated: I read the source, decide whether it holds up, and write what it actually means for someone deploying capital. That judgment comes from twelve years operating in these markets. The method is designed to extend the same way into every market I add next, which is why coverage grows without the standard dropping.

Not connected

Reading the database requires an access key with read permission. Everything else on this site works without one.

Add access key

Access key. This tool queries the database directly from your browser. The key is stored in your browser only, sent nowhere except the database, and never written into the page. A read-only key is sufficient.

Build your question Step 1 of 2 · choose what you are asking about

Market

Which country. Pick two if you want them compared. The number beside each is how many records exist for it.

Two markets selected. You will get a comparison rather than two separate answers, showing how each market solves the same problem differently. That contrast is not published anywhere else.

Sector

What the company does.

The question you are testing

The six things that decide whether a deal works. The same six used in the Africa IC Checklist on this site.

Results are counted after the query runs, not estimated before it.

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How a figure qualifies. Numbers enter the database only if they pass three checks: published within the last two years or flagged as older; specific to the exact country and sector rather than an Africa-wide average; and interpretable, meaning it can be explained in terms of what it means for deploying capital. All three: stored as a verified figure. Two: stored with a stated caveat. One or none: marked directional and never presented as fact.

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Coverage, and how it grows. Senegal, Cote d'Ivoire and Cameroun are deepest because I have worked in them and can explain what a rule means in practice, not just what it says. Kenya, Rwanda, Nigeria and Ghana are covered from the official record. Uganda and Tanzania are thin. The method is deliberately repeatable, so each new market is added the same way rather than requiring a different approach, and the comparisons get sharper with every one.