First G20 Summit On African Soil Delivers USD 100 M Startup Fund & New AI Push
· WeeTrackerFirst G20 Summit On African Soil Delivers USD 100 M Startup Fund & New AI Push
By
Henry Nzekwe
| November 26, 2025
At the G20 leaders’ summit held for the first time on African soil between 22–23 November 2025, delegates closed out two days of talks with a set of tech- and data-focused commitments that organisers say move the needle on some African priorities.
The summit, which took place in Johannesburg, South Africa, produced a USD 100 M B20 Digital Inclusion Fund aimed at African startups, the launch of an “AI for Africa” voluntary platform, and the establishment of a UNESCO-led Technology Policy Assistance Facility to help countries build AI and tech policy capacity.
The B20 South Africa Digital Inclusion Fund was announced at a B20 summit breakfast, the official G20 dialogue forum with the global business community. It is being structured as a “blended capital” vehicle that pairs concessional and commercial money to lower perceived market risk for investors.
Fund co-leads described it as a targeted vehicle to back businesses working on connectivity, fintech for the unbanked, edtech and healthtech, and agritech that supports digital infrastructure and access. Organisers say governance details and anchor commitments are still being finalised and that the fund is not yet open for applications.
Speakers framed the fund as an outcome of the B20 Digital Transformation Task Force, which is chaired by Phuti Mahanyele-Dabengwa of Naspers South Africa, one of Africa’s key tech investors. At the announcement, co-lead Shalini Khemka cited the scale of the challenge — roughly 2.6 billion people remain excluded from the digital economy — as justification for a blended-capital approach that aims to link capital with connectivity, skills and distribution.
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On the governance and policy front, the G20 Leaders’ Declaration welcomed the launch of the AI for Africa Initiative, described in the declaration as a voluntary multilateral platform to expand access to compute, training, representative datasets and infrastructure across African countries. The declaration ties the platform to a broader push for sovereign AI capability and long-term investment models that leaders say should generate sustainable value on the continent.
To support governments designing rules and regulations, the summit also noted the establishment of the Technology Policy Assistance Facility (TPAF), led by UNESCO under South Africa’s presidency.
UNESCO’s TPAF is presented as a web-based resource and assistance facility to help countries craft technology and AI policy informed by international research and experience. The G20 text and UNESCO materials describe the TPAF as directed at capacity gaps that can produce fragmented or uneven regulatory approaches across jurisdictions.
The summit took place against a tense diplomatic backdrop, notably a lack of U.S. presence and a broader set of diplomatic frictions as the meeting proceeded, but leaders adopted a joint declaration that highlights AI, data governance and infrastructure investment as priorities.
South Africa’s presidency framed the summit under the theme “Solidarity, Equality, Sustainability,” and this year’s meeting was the first G20 Summit to be hosted on African soil following the African Union’s admission as a permanent G20 member in 2023.
As next steps, organisers say the B20 will finalise the Digital Inclusion Fund’s governance and seek anchor limited partners before issuing an application call; UNESCO’s TPAF will roll out policy assistance resources; and the AI for Africa Initiative is positioned as a voluntary platform that participants can join to share capacity, compute and curated datasets.
Each of these initiatives is presented in official documents as complementary, i.e funding, capacity and policy, intended to reduce barriers to participation in the digital economy.
The declarations and B20 announcement provide the formal record of what was agreed; implementation timelines, capital closes, and operational details remain subject to the governance and funding steps that organisers said will follow the summit.