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About MMOF

The Missing Middle Opportunity Facility.

We sell two things to growing companies in East Africa: money, and the skills to use it. Both are priced. Both are measured.

MMOF team meeting a portfolio company
Invested
$4.8M
In portfolio companies
Financed
9 companies
Direct investment
Employed
224
People in the financed companies
Head office
Helsinki
Teams in Kampala, Nairobi, Mogadishu

What the name means

Finance is easier to get for large companies and for micro businesses than it is for the companies in between. The industry calls that gap the missing middle. Most of the businesses in that gap are not short of demand. They are short of capital and short of management capacity at the same time, and one without the other does not move them.

MMOF exists to sell both together. We select companies that are economically viable and that operate responsibly, then we finance them and work inside them. The word opportunity in our name is deliberate. The missing middle is a market, not a cause.

Why we charge for the work

Free advice has no price and no accountability. We agree a fee for the services before the work starts, and we agree what we must deliver for it. That gives the company a reason to hold us to the result, and it gives us a reason to send our best people.

The same logic sits behind the service-backed loan. Money and skills arrive in one agreement, so neither side can treat the skills as optional.

In high income countries SMEs supply 60% of the jobs. In low income countries they supply 30%. That difference is the whole business case.

What we look for

  • Revenue already coming in from paying customers
  • Operations in Uganda, Kenya or Somalia
  • A management team that wants the skills as well as the money
  • A business that can pass an ESG review and gain from it commercially

How we are funded

We work with investors, institutional donors, NGOs and the private sector. Grant funding pays for the capacity building that a loan on its own cannot buy. Investment capital pays for growth. Keeping those two sources distinct is what lets us price the services honestly.

The people who build with you.

Team

JK

Jukka-Pekka Kärkkäinen

Chief Executive Officer
Helsinki
EO

Emmanuel Obwori

Chief Operating Officer
Kampala
HA

Hani Almeghari

Head of ESG and Impact
Helsinki
JH

Johanna Arantola-Hattab

Marketing, Sales and Customer Experience
Helsinki
AI

Anton Ivanov

Financial Management Specialist
Helsinki
DK

Dennis Omondi Kasuku

Investment Analyst, Business Development
Nairobi
ML

Mutuma Laiboni

Business Analyst, Shared CFO Services
Nairobi
JA

Juliet Aparo

Investment Associate
Kampala
AY

Abdek Idriss Youssouf

Investment Analyst
Mogadishu

Names and roles are taken from the current site. Bios and matching studio portraits are still to be supplied, and several roles have changed since the site was last updated.

Building a business worth backing? Let us look at the numbers.

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