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The Africa Ecosystem Catalysts Facility, a $4 million pilot investment facility managed by Village Capital with funding from FMO and the Netherlands Enterprise Agency (RVO), has announced its first two investments in Ghana. The facility is deploying capital into Rivia Clinics, a tech-enabled primary healthcare startup, and VDL Fulfilment, an e-commerce logistics platform built for African SMEs.
Village Capital is investing $200,000 in Rivia to support its growth. The platform connects SMEs and individuals to a network of branded and partner clinics, offering virtual and in-person care through a single membership. By combining digital access with a growing physical footprint, the startup is making primary healthcare more accessible, predictable, and affordable. Since launching in 2024, Rivia has reached over 50,000 patients and continues to scale an asset-light model that enables rapid expansion without heavy infrastructure investment.
“For too long, healthcare has been built around misaligned incentives – providers, insurers, and patients operating in silos with no one truly accountable to the person who needs care. Rivia Clinics is rewriting that by combining care delivery and employer-health financing into one unified model. The Africa Ecosystem Catalysts Facility’s investment comes at exactly the right moment – enabling us to expand our clinics chain, strengthen our sales efforts, and deepen our virtual care capabilities,” says Isidore Kpotufe, founder of Rivia Clinics.
The second investment is in VDL Fulfilment, an end-to-end e-commerce logistics platform enabling African SMEs to store, manage, and deliver products more efficiently. VDL provides integrated warehousing, order management, and last-mile delivery services through a proprietary platform, helping businesses reduce operational complexity and scale without heavy upfront investment. Since its launch, the company has processed over $3.8 million in merchandise value and fulfilled more than 170,000 orders. It supports over 150 active vendors on its platform.
A $150,000 investment, structured as a blend of a convertible note and milestone-based debt financing, will enable the company to strengthen its warehouse and fulfillment infrastructure, expand its fleet, and develop distributed hubs closer to demand, all of which will increase delivery capacity and reduce costs for the SMEs it serves.
“Access to this type of capital allows us to build at the speed our operations can actually support, not at the speed capital usually demands. In a logistics environment like ours, premature scale creates inefficiencies that compound quickly,” shared Vanessa Omari, CEO at VDL Fulfilment.
Heather Matranga, managing director of venture and investments at Village Capital, said: “Rivia and VDL are strong examples of the businesses emerging across Ghana – founders building practical solutions to real, everyday challenges, from accessing quality healthcare to moving goods more efficiently. What stands out is the impact both companies are already having, driven by their deep understanding of the problems their customers face and the environments they operate in.”
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