Africa is not just catching up in Web3, it’s setting the pace. This is the argument from Gideon Greaves, Head of Investments at Lisk, who spoke to BeInCrypto during the ETHSafari 2025 in Nairobi.
Greaves believes the continent’s unique mix of necessity-driven innovation, grassroots entrepreneurship, and rising VC (venture capital) interest is turning it into the world’s most authentic crypto growth story.
Forget Silicon Valley, Africa Is Web3’s Real Testbed
Shopkeepers tap away on smartphones to accept crypto payments in Nairobi’s bustling markets. In Lagos, freelancers prefer stablecoins over the naira to protect their earnings from inflation.
Farmers also connect directly with buyers in rural Ghana through blockchain-powered apps that run on basic phones.
Lisk has long positioned itself as a gateway to Web3. From his perspective as COO, Dominic Schwenter sees Africa as central to this mission.
“Africa represents what happens when Web3 bypasses the speculation phase and goes straight to solving real problems. Many regions got caught up in DeFi yield farming and NFT trading. Still, African founders are building payment rails, supply chain transparency, and financial access tools because they have to,” Schwenter explained.
According to Schwenter, the mobile-first culture and entrepreneurial necessity create conditions where blockchain technology finds genuine product-market fit. These proven use cases then become templates for adoption everywhere else.
While regulators in Washington and Brussels debate how to define digital assets, Africa is already living the Web3 experiment. This is not surprising for Gideon Greaves, Head of Investments at Lisk.
“Africa has the highest entrepreneurship rate in the world—one in five adults owns their own business,” Greaves started in his interview with BeInCrypto.
According to the Lisk executive, African founders cannot afford to chase hype, as they build because they have to solve problems.
Indeed, data tells its own story, with a recent Chainalysis report showing stablecoins accounted for 43% of crypto transaction volume in Sub-Saharan Africa in 2024. That dominance is no accident.
Stablecoin vs. Bitcoin Usage in Africa. Source: Chainalysis report
Against this backdrop, Greaves highlights stablecoins as digital dollar accounts accessible to anyone with a mobile phone.
In economies where inflation erodes savings and remittances eat into household incomes, they are not a speculative instrument but a lifeline.
“It’s not about speculation—it’s about survival,” he added.
Small businesses preserve value in stablecoins, families cut transfer fees, and freelancers demand payment in digital dollars. In Africa, crypto is not a “future” use case; it is the present.
With Conviction, Nothing Beats a Problem-Led Builder
That sense of urgency shapes the playing field for startups. Unlike in Silicon Valley, where projects often launch tokens first and search for users later, African Web3 companies flip the model.
“They’re problem-led, not token-led,” Greaves articulated.
In this regard, Michael Lawal, partner at AyaHQ, agrees, noting that conviction is one of the key ingredients for a founder’s success. AyaHQ is one of the biggest Web3 founders’ incubation programs in Africa.
Meanwhile, Web3 companies in Africa are equity-backed businesses with live users. Tokens only appear if they serve a clear purpose.
That founder-first philosophy resonates on the ground. Ikenna Oriza, founder and CEO of Jamit, told BeInCrypto that he chose Lisk despite being courted by multiple ecosystems.
“Every major blockchain pitched us, and we even tested a few, but we picked the chain that showed up. Lisk already has what the others have and the edge that matters the most for us: intentional, hands-on support for African founders building for a global audience,” Oriza said in an exclusive statement to BeInCrypto.
Among other highlights, Oriza is renowned for pioneering the African digital music era.
The results are products that work in low-connectivity environments, enable cross-border trade, and unlock access to credit for the underbanked.
Could Lisk’s VC Eyes Turn to Africa?
Greaves, who brings over a decade of experience as an entrepreneur, investor, and advisor in emerging technologies, has seen this shift firsthand.
When he started investing in crypto in 2017, Africa barely registered with venture capital. That changed during the 2021 bull run, when global interest flickered. Now, he says, the momentum is real.
“Investors are realizing Africa is not just a future story but a present opportunity,” he explained.
With mature markets saturated, the continent offers differentiation and the chance for outsized returns.
“Capital follows function. The money comes if you’re solving a real, urgent problem,” Greaves pointed out.
Lisk COO Dominic Schwenter agrees, adding that the blockchain’s approach to emerging markets goes beyond technical support.
While many other ecosystems focus on onboarding developers and new users, Lisk is tailored specifically to founders committed to building a real business utilizing Web3.
“We also go beyond simply providing protocol-level support for technical integration. With boots on the ground in each of our target markets, we work hand in hand with local partners to provide founders a wide spectrum of value,” Schwenter.
For example, Lisk currently has more than five local incubation programs globally, which provide founders with tailored mentorship for their local market, as well as access to capital and a like-minded community.
Lisk Bets on Africa as A High-Growth Continent for Web3
Lisk is positioning itself at the heart of this wave, providing real opportunities beyond Lisk’s Layer-2 (L2) technology, mentorship, and in-house support.
It is also building the rails for payments-first dApps (decentralized applications), stablecoin settlement, and on/off-ramp integrations.
Greaves highlighted incubator programs run with CV Labs, where most startups do not issue tokens.
“That shows how utility-driven the mindset really is,” he said.
Looking ahead, Greaves believes Africa could play the same role for Web3 that India did for IT services, delivering a growth engine too powerful to ignore.
He imagines a world where stablecoins are the default for trade and remittances, crypto fades into the background of everyday apps, and small businesses access tokenized trade finance that shortens cash cycles.
Regulation, too, will mature, with licensing frameworks and sandboxes enabling compliant growth.
Looking three to five years ahead, Schwenter defines success in Africa as seamless adoption.
He projects that founders and startups that have come through the Lisk ecosystem will be profitable, scale across multiple countries, and genuinely improve how people access financial services and participate in the global economy.
These remarks align with assertions from Gideon, who predicted an equally significant growth trajectory for the continent.
“Africa will be to Web3 what India became to IT services…And that will prove what this industry was always about—solving real-world problems, not chasing hype,” he concluded.
Based on conversations with Lisk and comments from founders on the ground with the Ethereum-based L2 blockchain, Africa’s Web3 story is not one of catching up.
It’s a story of necessity, ingenuity, and resilience. And if Gideon Greaves is right, it may be the story that defines the future of blockchain itself. Stay tuned for more interesting stories as the Safari continues.
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