Consumer tech companies keep making the same expensive mistakes when they try to expand into Africa and emerging markets. The playbook that worked in Silicon Valley or London often falls apart completely when it hits the ground in Lagos or Accra. Susan Chen has watched this happen over and over again during her 15-year career, first at McKinsey and Jumia, then as Managing Director at New Trials Capital where she invests in ventures such as PalmPay and Speedaf.
Building Bridges Between Global Capital and Local Innovation
Chen’s job basically comes down to one thing: finding great local companies that need capital to grow. “At New Trials Capital, we bridge global capital with local innovation,” she explains. Sounds simple enough, but most investors struggle to understand what actually works in these markets. The problem isn’t lack of opportunity. These markets are exploding with potential. The problem is that too many companies show up thinking they can just copy what worked somewhere else. Chen has seen this movie before, and it usually doesn’t end well.
Local Innovation Always Beats Global Templates
Here’s where most companies mess up right from the start. They take a successful business model from New York or Singapore and expect it to work exactly the same way in Kinshasa. “Too many companies try to cut and paste what worked in the West or in Asia. But in places such as Lagos, Accra, or Kinshasa, the rules are different,” Chen says. The differences aren’t just cultural tweaks you can fix with better marketing. The entire infrastructure works differently. “Consumers leapfrog straight to mobile money. Distribution happens through informal channels and trust is built offline as much as online,” she points out. If you build a product that doesn’t account for these realities, you’re basically building something nobody can actually use. Chen has seen companies burn through millions of dollars before they figure this out. The smart ones flip their thinking completely. “Local innovation isn’t a constraint. It’s your biggest competitive advantage,” she argues. Once you stop seeing local market conditions as problems to solve and start seeing them as opportunities to create something better, everything changes.
Your First Hires Will Make Or Break You
Most business advice sounds obvious until you actually try to do it. Take hiring, for example. Everyone knows you need good people, but in emerging markets, your first few hires can literally make or break your entire expansion. Chen learned this lesson the hard way during her time at Jumia. “The biggest unlock for scale is local leadership,” she says. But it’s not just about hiring locally. The real trick is giving local teams enough freedom to actually do their jobs. “At Jumia, what drove real growth wasn’t just strategy. It was giving local teams the autonomy to adapt, move fast, and own their markets.” This pattern shows up everywhere in her portfolio. “Every successful founder we’ve backed has one thing in common. They are obsessed with finding the right people on the ground.” Not obsessed with hiring cheaply or hiring quickly, but obsessed with finding people who actually understand their markets and can move fast when opportunities show up.
Scale With Resilience, Not Just Speed
Growth stories always sound great in investor meetings. Reality is messier. Chen has seen too many promising companies crash when they hit their first major obstacle. Exchange rates swing wildly, infrastructure breaks down, governments change policies. The companies that survive are the ones that plan for this stuff ahead of time. “Scale with resilience, not just speed,” Chen advises. The temptation is always to grow as fast as possible, especially when things are going well. But emerging markets have a way of humbling companies that get too aggressive too quickly. “Growth is always exciting, until it breaks. In emerging markets, volatility is the norm. FX swings, infrastructure gaps, policy changes are all part of the landscape.”
The solution isn’t to grow slowly, but to grow smart. Build cushions into everything: your operations, your cash flow, your expectations. “In our portfolio, the ventures that survive aren’t always the flashiest, they’re the most adaptable,” Chen notes. Her advice for anyone thinking about expanding into these markets cuts straight to the point: “Scaling across Africa and emerging markets is not just about ambition, it’s about understanding. If you can respect the market, build with local allies, and move with resilience, you won’t just grow, you will endure.” That’s the difference between companies that crash and burn after six months and companies that build something lasting. Understanding beats ambition every single time.
Connect with Susan Chen on LinkedIn to learn more about scaling in emerging markets.
