Annemarie (Andy) van Duijn heads the Private Equity funds & co-investment business (Global Funds team) for FMO, managing a portfolio exceeding EUR1bn across Latin America, Africa, Eastern Europe and Asia. Andy previously led the PE funds & corporates team focusing on Asia/ECA and worked within the PE Financial Institutions team. In 2024, she reorganised FMO's PE funds business to enhance portfolio construction. Her diverse background includes investment banking at ABN AMRO and M&A advisory.

In your view, what is the most pressing challenge facing the private capital ecosystem right now?

The most pressing challenge at the moment is that there is still not enough capital flowing into the private capital ecosystem in many African countries to make it work like it should, or could. We see it translated into challenging exit environments and, related of course, challenging fundraising momentum. With growing geopolitical uncertainty, the industry needs the courage of capital allocators (national and international) and strategic players to be active in African markets because the longer-term outlook is still one of potential. It requires not 'waiting and seeing' but being part of keeping the markets moving towards the next levels of maturity. The thing I am optimistic about is seeing more local institutional money moving into private equity.

We're currently witnessing increased scrutiny of diversity and inclusion initiatives globally. How should the African private capital industry maintain momentum on gender equity in the face of fluctuating commitment? 

From my perspective, this is about leadership. And leadership is about vision, amongst other things – about what makes sense in the long run. As long as we have clarity on the 'why' of what we are doing, and how we are doing it, we will not get distracted by people or institutions moving away from these important topics. For us at FMO, working on reducing inequalities, and specifically also gender equality and DEI initiatives, lies at the heart of our work. Not just because we think it makes sense from a business and value creation perspective, but also because we feel it is simply the right thing to do.

This is about human rights, too; about humanity, if you ask me. If anything, we are more motivated to keep working on this in light of current events. And we will not get distracted by them.

I would encourage people working in the African private capital industry to reflect on their own leadership in this, and what role they want to (continue) playing towards the future.

Which bold move have you taken in your career that created unexpected opportunities for you or others in the industry? 

It's a little atypical, but my boldest move I made at the beginning of my career. It was to leave my investment banking job to pursue a career in music. I used to be a singer-songwriter, and have pursued the dream of making a living out of that. People thought (and some shared 😊) I was crazy, as I traded a well-paid job and great career outlook for a very uncertain alternative. In the end, I worked on pursuing that dream in music for another five years before deciding that 'breaking through' was not going to happen for me. And I decided to move into development finance.

So, back to how that impacts our work right now: I very much believe that having pursued that personal dream, and truly getting to know myself by doing this, has laid the groundwork for becoming the intrinsically motivated leader I am today. And by building on and improving that leadership every day, I aim to – together with my colleagues in FMO – create the environment where we dare to challenge each other to get to the best capital allocation decisions for FMO in the markets we operate in, both from a financial return and an impact perspective.

Because in the end, it's only with financially sustainable investments that we can create a longer-term impact on our markets and the private capital ecosystem.