Minet, a leading pan-African insurance brokerage, risk advisory, and employee benefits solutions provider, has received a new investment from Adenia Partners, with Capitalworks Private Equity successfully exiting its shareholding after eight years of ownership.
The transaction hands one of the continent’s most established insurance brokerages, operating across nine African markets, to a new institutional partner positioned to lead its next phase of growth.
A Business Built Across Nine Markets
The Adenia Partners acquisition of Minet following Capitalworks’ exit in 2026 transfers ownership of a company with genuine pan-African scale.
Minet operates across Botswana, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia, serving corporates, SMEs, and institutions with comprehensive insurance and risk management services.
That nine-country footprint did not happen by accident. It reflects a deliberate strategy of regional expansion that began before Capitalworks’ involvement and accelerated significantly under its ownership.
Minet’s origins trace back to its time as part of global broker Aon before being acquired by Capitalworks in 2017.
That history matters for understanding the business Adenia has now acquired: a company with international brokerage standards inherited from its Aon years, combined with the regional market knowledge and operational independence that came with carve-out ownership under a dedicated private equity partner.
Why Capitalworks’ Exit Matters for African Insurance Brokerage Private Equity
Capitalworks’ exit from Minet’s insurance brokerage business in 2026 represents a successful conclusion to a private equity ownership cycle that demonstrates the model working as intended.
Garth Willis, Managing Partner at Capitalworks, described the transaction as a testament to how active private equity partners alongside experienced management teams can unlock significant growth potential in leading businesses and facilitate the introduction and successful transition to new shareholders.
That framing captures the core value proposition of private equity ownership in African financial services: institutional capital and governance discipline applied over a multi-year period, building a business that becomes attractive to the next category of investor at exit.
Capitalworks took Minet from an Aon carve-out to a business with nine-market reach and sufficient scale to attract Adenia’s interest, a trajectory that validates the patient capital model for African insurance brokerage assets.
How Adenia Partners is scaling Minet’s pan-African insurance brokerage starts with a thesis about demographic opportunity.
Martha Osier, Partner at Adenia, pointed to a generational opportunity to build scalable, technology-driven insurance models that meet the needs of young and urbanising populations across many parts of Africa, positioning Minet to capitalise on that shift.
Africa’s population is younger and urbanising faster than most global regions, and insurance penetration across the continent remains low relative to comparable emerging markets, creating significant headroom for brokers that can modernise distribution and product design.
Adenia’s stated priorities for the next phase include supporting the management team through this growth period, implementing operational and sustainability-linked best practices, and extending Minet’s leading position across its existing markets.
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That combination of management continuity and operational upgrade is consistent with how Adenia has approached other African platform investments: backing proven teams rather than replacing them while bringing the governance and technology infrastructure that allows a regional leader to scale further.
The Capitalworks-Adenia Minet Transaction Across Nine African Markets
The Capitalworks-Adenia Minet insurance private equity transaction spanning nine African markets is significant for what it signals about the maturity of African private equity exits in financial services.
Insurance brokerage is a business built on relationships, regulatory licensing, and accumulated institutional knowledge in each market it operates in.
Successfully transferring ownership of a business with that complexity across nine separate regulatory jurisdictions, without disrupting client relationships or operational continuity, requires the kind of structured, professional transaction process that both Capitalworks and Adenia have demonstrated experience executing.
For institutional investors watching the African financial services sector, the transaction adds to a growing body of evidence that well-governed, multi-market platforms in insurance and risk management can generate the kind of exit outcomes that justify continued capital allocation to the sector.
African Insurance Technology and Growth Under New Ownership
African insurance technology and growth prospects for Minet under Adenia Partners’ investment in 2026 will likely centre on closing the gap between traditional brokerage models and the digital distribution channels that are reshaping insurance access across the continent.
Mobile-first insurance products, embedded insurance within other financial services, and data-driven risk assessment are areas where technology-enabled brokers can outpace incumbents still operating on legacy processes.
Minet’s existing scale across nine markets gives it a distribution advantage that newer, digital-native insurtech competitors lack.
Adenia’s stated intention to build scalable, technology-driven insurance models suggests the next phase of Minet’s growth will combine that existing distribution strength with the kind of technology investment that allows the business to serve younger, increasingly digital-first customers more effectively.
What This Deal Signals for African Financial Services
This transaction highlights continued strong investor appetite for high-performing African financial services businesses with scalable platforms and clear growth potential in insurance, risk, and employee benefits.
For an asset class that has sometimes struggled to attract the depth of institutional interest seen in African fintech, Minet’s transition from Capitalworks to Adenia is a reminder that insurance brokerage, when built with the right governance and regional scale, remains a compelling investment category on the continent.
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