Why It’s Time to Rethink SAFEs for Africa’s Startup Ecosystem

Why post-money SAFEs may be hurting African founders and investors—and how we can fix them.

The Simple Agreement for Future Equity (SAFE) was designed to make early-stage fundraising simpler, faster, and more founder-friendly.

And in some ecosystems, it does exactly that.

But in Africa, the standard SAFE—especially the post-money variant popularized by Y Combinator—is quietly creating avoidable problems. Founders are getting diluted before they’ve even hit product-market fit. Investors are sitting on “equity-ish” promises that may never materialize into actual shares. And both parties are often unaware of the implications until it’s too late.

This isn’t a call to abandon SAFEs. It’s a call to adapt them—intelligently—for the African context.

1. The SAFE’s Original Purpose—And What’s Changed

When YC launched the SAFE in 2013, it was a smart fix to a real problem: early-stage startups needed capital, but traditional convertible notes brought legal complexity and risks around interest rates and maturity dates.

The SAFE eliminated those pain points. It was meant to be simple, quick, a…