South Africa's strong fintech sector, financial and regulatory systems make it an opportunity for foreign investors, but local corporates need to help seed the startup ecosystem.

The Bakery will help clients build CVC strategies while Staged Ventures will manage the funds and Pipe Ventures will provide deal flow.

Kuroneko Innovation Fund 2 has $51.5m in capital to continue to invest in strategic areas like cleantech, spacetech, fintech, robotics and AI.

Allstate Strategic Ventures is finalising a new investment vehicle that will focus on long-term horizon investments in areas like climate tech.

Javier Gonzalez will be the director of Alantra's corporate venture capital team.

SC Ventures, the innovation arm of Standard Chartered bank, has gone big on building its own startups. It has launched more than 15 so far and always has a pipeline of 30 projects.

Insurance CVCs are eyeing up the potential of AI even if regulation may make adoption slow. Climate risk mitigation and quantum are also on the menu. Blockchain — not so much.

Alex Kamenetskiy is now managing director at the CVC unit, while Ian Sanders and Sabeeha Islam are SVP and VP of portfolio development.

Jeremy Shure will continue to identify and invest in fintech startups in Europe and North America for Sella Group’s CVC unit.

The first wave of insurtech startups hit the wall trying to fight the industry's biggest players. Now, insurance CVCs say they're seeking the ones embracing a partnership model.