Building Africa’s Multigenerational Family Businesses: New Research from East Africa

Family businesses are the backbone of African economies, sustaining livelihoods, preserving heritage, and anchoring local communities across the continent. Yet despite their scale and significance, these enterprises remain under-researched and under-supported. In this article, The Education Collaborative shares insights from a landmark, multi-country study conducted in partnership with the Musizi Sustainable Business Institute, exploring what enables African family businesses to survive, adapt, and thrive across generations—and how research, education, and practice can work together to strengthen their future.

Contributed by The Education Collaborative:

Conversations on entrepreneurship often focus on start-ups – the disruptors bringing fresh, innovative ideas to the marketplace. Yet, beneath the surface lies a quieter, often overlooked engine of African economies: family businesses. Across Africa, these enterprises contribute significantly to employment and household incomes, enhancing communities, and boosting local economic growth. According to the African Development Bank (2021), micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises – many of which are family-owned – represent over 90% of all businesses and generate more than half of all jobs on the continent.   

In East Africa, 64% of family firms reported business growth despite recent global disruptions (PwC East Africa Family Business Survey, 2023). Yet only one in three have a formal succession plan, leaving many vulnerable when continuity matters most. Without deliberate transition planning, these businesses risk collapse – and with them, the jobs, heritage, and family legacies they sustain.  The Education Collaborative recognizes this as a critical space for action. As part of the commitment to context relevant and collaborative research that strengthens entrepreneurship education in Africa, the Collaborative is partnering with the Musizi Sustainable Business Institute (MSBI) to conduct a multi-country study on family enterprises across East Africa.  

Launched in 2024, this research brings together scholars from Education Collaborative network universities in Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, and Rwanda to work with growing family businesses to study what makes family business thrive for multiple generations. The study will generate African-centered teaching cases and actionable insights that bridge academia and industry practice. 

This partnership aligns with the Collaborative’s broader mission to advance research that directly informs practice, strengthening how Higher Education Institutions teach, train, and equip entrepreneurs to lead the multigenerational enterprises they inherit or help build. The study’s findings will be translated into practical teaching tools and curricula that enrich programs designed to develop entrepreneurial and family business leadership.  

Why This Research Matters for Africa’s Development  
Global studies show that family businesses account for two-thirds of firms worldwide and around 70% of SMEs in Africa (Brookings/INSEAD, 2024). In South Africa, they contribute 20–30% of GDP (IOL Business Report, 2024). The World Bank notes that household enterprises account for about 40% of livelihoods in sub-Saharan Africa (World Bank, 2023), Yet, despite their economic importance, African family businesses remain under-researched and under-supported. 

Most global insights come from Western economies, where deep capital markets, robust governance systems, and predictable regulation are the norm. Family enterprises in East Africa operate in a different reality: limited access to finance and talent, exposure to political and climate shocks, weak regulatory systems, and complex family dynamics.  This research study offers one of the first locally grounded research models connecting empirical data, university instruction, and enterprise development.  

Key Insights Shaping Africa’s Next Generation of Family Enterprises 
The ongoing study, now comprising over 40 in-depth case studies, reveals key insights into continuity and resilience in African family enterprises: 

• Generational Shifts: Founders were necessity-driven pioneers, who built enterprises on community trust and risk-taking, while successors enter with global exposure and higher education but face saturated markets and new competitive pressures. 
• Succession Gaps: Few businesses have clear succession plans. Cultural taboos around death and leadership transition mean that disputes often spill into courts, eroding wealth and family unity. 
• Limited Advisory Support and governance gaps: Less than 1% of global family business advisers serve Sub-Saharan Africa. Few programs train successors in governance, conflict resolution, or continuity planning. 
• Mismatch in Education: Heirs studying abroad often return with skills unsuited to local realities, leading to frustration or disinterest in joining the family enterprise. 
• Inheritance as Burden: Successors inherit not only assets but also debts, disputes, and family obligations, creating strain without preparation. 
• Resilience Through Innovation: The most enduring families embraced professionalization, governance structures, and innovation treating continuity as a conscious project, not an assumption. 

At the inaugural African Family Business Conclave in Kampala in August 2025, Elaine Alowo-Matovu – co-founder of MSBI with Takako Mino – and Grace Amponsah of the Education Collaborative highlighted how collaboration between academia and enterprise is transforming the landscape of family business development in Africa.  Elaine emphasized the importance of evidence-based learning for continuity and resilience: 
“African family enterprises hold deep social and economic significance. This work helps us move from anecdote to evidence, and from experience to structured learning that can guide the next generation of family business leaders.” 

Grace, reinforced the Collaborative’s vision for universities as catalysts of transformation: 
“Family businesses are the backbone of our economies, employing millions, preserving heritage, and serving as the first training ground where values of leadership, stewardship, and resilience are nurtured.” 

Turning Research into Teaching and Scaled Application  
A key output of the Musizi– Education Collaborative partnership is the African Family Business Health Rubric, a self-assessment tool designed specifically for African contexts that helps families evaluate their enterprises across leadership development, succession planning, innovation, and risk management. The tool will also support advisory programs helping family enterprises across Africa to design continuity and governance strategies. 

With the research phase concluding, attention now turns to adopting and applying the developed case studies and African Family Business Health Rubric  across partner universities and other key stakeholders. Speaking at the Conclave, Grace highlighted the Collaborative’s next phase: 
“Our focus lies in advancing practice and bridging the gap between what is studied and what is taught. By supporting Musizi to lead the development and application of tools and teaching cases rooted in African realities, we are helping universities prepare entrepreneurs to sustain family enterprises that power Africa’s economies.” 

The partnership with Musizi reflects the Collaborative’s model for scaled implementation, supporting research that informs curricula, industry engagement, and policy insights.  

References:  

1. AfDB Press Release: Global Development Finance Coalition Commits Over $55 Billion to MSME Financing in Africa, 2021 
2. PwC, East Africa Family Business Survey (2023). 
3. Brookings Institution, Foresight Africa 2024: Chapter 3 – African entrepreneurship and innovation (citing INSEAD/Brookings data). 
4. Fox, M. Louise; Pave Sohnesen, Thomas. Household enterprises in Sub-Saharan Africa: why they matter for growth, jobs, and livelihoods (English). Policy Research working paper; no. WPS 6184 Washington, DC: World Bank 
5. IOL / Business Report, Fostering growth of multigenerational family businesses (2024). 
6. Musizi Sustainable Business Institute, East Africa Family Business Landmark Study (2023), supported by The Education Collaborative. 

This article was originally published by The Education Collaborative and is republished here with permission.

The Education Collaborative is a pan-African network advancing higher education through collaborative research, practice-driven programs, and shared accountability among universities and education leaders, with a focus on strengthening graduate outcomes and long-term institutional impact.