Adesuwa Okunbo Rhodes

Adesuwa Okunbo Rhodes has 12 years of investment banking, private equity, and structured credit experience in developed and emerging markets from global institutions. She is the Founder and Managing Partner of Aruwa Capital Management, one of the few woman-owned and led private equity funds in Africa investing in untapped investment opportunities in West Africa in the small to lower mid-market. Prior to starting Aruwa Capital, she spent five years as Managing Partner of Syntaxis Capital Africa, a provider of growth capital to SMEs in Nigeria and across Sub Saharan Africa. Syntaxis Africa was part of Syntaxis Capital, a private equity fund active in other emerging markets with $300 million in AUM from global institutional investors. At Syntaxis Africa, she led transactions totaling more than $200 million across SSA. Prior to co-founding Syntaxis Africa in 2014, Adesuwa was in the Leveraged Finance and M&A teams at J.P. Morgan in London, where she was involved in $5.6 billion worth of transactions across emerging markets including Nigeria.

Prior to J.P. Morgan, Adesuwa worked in Africa-focused PE fund, TLG Capital as an Investment Professional, involved in transactions across Anglophone Africa including a highly successful investment in Uganda, where she personally invested and generated a very attractive return. She was named as an Agent of Impact in 2019 by Impact Alpha for her commitment to gender equality in private equity and across the society through Aruwa Capital’s investments.

She started her career at Lehman Brothers and holds a BSc in Economics from the University of Bristol. She currently sits on several boards in Nigeria including Wells Hosa GreenHouse Farms and Wells Carlton Hotel and Luxury Apartments.