Setting up a venture fund in 2020 was a “huge paradigm shift” for Stellenbosch University in South Africa, because, for the first time, the executive leadership at the institution became interested in spinouts, says Anita Nel, the chief director for innovation and business development, because they understood that academic research had commercial value and a way to build, for example, local pharmaceutical expertise (the country had to wait six months longer than the northern hemisphere for a covid-19 vaccine because there were no vaccine developers or drug discovery companies in all of Africa).