The Middle East is becoming a hub for channeling investment into Africa, as its economies continue to expand and develop, according to a recent report by international law firm Hogan Lovells.

Andrew Skipper, Head of Hogan Lovells' Africa Practice said: "We've witnessed a steady increase in clients from the Middle East entering into African markets, no longer solely in the North and East regions but across the wider continent.”

“As African economies continue to expand and develop, businesses and investors are increasingly recognizing the benefit of using Dubai as a base to access the massive growth potential available,” he said.

According to the report on Middle East Investment into Africa, this is partly because the Middle East has a long relationship with Africa, sharing both language and cultural ties.

“But the proximity of Dubai to many parts of Africa makes it an ideal transport hub, boasting better flight connections than many European countries have with the continent,” the report said.

Sub-Saharan Africa has attracted more than $10bn of foreign direct investment from the Gulf since 2005, but North Africa has attracted around ten times that amount, highlighting the closer ties the Middle East has with countries in the north of the continent, according to the Dubai Chamber of Commerce.

Skipper said that could change as Middle East investors focus more on countries in eastern Africa such as Kenya, Tanzania and Ethiopia.

Since 2005, inbound mergers and acquisitions (M&A) activity into Africa from the Middle East has totaled $31bn, roughly 14% of all inbound M&A from outside the continent over that period, according to Dealogic.

African private equity deals meantime have totaled almost $22bn since 2010, according to data from the African Private and Venture Capital Association, or AVCA.

Abraaj Group is one of those private equity groups that has been taking steps to expand on the continent from its base in Dubai.

Last year the firm closed its third Africa-focused fund at just shy of $1 billion (£706m).

But while buyouts might appeal to some firms, a joint venture with a local partner is still the most common way for companies to expand into Africa, said Imtiaz Shah, a Dubai based Partner at Hogan Lovells.

Sometimes this is because in certain jurisdictions there are rules limiting foreign ownership, but more frequently it is to gain vital local knowledge, he said.

Shah added: “What a lot of foreign companies find is that they don’t think they know the market well enough. Also to go in and try and grow something organically yourself and learning through mistakes is a slower method. But if you believe in the opportunity then M&A is a better way to do it because it is a much more hard-wired solution and it could be more profitable because you don’t have to share profits with a joint venture partner.”

Even though there has been some recent cooling towards emerging and frontier markets amid wider global growth concerns, there is not a lack of capital on the continent.

For large infrastructure projects, development finance institutions (DFIs) remain the biggest lenders, mostly because they can provide more long-term loans.

The Arab Coordination Group invested around $3.5bn in African infrastructure projects in 2014, about 12% of total public external funding on the continent, according to the Infrastructure Consortium for Africa’s most recent data.

Olivier Fille-Lambie, Partner at Hogan Lovells, who has worked on projects such as the new international airport in Dakar, says there are signs this is changing.

“Commercial banks and debt funds increasingly seek to participate in financing infrastructure projects alongside the traditional DFIs,” he said.