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Ghana is now the fastest growing mobile money market in Africa. Registered mobile money accounts increased six-fold between 2012 and 2017. The increased ownership of mobile money accounts has caused access to formal financial services to rise from 41% of adults in 2014 to 58% in 2017. While Africa has always led the rest of the world in mobile money, Kenya has been at the forefront with the success of M-Pesa. Higher mobile phone penetration and a favourable regulatory environment are now helping Ghana show an example in financial inclusion.
Niger, Mauritania and Equatorial Guinea have the slowest broadband speeds in Africa according to the Worldwide broadband speed league 2019 report by Cable. The report ranks the broadband speeds in 207 countries across the world. Madagascar is the fastest African nation and the 33rd globally with an average speed of 22.57Mbps. Africa’s largest economy, Nigeria, where it takes about 7 hours to download a 5GB movie is ranked 176. In contrast, it takes 8:02 minutes to download the same file in Taiwan, the world’s fastest broadband speed.
Airtel Africa has now listed on Nigeria’s stock exchange. Its shares closed up 10% (max allowed for a single day) giving it a market cap of about $4.2bn. Its competitor MTN Nigeria is currently valued at $7.2 billion. Airtel Africa listed on the London Stock Exchange in June with the aim of raising $749.05 million. Its Lagos cap is currently higher than its London cap.
Nigeria-based fintech startup, Cowrywise has partnered Scale My Hustle to provide financial and growth advisory to African entrepreneurs. The program is expected to impact at least 500,000 unique businesses in the next 10 years. Learn more about the program here and get a chance to participate here (enter “Mochievous” as referral source).
Tomorrow, Thursday, July 11, Techcabal is convening African governments, regulators, investors, development agencies, multinationals and entrepreneurs at TC Townhall: Renewable Energy to discuss “The Future of Africa’s Energy”. We will be attempting to answer the question “How do we quickly build modern energy infrastructure, that is affordable and provides last-mile access, using abundant renewable energy resources, in a friendly policy environment?”
Russian ride-hailing startup, InDriver has launched in Kampala, Uganda. This will be its fourth African nation following its launch in Nairobi in June. It first started its Africa operations in Tanzania and is also present in South Africa. InDriver was founded in 2013 and it hopes to differentiate itself by allowing riders haggle prices and not charging drivers commissions. It currently operates in 200 cities, is used by 26 million people and has raised $15 million in two rounds from Leta Capital.
Tunisia has received $175 million from the World Bank to invest in startups and the digitization of social protection as well as education. Through the ‘Tunisia Innovative Startups and SMEs Project‘, the government will use $75 million from the loan to provide equity and quasi-equity to approximately 280 ‘innovative startups’ and SMEs. The project will be implemented by the Caisse de Dépôts et Consignations (CDC) and the International Finance Corporation.
Applications are now open for the second cohort of the GreenHouse Lab accelerator. Female-led or female-focused startups with an aspiration to scale across African markets can get into the program byapplying here before August 4.The program is put together by GreenHouse Capital in collaboration with Vibranium Valley and Google Launchpad Africa. Startups who meet GreenHouse Capital’s criteria could receive a minimum of $100,000 in investment.
South Africa’s Knife Capital has led an undisclosed Series A round in Cradle Technology Services. The 19-year old company provides a barcode-based warehouse management system called Granite that can be easily integrated into ERP systems. The company has implemented its system in over 100 sites across three continents and in over 40 different industry sectors.
The India-Africa Entrepreneurship and Investment Summit is holding from August 16 – 18 in Mauritius. Learn more about the summit and apply here.
TechCabal Daily – Laid off for doing too well