TechCabal Daily – One of Nigeria’s biggest banks wants to battle fintech startups

GTBank is described as “too big to fail” in Nigeria. It is one of the most profitable banks in the country. In 2019, its profit was 53.2% of its revenue. But the bank’s CEO, Segun Agbaje, is bored with the growth potentials in the banking industry. During the bank’s 2019 earnings call, Agbaje said “most banks are growing 5% to 7%. We don’t think that’s sustainable.” He wants to restructure the bank into a holding company. With this structure, GTBank can pursue other non-banking businesses in addition to its core.

In this article, I write that Agbaje has his eyes fixed on payments and fintech businesses. Over the last few years, he has developed competing fintech services to rival Flutterwave, Carbon, PalmPay and OPay. The bank could get even more aggressive against fintechs if it restructures. Looking at the payment business as a zero-sum game, Agbaje’s plan is to win the payment business; “and we’re going to win very easily” he said.

Co-working is an interesting trend in Nigeria from the 2010s. But at the moment the pandemic is having an impact on coworking spaces. With people self-isolating to avoid getting infected, it is affecting the business of coworking and some operators have closed down temporarily, Techpoint reports. Wennovation Hub in Lagos, CcHub and LeadSpace have suspended coworking activities. Other coworking spaces are getting deserted as people have chosen to work from home.

Nigeria’s gets a new five year broadband plan

The Nigerian government recently launched a new five-year broadband plan for the country two years after the previous plan expired. The new plan aims to grow broadband penetration from 30% to 70% by 2025. 5G adoption is a key part of the plan. TechCabal’s Kay Ugwede writes that within the next five years, the government wants 90% adoption of 4G/5G services in the country.

African mobile money transactions in 2019 grew by $125.5 billion

Everybody knows that Africa leads the world in terms of mobile money adoption. A new research by GSMA captures it all. According to the report, in 2019 global mobile money transactions stood at $690.1 billion. 66% of this transaction value came from Sub-Saharan Africa. The report also shares that mobile money users on the continent grew by 55 million last year and the total number of users stands at 181 million.

Will COVID-19 spur new tech innovations?

The global pandemic has had far-reaching effects on the lives of many. Businesses are struggling, healthcare services are overwhelmed and even internet services are struggling with the surge in users. Despite the negatives, Kay Ugwuede writes that for some tech companies, the pandemic presents new business possibilities across a varied number of sectors. 

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Mohamed Okasha, the co-founder and Managing Director of Fawry is quitting to launch a $25 million venture capital fund. Although details are scarce, the new fund will invest in fintechs and it is anchored by Fawry, Menabytes reports.

54Gene raises $500,000 to boost COVID-19 testing in Nigeria

Nigerian health and biotech company 54Gene has raised $500,000 for a fund aimed at improving the country’s capacity to carry out tests for COVID-19. The funds will ramp up testing for the disease by up to 1,000 additional tests a day.

Showmax’s live TV plans continue

Showmax, the Netflix-clone from Multichoice, has introduced seven news channels on its streaming platform. This is not big news, especially because Multichoice recently offered the same channels for free on its pay-TV service, DStv. But the move is worth noting.

The video-on-demand platform is going beyond providing movies and series. Since 2019 it has been trying out live TV content. It introduced sports viewing last year and now it has rolled out news stations. With just these two offerings, Showmax is already competing with another Multichoice product, DStv Now. DStv Now is the online-only version of DStv service and users need to already own a DStv decoder before they can signup.

Showmax doesn’t need a DStv account. Multichoice planned to open up DStv Now to non-DStv subscribers this month but there nothing has happened so far. Perhaps it has switched that plan? Perhaps it wants to prioritise Showmax over DStv Now? Or will both services merge sometime in the feature? We can’t say. But Showmax offers more value than before.

Other things we’re reading:

+ Africa turns to mobile payments as a tool to curb COVID-19

+ My Life in Tech: Mayokun Fadeyibi on expanding online car sales in Africa’s chaotic auto market

+ Kids can keep learning even during a lockdown. Here’s how

+ Will card payments disappear in the nearest future?