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In Wednesday’s newsletter, we hailed Flutterwave as one of the startups listed as Times 100 most influential companies. Gro Intelligence, another startup from Africa was also part of that list.
In today’s edition:
- Opera’s Q1 results
- My Life In Tech
- Amazon’s big plans
- Some funding news
Opera’s unaudited Q1 report
The Norwegian web company Opera has released its unaudited report for the first quarter of 2021. In Africa, Opera is most famous for its browser’s data-saving feature.
But the company also owns a news platform called Opera News hub, with an app on Android and iOS. The app reportedly has over 300 million users, with many users doubling as paid news creators.
It means that Opera has multiple revenue streams, and in Q1, all those streams saw huge improvements.
Highlights:
- Opera’s monthly active user base increased by 16 million year-over-year in the first quarter; driven by 12% and 14%
- Opera News revenue grew over 260% year-over-year and 30% sequentially versus the fourth quarter.
- The Company reached 79 million average monthly PC users in the first quarter, up 17% year-over-year.
Is an Opera financial report complete without a mention of OPay? Since Opera owns 13.1% of OPay, it often reports its transaction volume. Those figures are often enormous, and whenever they are published, it causes quite the stir.
Looking forward: Look out for my analysis of Opera’s Q1 report by noon today!
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My Life In Tech
Every week, My Life In Tech tells the stories of Africans making a difference in the world of technology. This week Edwin spoke to Jade Leaf, the head of the East and South African divisions of the digital music distribution company, Tunecore.
Jade shared her thoughts on how life is different thanks to the pandemic, when architecture was her passion, and the serious business of building structures for the African music industry.
Her words: “If you look in my career over the years, there’s always been some level of contribution to music and culture and I think for me, as long as I’m doing that, at some level where I can actively make decisions, then I’ll always be fulfilled.”
Amazon’s big plans for Africa
Last week, Amazon had some pretty big news as it announced its first African office will be in South Africa. The planned HQ will be 70,000 square meters and be on the outskirts of the city centre.
It’s a massive project that’s expected to take between three to five years, and early estimates suggest that 19,000 jobs will be created as a result. Daniel dug into the details of the project and how Amazon will spend $280m on it.
Some funding news
Kidato, a Kenyan, Y Combinator-backed online homeschooling startup, has raised $1.4 million seed investment for expansion across Africa as the pandemic hits the education sector.
The $1.4 million was raised from Learn Start Capital, Launch Africa Ventures Fund, Graph Ventures and Century Oak Capital, among others, to fuel growth for the alternative teaching platform built around Zoom.
Also, the Egyptian mobile lending app Kashat has secured a funding round from Cairo Angels as it looks to expand its product suite and scale operations.
Founded by Sumair Farooqui and Karim Nour and launched last year, Kashat is the first nano lending mobile application in Egypt, offering short-term loans of between EGP200 (US$13) and EGP1,500 (US$95) with a repayment plan up to 61 days.
Opportunity
Ingressive For Good recently partnered with Jobberman Nigeria on the #I4GJobberman Soft Skills Scholarship to train people in soft skills.
It covers negotiation, CV/cover letter writing, job search strategies, interview prep, working in highly successful teams, personal development and more.
Registration closes on May 5th, so register here to be a part of the program.
What else we’re reading
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