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This week: MTN’s mobile money mess

By Ngozi Chukwu Jul 02, 2022

An MTN mobile money billboard advert in Ghana. Image credit: Espen Eichhöfer via Deutsch Bank.

Editor’s Notes

Week 26, 2022
Read time: 5 minutes

Big employee moves this week at TLcom and Flutterwave. Missed them? We’ve cycled the news back up. The healthy workplace culture at startups is (still) on our minds at TechCabal, and we have a story about that here.

Have a fun weekend,

Kelechi Njoku, Senior Editor, TechCabal.

Editor’s Picks

	MTN alleges $53 million mobile money fraud MTN hasn’t courted fintech that long, yet it’s already dragging 18 Nigerian banks to court over a ₦22.3 billion ($53.7 million) mobile money fraud. Allegedly, the fraud was committed over a 1-month period. Read the story on TechCabal
	Paystack transfers launches in South Africa Paystack has gone south for its customers. The fintech company has launched its Paystack Transfers services in South Africa to facilitate money transfers on the platform which could only collect payments before now. Learn more on TechCabal
	Former Goldman Sachs MD appointed as Flutterwave CTO Waving goodbye to Goldman Sachs, former managing director Gurbhej Dhillon joins Africa’s biggest fintech startup Flutterwave as chief technical officer (CTO). He’ll use his experience in leadership, engineering, and application architecture to bring about internal infrastructural developments at Flutterwave. More about this hire on TechCabal
	Abeg pockets MOMO license New name, new service. Abeg has been renamed PocketApp by its parent company PiggyTech. It has also pocketed a mobile money (MOMO) license to transition from a payment app to a social commerce app that supports online merchants in Nigeria. Read it on TechCabal
	FirstCheck Africa is $2 million heavier FirstCheck Africa is checking Africa’s gender funding gap. The women-focused angel fund received a $2 million commitment from venture capital firm TLcom Capital. Summed to their $10 million debut fund, they’ll have $12 million to write more cheques for African female-led startups. Read it on TechCabal
	Binance partners with Khaby Lame Most followed TikTok Influencer Khaby Lame rose to fame by making complicated things look simple. Binance is tapping into the Khaby magic to drive mass adoption of crypto, NFT, and all things web3. Read more on TechCabal

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	A ransom for ShopRite’s customer data Cyber-terrorist group RansomHouse is demanding a ransom from Africa’s largest retailer, Shoprite, for data of some of its customers in Eswatini, Namibia, and Zambia. Their threat is simple: Pay us, or we sell the 600GB of data. Read the full story on TechCrunch
	Sudan shuts off its internet…again Following the military coup in Sudan, the country’s internet has been shut down to discourage online press and protests about the political violence occurring in the country. Quartz Africa has the full details
	COVID vaccines go mobile in Kenya COVID-19 vaccines are on wheels in Kenya. The country’s ministry of health is collaborating with Amref Health Africa and AstraZeneca to send solar-powered mobile clinics to vaccinate people in hard-to-reach areas in the East African country. The news is on The Guardian
	AFDB grants ECOWAS $2 million Many of West Africa’s problems are tied to power and the African Development Fund (ADF) wants to change that. It has approved a technical assistance grant of $2 million for electricity reforms in countries of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). Read more on IT News Africa
	South African charged with $1.7 million bitcoin scam In this week’s episode of pyramid schemes, Johann Steynberg reached new heights. Johann ran a $1.7 million bitcoin-based network marketing scam that began in South Africa and drew in 160,000 members worldwide. Read about it on MyBroadband

Who brought the money this week?

Moove secured $20 million debt funding to build an integrated vehicle financing platform
African fintech Yellow closed a debt financing round of $20 million.
Sava secured $2 million pre-seed funding to build a spend management platform for African businesses.
Kukua, a Nairobi- and London-based edtech, raised $6 million to build an IP-centric kids’ “edutainment” universe.
Egyptian tech startup Synapse Analytics raised $2 million in a pre-Series A funding round to help businesses adopt AI.
Malian insurtech OKO closed a $500,000 seed extension round for its Côte d’Ivoire expansion.