TechCabal Daily – Layoffs at Max

Imagine you have a big box of colourful storybooks, and you want to share them with friends. My job is to help find those friends, make sure they know the storybooks exist, and get them excited to read them every time a new one comes out. I also help make the storybooks fun, easy to read, and interesting, so all our friends keep coming back for more stories!

At first I was afraid, it was part of my job as a journalist. 

And then, it offered me the opportunity to learn a lot of things and learn them fast. There’s product management, yes, but there’s also front-end development, UX/UI design, performance marketing, and content strategy. I’ve even done a couple of expense sheets. 

Plus law and products are similar in the sense that you can do both in any sector and any company.

It depends on the objective of the newsletter. For a newsletter with an objective to redirect leads or readers outside the product itself, the metric of success is not an open rate but a click-through rate. The value here is not how many people open, it’s how many people click. 

Open rates are super critical; I’d say they’re the primary measure of success but look, they’re just percentages, and percentages can be misunderstood. 

For example, a newsletter recording an increase in open rates from 35% in January to 40% in June is not necessarily a good thing. In January, the newsletter may have had 100,000 readers which would mean a 35% open rate is 35,000 active readers. In June, they may have dropped to 80,000 which means just 32,000 active subs at a 40% open rate. The percentage increased, sure, but the real numbers tell us that numbers are dropping.

That’s why it’s essential to go beyond percentages and focus on the actual numbers, whether it’s clicks, conversions, or another metric, to truly measure your newsletter’s success.

Be consistent—this is the hardest part. I always like to say that newsletters are hungry-hungry babies. They require consistent attention or they will fester away into irrelevance.

The biggest is that we’re still navigating is email literacy.

Over the past five years, across every company I’ve worked with, we’ve consistently found that our target audiences aren’t as email-literate or email-conscious as we’d like. This gap makes growth tougher by limiting the number of high-quality leads we can generate. For example, you might run an ad and capture 4,000 leads, but only around 400 of them will consistently read the product—many might not even remember clicking the sign-up link.

To address this, we’ve tightened our sign-up process with a double opt-in. This ensures that only genuinely interested readers subscribe, even if it means a narrower funnel. The funnel is so thin it only reinforces my theory on email literacy. I think we continue to grossly overestimate just how many people use emails for their day-to-day tasks. 

Nigerian mobility financing startup MAX has made a bold bet on electric vehicles (EVs), but not without casualties. In January, the company laid off 150 employees—30% of its workforce—as it transitioned to exclusively financing EVs across Nigeria, Ghana, and Cameroon.

The move is part of MAX’s ambitious plan to finance 120,000 EVs, triple the number of vehicles it supported in 2024. However, the layoffs have raised concerns among employees, some of whom claim the terminations were abrupt and lacked severance packages. MAX insists the restructuring was necessary, offering support measures like job placement assistance.

Beyond workforce cuts, the company has introduced cost-saving measures, including reduced energy consumption and a push for cleaner energy sources at its offices and battery swap stations. MAX is also scaling its EV charging infrastructure, securing a $10 million partnership with PASH Global in November 2024.

Despite its aggressive pivot, MAX faces huge financial demands. Since 2019, it has raised $63 million in equity and debt financing, but with EVs costing up to $900 per unit, securing additional capital will be critical.

The mass job cuts signal that the mobility financing startup is on a path to becoming cost-efficient. Nigeria’s EV industry has seen some remarkable advancements. Over the past few months, players like Siltech, are increasingly betting that Nigeria, despite the infrastructural lack, is ready for EVs. 

MAX is part of that bubble; however, its EV bet is a question of whether the startup can balance its ambitious goals with the human cost of its transition. It needs to raise money to finance and prioritise its new growth efforts, sacrificing profitability—or the hopes of it—in the process.

At the start of the week, rumours spread about the Nigerian government taking over Keystone Bank, a commercial bank with ₦307.5 billion ($204 million) in total assets. This follows the Central Bank of Nigeria’s (CBN) decision in January 2024 to sack the boards of Keystone, Union Bank, and Polaris Bank over “regulatory non-compliance and corporate governance failure.” The apex bank said they were also involved in activities threatening their financial stability.

To address the rumours and avert a potential bank run, Keystone Bank issued a statement on Tuesday clarifying that the Lagos State Special Offences Court had ordered the forfeiture of shares previously held by its shareholders, transferring ownership to the federal government.

When a government takes over a bank, it often signals deep financial or corporate governance troubles. In Keystone’s case, the move could suggest that the government is stepping in to stabilise operations, protect depositors, and ensure compliance with regulatory standards. While this intervention is intended to prevent a collapse and maintain confidence in the financial system, it also raises questions about the bank’s future and its recapitalisation efforts. Keystone Bank stated that the clarity around ownership will allow it to focus on raising the required capital to maintain its banking licence.

This is not the first time the Nigerian government has taken such action. In 2009, the CBN intervened in several banks, including Afribank, Finbank, Intercontinental Bank, Union Bank, and Oceanic Bank, firing their executive directors after audits revealed severe financial mismanagement. The CBN injected ₦400 billion ($2.5 billion at the time) to stabilise their balance sheets. Some of these banks were later acquired by new investors or rebranded. For instance, Skye Bank, which faced similar issues, was taken over and eventually became Polaris Bank in 2018.

Keystone Bank itself has a history of revival. It was created in 2011 after taking over the assets of the distressed BankPHB. BankPHB’s licence was revoked for failing to meet the recapitalisation deadline. 

That moment in history could come full circle if Keystone fails to recapitalise by the March 2026 deadline set by the CBN. While the bank shows no immediate signs of weakness, rumours about consolidation among smaller banks continue to swirl—with Keystone Bank featuring heavily in the early talks.

With the takeover of Keystone Bank, the government could inject much-needed funds to stabilise the bank’s financial books in the short term while figuring out long-term solutions. Despite talks of a bank run, it is in the CBN’s interest to maintain confidence in the retail banking sector.

This week, Raenest, a Nigerian fintech platform, raised $11 million in Series A funding. The round was led by QED Investors, with participation from Norrsken22, Ventures Platform, P1 Ventures, and Seedstars. (February 11)

Here are other deals for the week:

• Egyptian social e-commerce platform Taager secured a $6.75 million Pre-Series B funding round led by Norrsken22. The round included participation from Endeavor Catalyst, Beltone VC, and existing investors such as 4DX Ventures, RAED Ventures, BECO Capital, and Breyer Capital. (February 11)
• Affinity Africa, a Ghanaian digital banking platform, secured $8 million in seed funding in a round led by Grazia Equity and BACKED VC. Other participants include Enza Capital, Launch Africa, Renew Capital, Finca International, Attijariwafa Ventures, Impact Assets, and other prominent angels. (February 11)
• Rode Publications & Media, a South African startup, secured an undisclosed investment from REdimension Capital’s Real Estate Technology and Sustainability Fund I. (February 10)

Follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn for more funding announcements. Before you go, read our State of Tech in Africa review for 2024. Click this link to read it.