• Black Swan builds alternative AI-based credit-scoring tools for Africa’s informal economy.

• The fintech won the 2025 MEST Africa Challenge and secured a $50,000 investment.

• The company uses non-traditional data such as mobile-money flows and merchant-terminal activity to estimate borrower capacity.

Derick Kazimoto develops a new method to interpret economic traces and reshapes how lenders analyze credit risk. He opens access to previously untapped information that financial institutions use to refine their lending decisions.

Kazimoto, an entrepreneur and consultant based in Dar es Salaam, co-founded and currently leads Black Swan. The fintech, registered in Mauritius, builds alternative data-analytics tools that enable lenders to assess solvency with higher precision and broader flexibility.

Black Swan, founded in 2022, focuses its operations on the informal economy in sub-Saharan Africa. The company designs AI-based evaluation models that rely on non-traditional data to expand financing access for SMEs, micro-entrepreneurs, traders and individuals with limited banking history.

The company’s core product is an alternative credit-scoring engine. The system estimates the borrowing and repayment capacity of individuals or small businesses without depending on conventional bank-history checks. The models integrate mobile-money transactions, merchant-terminal receipts, recurring bill payments and a broad range of digital footprints. Lenders can combine these scores with their internal systems to refine risk models.

Black Swan won the seventh edition of the MEST Africa Challenge in November 2025. The award granted the company a USD 50,000 investment and entry into the MEST portfolio.

“Our mission is to make Africa bankable. We believe the continent is shifting from informal, collateral-heavy lending to data-driven credit. This transformation changes how banks and fintechs trust, lend and grow,” said Black Swan CEO Derick Kazimoto after the announcement.

Alongside his role at Black Swan, Kazimoto works as a fintech consultant for AfroPavo Analytics, a Tanzanian company that builds digital solutions using data analysis. He also co-founded Tausi Africa, an AfroPavo subsidiary that develops financial tools.

Kazimoto earned a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from the University of Cape Town in 2019, followed by a master’s degree in financial technology in 2021. He began his career the same year as a data scientist at Spoon Money, a South African fintech. He later joined Akeo Tanzania, the development hub of the Akeo Group, where he served as country director from 2021 to 2022.

This article was initially published in French by Melchior Koba

Adapted in English by Ange Jason Quenum