Developing innovative solutions to boost the SME world is a major concern for African economies. Yet, accessing financing remains a headache for sector players.
On Tuesday, November 15, the International Finance Corporation (IFC) announced the launch of a new vehicle dedicated to supporting venture capital systems in Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia, and Pakistan. This $225 million fund will provide seed funding for startups that address development issues in areas such as climate, health, education, agriculture, e-commerce, etc. through technological innovations.
“Support for entrepreneurship and digital transformation is essential to economic growth, job creation, and resilience. It will help innovative tech companies in Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia, and Pakistan expand during a time of capital shortage and create scalable investment opportunities. We want to help develop homegrown innovative solutions that are not only relevant to emerging countries but to the rest of the world,” said Makhtar Diop, IFC's Managing Director.
The already difficult access to funding for startups in low-income countries has worsened with the global slowdown in venture capital investment, the Covid-19 pandemic, rising food and supply chain costs, rising interest rates, and currency devaluations. However, countries still have a huge potential for development. In Africa, for example, the digital economy could contribute up to $712 billion to the continent’s GDP by 2050, according to a report published on June 9 by the international network of high-impact entrepreneurs Endeavor.
The IFC sees in its new platform a way to boost nascent venture capital markets in regions that have shown early growth potential but face challenging global economic conditions. The international organization says it will make equity and quasi-equity investments in tech startups and help them grow into scalable companies capable of attracting traditional equity and debt financing. It will also use the platform to collaborate with other World Bank Group teams to build and support venture capital ecosystems through regulatory reforms, sector analysis, and other tools.
An additional $50 million will be provided by the International Development Association's Private Sector Window Blended Finance Facility, which helps reduce the risk of investments in low-income countries.
Samira Njoya
The growing number of fintechs in Africa is comforting many countries in their ambition to develop cashless economies. In Ethiopia, innovative solutions are being shaped to accelerate this development.
One of them is ArifPay, a fintech solution developed by a local startup of the same name. The solution is an app that allows users to transfer, save and receive money directly with their mobile phones. The fintech was founded in 2021 by Habtamu Tadesse (pictured, center) and has already raised over $3.5 million in expansion funds. With his startup, the entrepreneur seeks to provide convenient, innovative, safe, and secure electronic payment processing services and platforms for the Ethiopian market.
“ArifPay aspires to make a significant contribution to the financial sector by offering digital-based payments services that meet the needs of consumers and merchants towards cash-lite transactions in line with the national agenda of the digital economy,” Habtamu Tadesse said. “We also believe ArifPay will support the country’s aspiration towards building a digital economy by empowering businesses and entrepreneurs who are looking for digital payment solutions to digitalize their business and services deliveries,” he pointed out.
The app is available on both android and iOS systems. Merchants using the app will be able to make electronic invoices, record taxes, and perform 100% cashless transactions with their clients if they also use ArifPay.
In addition to the mobile and web platforms, the fintech has developed a mobile point-of-sale system that will allow ATM cardholders to conduct electronic transactions on smartphones.
Adoni Conrad Quenum
The solution aims to facilitate the acquisition of real estate properties for the Senegalese population.
Alpha Digicrédit is a digital platform developed by a Senegalese eponymous start-up. It aims to democratize access to housing for Senegalese, both locals and the diaspora, by allowing access to real estate loans.
According to Dina El Kadry, the mastermind behind the solution, with Alpha, users have a precise idea of the overall cost of their real estate acquisitions (both the loan and the fees), thus avoiding additional costs. They can also negotiate the best conditions, with experts helping them reduce costs along the entire acquisition process, he adds.
The startup has a mobile app that provides users with all the information they need when they initiate an acquisition process. It then gives them information to assess the quality of the property they want and choose the adequate financing model.
Through the mobile app, on registration, users can view all the properties listed on the platform and use the mortgage calculator to assess whether their acquisition projects are feasible.
"For many Senegalese and even Africans living on the continent or abroad, acquiring a real estate property is a life goal. [..] As a single point of contact, Alpha manages the entire process by applying for loans and dealing with notaries insurance companies, and developers. It oversees the case till completion,” Dina El Kadry explains.
Adoni Conrad Quenum
The tech entrepreneur heads several startups in Kenya. His ambition is to help households fend for themselves.
Sam Wanjohi (photo) is a Kenyan entrepreneur and founder of fintech startup Popote Payments Ltd. In 2013, he launched -through Popote Payments- Popote Pay, an expense management solution designed for African businesses. The solution allows businesses to easily pay for everything including supplies, salaries, utilities, and taxes. It also enables team collaboration in the payment workflow.
“Popote Pay allows businesses to link, and enables the payout of multiple bank accounts or mobile money wallets. Completed transactions are stored alongside their notes, attachments, authorization history, and accounting general ledger, meaning the accounting part is also done. At the click of a button, records can be retrieved for use in preparing management or audited accounts. The entire process is seamless,” Sam Wanjohi explained in 2021.
Popote Pay is the result of personal experience. Indeed, in 2012, Sam presented his concierge platform, Dash2do, at the Phocuswright Travel Innovation Summit. Thanks to the concierge platform, he was the third winner of the challenge and had to scale the solution in the U.S. This was a major headache as he still had to oversee his businesses in Kenya. So, he developed Popote Pay to be able to run his Kenyan operations remotely.
In 2007, the serial entrepreneur founded Foresights Interiors, a home furniture manufacturer. Five years later, he founded Foresight Ventures, a firm that develops tech solutions to solve day-to-day problems and invests in other innovative startups.
He is also the non-executive chairman of Foresight Housing Group, formed in 2018 with the acquisition of Foresight Interior and Economic Housing Group (established in 1972).
He entered the professional world, in 2002, working as a civil engineer for the British multinational professional services firm Arup. In 2005, he entered the real estate investment sector, kicking off his entrepreneurial career.
Melchior Koba
The coronavirus pandemic revealed the need to develop strategies to ensure education continuity in times of crisis. In that regard, countries, and development partners are now implementing projects to bridge the digital divide and transform the education system.
Earlier today, November 15, during an event organized on the sidelines of COP27, UNESCO and HUAWEI presented their joint Technology-enabled Open Schools for All (Huawei TECH4ALL) program.
The program was presented by Stefania Giannini, Assistant Director-General of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). During her presentation, she explained that it has become necessary to leverage technologies to change education models.
“Aiming to leave no one behind in the digital world, enabling equity and quality in education is one of four focused domains in the Huawei TECH4ALL digital inclusion initiative,” said Catherine Du, head of the Huawei TECH4ALL program.
The program, which entered its implementation phase in Ghana, Egypt, and Ethiopia last year, aims to encourage the development of resilient education systems in times of profound global changes like the Covid-19 pandemic. Apart from equipping schools, the program also includes digital training for teachers and learners as well as the development of online platforms -to enable hybrid learning- and digital courses.
In Egypt, the joint UNESCO-Huawei program aims to empower 950,000 teachers, principals, and supervisors to more effectively integrate ICT into their daily practice. Ultimately, in the country, 23 million basic education students are expected to benefit from an improved and more equitable digital learning experience.
TECH4ALL, which aligns with UNESCO’s flagship program Priority Africa, will ensure that Sub-Saharan African countries can leverage technology as an accelerator to achieve MDG 4 and as an equalizer for digital development opportunities. It will contribute to the achievement of the goals of "Agenda 2063: The Africa We Want," including sustained investments in universal early childhood development and basic education, and the elimination of gender disparities at all levels of education.
Samira Njoya
Africa wants to leverage digital technologies to accelerate its economic growth. For that purpose, countries are acting together for more efficiency.
The West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU) will adopt a Regional Program for the Development of the Digital Economy (PRDEN). This is one of the decisions approved by the member countries’ Ministers of Digital Economy when they met in Cotonou, Benin, last Friday.
The XOF121 billion (US$190 million) program -deemed ambitious and innovative- aims to boost the digitalization of socioeconomic activities in the community.
"We started with pilot projects, extending resources to member countries under the program for the installation of digital boxes and the digitization of public services,” indicated Abosse Akue-Kpakpo, the WAEMU commission’s head of digital economy. He added that the commission has already funded the elaboration of a legislative and regulatory framework, which is being submitted to member countries for approval, to improve governance.
According to Abosse Akue-Kpakpo, in recent years, West Africa has made remarkable efforts for the development of its digital economy. In a video published earlier this year, the WAEMU informs that nearly 94% of the zone has a mobile cellular subscription and nearly 40% have access to the internet. More than 80 million mobile money accounts are active in the region, representing 63% of the population. The mobile money accounts carry out over 2.7 billion transactions for a cumulative annual value of XAF29 trillion+ (more than US$47 billion).
The PRDEN, through its four main axes, intends to strengthen digital governance, improve access to digital services, promote innovation and research and boost the digital services offering.
The program will run from 2023 to 2027, with the expectation that it would help digitize 120 public services in the WAEMU member countries. To raise the funds required for its implementation from financial partners, a roundtable will be organized in the second quarter of 2023.
At the end of the meeting held on November 11, 2022, the participating parties also approved the draft decision on the establishment of the Commission of Digital Regulators and the draft directive for the improvement of mass adoption of digital technologies.
Samira Njoya
The physician has nearly 20 years of clinical experience in HIV/TB and 10 years of experience in the healthtech segment. The healthtech startup he founded provides effective and much-needed digital health solutions to “support self-care and provide access to services.”
Musaed Abrahams is a South African health professional and the founder/CEO of Aviro Health, a healthtech startup founded to improve access to quality healthcare in Africa.
“My goal is to create healthcare impact through technology by focusing on empathy, great design, and data,” his Linkedin profile reads.
His healthtech startup offers tech solutions that automate workflows, therefore allowing healthcare professionals to focus on important tasks. It also improves access to health information and provides digital consulting services. Currently, it claims more than 50,000 patients helped in South Africa and Kenya.
The startup developed Aviro Pocket Clinic to allow healthcare providers to easily and quickly perform digital HIV, tuberculosis, and diabetes checks. It also allows individuals to privatively perform those checks and access specialists and services for support when needed.
Its CEO holds a Bachelor of Medicine and Surgery (MBChB) obtained at the University of Cape Town in 2001. In 2010, he got an HIV management diploma from the Health Professions Council of South Africa. He also took part in the Harvard Business School’s Healthcare management program.
His professional career began in 2005 as a senior physician at the ARV Clinic in South Africa. He joined Médecin Sans Frontière (MSF) in 2008 as the HIV training coordinator in South Africa. Then, from 2013 to 2015, he worked as the organization's digital content producer and editor, contributing to the creation of the eighth edition of the MSF HIV/TB guide.
Currently, he is the deputy president of MSF's Southern Africa board. Between 2016 and 2017, he was a senior business development consultant for the health technology company Praekelt.org.
Let’s note that his startup, Aviro Health, was among the top 45 of the most innovative startups at the AfricaTech Awards 2022. It is also a beneficiary of the pan-African innovation program Investing in Innovation.
Melchior Koba
Though they are not yet popular like fintech and healthtech solutions, insuretech tools are garnering a fair share of attention in Africa. In Rwanda, a tech entrepreneur has developed a solution to allow access to decent healthcare for corporate employees.
Eden Care is a digital platform developed by a Rwandan eponymous start-up. It helps users subscribe to health insurance without even passing through insurance brokers.
"Eden Care was founded to create the kind of health insurance we wanted for ourselves – one that is affordable and doesn’t require filling six pages of documents at the hospital and a three-hour wait time. One where we can easily see our benefits and provides wellness tools, community, and incentives to enable us to get and stay healthy,” explains Moses Mukundi, CEO and founder of Eden Care.
The solution offers customizable and affordable health plans allowing firms to subscribe to plans based on the number of their employees. It boasts an extensive network of providers for good national coverage. If necessary, it resorts to telehealth.
It significantly reduces the paperwork with faster pre-authorizations and also reduced reimbursement times for medical providers.
"We see Eden Care as having what it takes to deliver that increase in value and service for consumers. […]By digitizing insurance processes and providing a wellness-first insurance cover to employers, Eden Care is making quality health insurance accessible to an underserved market – growing SMEs and businesses,” says Arnold Mwangi, partner at the Dutch impact investment firm DOB Equity, which contributed to the healthtech startup’s recent pre-seed round.
Adoni Conrad Quenum
Digital tools are currently considered essential technologies for Africa's post-Covid-19 recovery and even its future growth. However, unequal access to the internet may become a challenge to countries’ efforts.
Last Thursday, the European Investment Bank (EIB) announced US$10 million in support as part of its cooperation with telecom infrastructure company the Bandwidth & Cloud Services Group (BCS Group).
The investment aims to bring transformed digital connectivity to more than 2.5 million people living in remote areas of the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo through a fiber optic network built by BCS.
"The European Investment Bank is committed to accelerating digitalization across Africa and is pleased to strengthen our partnership with BCS to transform high-speed fibre optic networks in the DRC. Expansion of the fibre optic backbone will enable local communities to benefit from mobile broadband and hospitals and schools to be connected to the rest of the world,” said EIB Vice-president Thomas Östros.
According to the Global System Operators' Association (GSMA) report "The State of Mobile Internet Connectivity 2020, "DRC is one of the African countries that have the largest connectivity gap between urban and rural areas. Its demand for connectivity has grown significantly after the coronavirus pandemic, encouraging international companies to invest in the country. Liquid Technologies, Facebook, and CSquared have committed to building fiber optic networks in the country to improve access to affordable broadband internet.
The new BCS investment, supported by the EIB, will connect areas currently underserved by broadband telecommunications. The support will fund the construction of 1,200 kilometers of fiber out of the 20,000 kilometers planned by BCS in Southern, Central, and Eastern Africa over the next 3 years.
Several outcomes are expected at the end of the project. According to the EIB release, "better digitalization will unlock new opportunities for local entrepreneurs and support job creation, and direct telecom connections to 319 schools and 70 hospitals and health centers to improve education and public health."
Samira Njoya
The Ivorian government is multiplying digital initiatives to boost young people and women’s employability, promote innovation and reduce unemployment.
In Côte d’Ivoire, Communication Minister Amadou Coulibaly (photo, right), and Minister of Trade Souleymane Diarrassouba (photo, left) launched the Employment4Youth program last Thursday.
The program’s full name is "Employment4Youth / Industry 4.0 to promote youth employment in Tunisia and Côte d'Ivoire. It was launched in collaboration with the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) with financial support from the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). It aims to support and strengthen stakeholders’ capacity in the ICT and agribusiness sectors to ease access to the opportunities presented by the fourth industrial revolution as well as create jobs for women and the youth with the adoption of new technologies in targeted value chains.
"Our country wants to ensure that the digital economy is a growth sector by creating jobs for the youth and promoting investments,” said Amadou Coulibaly, before stressing that the government's goal is to make Côte d’Ivoire a fully digitized country by 2030. Last September 26, the country set up a National Digitalization Committee, that will, among other things, elaborate a framework governing digitization efforts for an effective digital transformation.
In 2011, the Ivorian government initiated several digital reforms including the adoption of the National Digital Strategy. The strategy is focused on seven pillars. It suggests 32 reforms and 96 projects requiring a XOF2,000 billion (US$3.15 billion) investment to be implemented over 2021-2025.
According to Amadou Coulibaly, the Employment4Youth program is part of this strategy. It is also in line with the structural transformation promoted by the president of the republic to make digital transformation an effective solution to youth employability. The initiative will be based on Industry 4.0 or the industry of the future which uses artificial intelligence, big data, digital technologies, blockchain, e-commerce, etc. It will create 13,000 jobs (3,000 direct jobs) by 2025 in the private sector (social and ecological transformation, renewable energy, ICT, agribusiness, etc.). The estimated investment required is US$30 million.
Samira Njoya
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It is sometimes challenging to send money to relatives in Africa because of the high fees charged by transfer companies. The situation has improved in recent years, with tech entrepreneurs developing innovative solutions to address the issue.
Yalla Xash is a fintech solution developed by a Moroccan eponymous startup. It allows users to quickly send money to Canada, Senegal, and Côte d’Ivoire, via its mobile app.
Using its mobile app -Android and iOS apps, registered users can send funds, which will be available for withdrawals in cash within 30 seconds. For bank transfers, it takes a max of 48 hours to clear.
The startup claims its withdrawal fees, which start from CAD1.99 (US$1.5), are up to six times lower than the competition. It always sends SMSs to notify recipients of incoming transactions and the details of the specific transactions. Also, once the funds sent are withdrawn it sends SMSs to senders informing them of the successful withdrawal.
Currently, PlayStore data shows its Android app has been downloaded more than 5,000 times. After the Covid-19 pandemic, it recorded a 35% rise in transaction volume and is steadily gaining ground in Africa. It has over 4,300 pickup points in Morocco. In June 2021, it announced the raise of MAD6 million (US$560,000) from the Maroc Numeric Fund, which was seduced by its solution and social impact.
Adoni Conrad Quenum
She is a lawyer with more than 10 years of experience working for Belgian law firms. Recognizing how difficult it is for residents to access legal information in Senegal and Africa in general, she decided to create a digital database of African laws.
Nafissatou Tine (photo) is a Senegalese lawyer and entrepreneur. She is the founder and CEO of Sunulex, a start-up that digitizes legal documents to facilitate certain procedures for the African and Senegalese diaspora.
Sunulex has two legal platforms. The first -Sunulex.sn- was created in 2016 to solve access to legal information and practitioners' challenges in Senegal. It is the reference legal platform in Senegal, listing Senegalese, OHADA, WAEMU, and ECOWAS legal texts and court decisions proclaimed by the Senegalese supreme court and the OHADA Common Court of Justice and Arbitration.
"I launched the Sunulex.sn legal platform in Senegal to provide online and organized access to Senegalese legislation for legal practitioners and citizens," she said in 2019.
The second platform is Sunulex Africa, which is an online database of African laws. It gives legal professionals access to the resources they need to advise, defend and enforce the right laws. Sunulex, which was created in 2020, contains over 70,000 official documents covering 15 French-speaking African countries and 8 regional economic zones.
Its originator graduated from the University of Tours with a master's degree in French private law in 2007 and from the Free University of Brussels with a master's degree in Belgian law in 2010 and a complementary master's degree in social law, labor law, and social security in 2011. In 2016, she also got a certificate in public management from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
She started her professional career, in 2005, as an intern with the Senegalese human rights NGO RADDHO. In 2007, she joined Human Rights Watch as an intern, in Belgium. The following year, still in Belgium, she started teaching French at Global LT, and, in 2009, she became a federal public service employee at the Brussels Social Inspection Department.
From 2011 to 2012, she was a lawyer at Marx Van Ranst Vermeersch & Partners. She later became the lawyer representing the energy firm VWEW. Concurrently, she was a teaching and research assistant at the Catholic University of Leuven.
In 2014, Reliance Avocats hired her as an attorney, and in 2015 she became a research associate at the Pan African Institute of Strategies in Senegal. From 2017 to 2018, she worked, as a legal adviser, for the IT firm ETNIC. Nafissatou Tine won the 2018 African Diaspora Entrepreneurship Award in Belgium for Sunulex. Currently, she is an attorney at the law firm Sunulex lawyers, in Belgium.
Melchior Koba
Over the past few years, the number of digital solutions developed in Africa has grown significantly. With the ongoing digital transformation, it is poised to rise further but, there is still an urgent need to train the youth to accelerate productive transformation and end unemployment.
Last Wednesday, the National Agency for the Promotion of Employment and Competencies (ANAPEC) and Orange Morocco signed a framework agreement to train young people in digital professions.
The agreement aims to ensure that 1,000 young Moroccans and legal migrants are trained and supervised at Orange Digital Centers and ANAPEC’s MoukawiLab in the framework of a technical and professional support program. The training will take into account the labor demand and entrepreneurial potentials.
According to Minister of Economic Inclusion Younes Sekkouri, it is a promising project that aims to support thousands of young people -graduates and non-graduates alike as well as young persons neither in education nor employment or training- by providing them with intensive training and tailored support to create their businesses and develop their ideas.
In March, Orange opened its 10th African Digital Center in Rabat to boost innovation in Morocco. During the inauguration, it committed to promoting youth employment and entrepreneurship by democratizing access to technologies in the country.
The newly signed agreement lines up with that commitment. It covers the implementation of dedicated programs under the "Orange fiber school" which trains qualified technicians and sales representatives and develops valuable fiber optic technician skills.
The agreement will also allow the two institutions to co-organize roadshows to raise awareness of the training and entrepreneurship opportunities offered by the program and encourage participation in each of the targeted regions.
Samira Njoya
In September 2022, in line with its ambition to conquer Africa, Cellulant signed a partnership with Orange Money, to implement card-to-wallet transfers for eight banks in Botswana.
Pan-African fintech Cellulant Corporation announced, last Tuesday, it had secured a payment systems operator license from the National Bank of Uganda, per the 2020 Act that governs the national payment system.
According to Frances Diribe, Cellulant’s Chief Risk & Compliance Officer, the license marks another evolutionary step for the company founded in 2003. "Uganda currently has over 800,000 registered businesses and a fast-growing digital youthful population. We’re on course to double down our work in offering these businesses and their clients’ dependable payment options. By streamlining the business payment process, they can concentrate on growing themselves," he said.
Mobile and digital payments are gaining momentum across Africa. In its "State of the Industry Report on Mobile Money 2022," the Global System Operators' Association (GSMA) estimates that the continent was home to more than half of the world's active mobile money accounts in 2021. It had 184 million subscribers compared to 161 million the year before. This leads to a fairly high transaction volume (36.7 billion transactions and US$701.4 billion in value), up by 39% year-on-year.
The license allows Cellulant to expand its operations locally and regionally while assuring its business partners of its compliance with local and international security regulations. By partnering with six financial institutions and over 50 merchants in Uganda, Cellulant offers mobile banking and cashiering solutions throughout the country. It claims payment collection and payouts powered to thousands of businesses in 35 African countries.
“Cellulant launched operations in Uganda in 2009 and through its single API payments gateway – Tingg – it enables global, regional and local businesses to collect payments online and offline serving its customers with locally relevant payment methods, including mobile money, cards & banks,” it indicates.
Samira Njoya