The Port Authority of Douala is set on making digital transformation its choice weapon to improve efficiency, security, and revenues. In that regard, in the past five years, it implemented several projects with more to go.
In Cameroon, the entrance fees generated by the Port of Douala rose fourfold thanks to digitalization. According to Lieutenant Colonel Bertrand Mekinda, deputy MD of Douala Port Security -the firm in charge of securing the Port of Douala- entrance revenues jumped from XAF250 million in previous years to XAF1 billion currently. The revenues may rise further to XAF2 billion yearly when new entrance booths become operational, he estimates.
To digitize the entrance fee collection system, the port created an access badge system for users, the official revealed during a press conference on Friday 15, 2022.
The badge costs XAF1500. It stores users’ information on a server allowing QR code readers to read it when they return . Therefore, users can not resell them once they are within the port and the 24 hours validity period is still on. Unlike the old system that consisted in selling paper tickets, entrance revenues are more secure with the digital system because port authorities now have a clear view of the number of people who access the port during a specific period.
In the past five years, the Port Authority of Douala (PAD) implemented several projects to secure its operations, and improve port security and efficiency. For instance, it installed more than 400 HD video surveillance cameras and built a security task force building that houses a data center and a CCTV operations and control room.
The PAD also plans to buy a management software that will facilitate the digitalization of all the port operations and services. Ten departments are concerned, namely customer relationship management, performance monitoring, incoming and outgoing ships’ management, and cargo tracking.
Ruben Tchounyabe
In Africa, the low bancarisation rate, combined with the digitalization fever, offers a fertile ground for the development of fintech startups.
Yoco is a South African fintech startup co-founded in 2013 by Katlego Maphai, Carl Wazen, Bradley Wattrus, and Lungisa Matshoba. Through its platform, it allows entrepreneurs to accept card payments. In 2017, the startup launched an eponymous mobile app to serve more clients in the local market.
The platform allows Yoco clients to collect card payments but, it also gives SMEs the possibility to get cash advances to develop their businesses, through Yoco Capital. With Yoco Capital, the South African startup aims to help SMEs that are unable to get loans from traditional institutions develop their operations with no worries about deadlines, interest rates, or even defaulting risks and their consequences.
“We understand that accessing capital is one of the hardest challenges faced by small business owners. It's also one of the biggest reasons why small businesses remain small. We continue to offer solutions that leverage smart technology to help small businesses grow,” indicates Yoco co-founder Katlego Maphai.
Yoco Capital is accessible to eligible Yoco merchants only. Within one day, applicants can receive the loans requested. The amounts granted can range from ZAR2,500 (US$160) to ZAR75,000 (US$4,800).
Since its creation, the startup has completed several funding rounds. The latest is a Series C funding round completed in July 2021. During that round led by Dragoneer Investment Group, Yoco raised US$83 million “to accelerate product development.”
In 2021, the startup claimed it had 150,000 businesses in its portfolio with 500 new merchants adding to that portfolio daily. Currently, the startup plans to expand into new African markets. Indeed, 90% of SMEs operating on the continent are small businesses. Yoco’s offers will be highly valuable to African entrepreneurs.
In 2017, Yoco was selected by CB Insights as one of the top 250 financial technology companies in the world.
Adoni Conrad Quenum
Given his training, one would expect Hossam Taher to create a healthtech, not an edtech. However, his choice proved well-founded as he is now trusted by several investors who are committed to the development of ORCAS.
Hossam Taher is a young Egyptian entrepreneur, CEO, and co-founder of ORCAS, a startup that networks parents and students with nearby tutors through its eponymous mobile app.
Founded in 2018, ORCAS allows tutors to offer quality training to students in elementary, middle, and high schools with personalized learning plans and assessments. It is “currently working on growing (..) to become the biggest school in terms of hours taught in the world by operating in developing countries on K-12 students,” as Hossam Taher puts it.
To fulfill its ambition, the startup co-founded by Amira El Gharib successfully raised US$2.1 million, on January 16, 2022, during a pre-Series A round led by NFX Ventures and Access Bridge Ventures.
Thanks to the funds raised, Hossam Taher plans to add more features to ORCAS, attract more talents and expand into the Middle East, North Africa, and Pakistan (this year, it is expected to launch operations in Lahore).
ORCAS was previously CairoSitters. It was founded in 2014, months before Hossam Taher graduated from Cairo University with a BSc in Medicine. From 2014 to 2016, CairoSitters was an “online virtual platform where parents can find, book and manage sessions with high-quality babysitters and tutors.” It was an avenue to offer flexible work opportunities to university students and above all fill the demand for qualified and trusted tutors.
To address the specific needs of every student, CairoSitters was rebranded as ORCAS with more offers. “Learners today have different needs that edtech companies must cater to. For that reason, we have evolved into a learning platform that offers the complete spectrum of teacher-led & self-paced learning environments,” Hossam Taher explains.
Melchior Koba
The barcoding project is one of the 52 projects included in the country’s strategy to boost digital transformation by 2023. Launched in 2021, the project will help boost public revenues and improve the competitiveness of made-in DRC products.
DRC will soon start using bar codes to ensure the traceability of its commercial exchanges. During a workshop organized from April 18 to 20, by the Ministry of Digital Transformation, the national strategy for seamless implementation of that project was validated.
According to Prime Minister Jean-Michel Sama Lukonde, the strategy is the government's commitment to "build a strong, prosperous and united country” by controlling the local production, monitoring commercial exchange data, and efficiently curbing counterfeits.
During the December 24, 2021, ministerial council, Minister of Digital Transformation, Désiré-Cashmir Kolongele Eberande, announced that the DRC obtained its personal barcode prefix (605) that identifies where a product comes from.
"With 605 as the barcode prefix for every product made in DRC, we independently chose to join the global network of countries that implement the bar coding system. We highlighted our country in global supply chains to create a favorable environment for the digital economy,” indicated Prime Minister Jean-Michel Sama Lukonde.
According to the government official, a successful implementation of the national barcoding strategy will make made in DRC products compliant with international standards on security and traceability and boost their competitiveness in local, regional, and global markets.
Ruben Tchounyabe
Training is a crucial economic development issue in Africa. The continent currently has the highest unemployment rate, the youngest population in the world, and a high NEET population. The initiative launched by Trace aims to bridge the education gap.
French media group Trace launched, Thursday (April 21), Trace Academia, a free training platform for young Africans.
The mobile app was officially presented during a virtual press conference hosted on April 21, in Johannesburg. It offers technical and cross-cutting courses covering 15 industries and skills including energy, beauty, fashion, DIY, digital marketing, hospitality, creative arts, journalism, film, technology, entrepreneurship, public speaking, and well-being.
The courses are developed in partnership with well-known international groups like Orange Visa, and Google.
The courses already available are notably Entrepreneurship developed by Valued Citizens and the University of Johannesburg, Becoming a DJ developed by Trace, and Introduction to the Electrical Trade by Schneider Electric. There is also DIY by Leroy Merlin, Tech the Power by MasterCard, Sexual Wellness by Durex, and Introduction to Digital Marketing by Google. French telecom group Orange will also offer ten training modules to showcase digital professions in Senegal, Cameroon, Côte d'Ivoire, and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
“To build Trace Academia, we’ve combined our expertise and experience in entertainment with cutting edge learning approaches adapted to the realities and cultures of Africa…We believe that Trace Academia has the potential to positively impact the lives of millions of young people in South Africa and across the continent,” indicated Olivier Laouchez, Trace Co-Founder and Executive Chairman.
With Trace Academia (available on PlayStore and AppStore), Trace wants to offer professional and cross-cutting skills to 26 million Africans by 2025. In its 2020 “Report on Employment in Africa (Re-Africa),” the International Labour Organization reveals Africa is the only continent where the labor force is expanding quickly. In 2020, 34.2% of the continent’s working-age population was constituted of young people aged 15-24 against a global average of 23.6%.
The ILO also estimated that the continent’s unemployment rate (6.8%) was higher than the global average (5%). Africa’s unemployment population was close to 34 million at the time, including 12.2 million people aged between 15 and 24. The organization added that between 2010 and 2020, the unemployed population aged 15-24 grew by 6.4 million in Africa.
At the same time, in Africa, the number of young people not in employment,
education or training (NEET) was four times (53.5 million actually) higher than the number of unemployed youth (aged between 15 and 24).
Ruben Tchounyabe
In Africa, thanks to technology, citizens now have easy access to alternative financial solutions. Lucky is one of those solutions.
Lucky is a digital app that gives users in the MENA region the chance to win discounts, as well as access interesting offers, cashback, and credit products from 20,000 local and international brands. The platform was developed by the eponymous startup, Lucky, co-founded in 2018 by two Egyptians, Momtaz Moussa and Ayman Essawy (photo).
In March 2022, some four years after its creation, the startup completed a US$25 million series A funding round to support its growth in the MENA region. Lucky gives users transparent offers and increased buying power in a region where consumers usually have poor or no access to credit. For Momtaz Moussa, “the MENA region’s huge unbanked, young population and cash-dominated economy is a significant market opportunity” for Lucky.
All users have to do is to download Lucky from AppStore or PlayStore, register, and shop as they usually do to start accumulating points to be redeemed for discounts and cashback from the numerous e-commerce platforms Lucky is partnered with. Most of the time, the offers and cashback come from brands seeking more visibility. In their quest, they pay commissions to Lucky, which redirects part of those commissions to its users through the offers and cashback.
Currently, the startup claims more than eight million users and a network of 30,000 stores.
Adoni Conrad Quenum
Because of the coronavirus pandemic, African countries have sped up their digital transformation plans. Demand for the internet is growing, as a result. However, though internet adoption is rising tremendously, millions of residents are still unable to access the service because of its prices. Yet, affordable and quality internet is one of the requirements for successful digital transformation.
The Internet now appears like a necessary service in the likes of drinking water and electricity. According to the GSM Association (GSMA), in 2020, global internet penetration was 51% with 4 billion users. However, some countries have lower penetration rates. In its 2022 internet poverty index, the World Data Lab identified Nigeria as the country with the largest number of people living in internet poverty, meaning the number of people who “cannot afford a minimum package of mobile internet.”
The World Data Lab based its index on three factors, including affordability, quantity, and quality. “Affordability refers to the price of mobile broadband service and is set with a person’s total expenditure. (...) quantity refers to the amount of data that can be sent or received per theoretical use” while “quality describes a multitude of factors such as download and upload speed, bandwidth, latency, 2G, 3G, and 4G coverage, as well as the number of servers per 100,000 inhabitants,” the data agency explains.
The World Data Lab estimates that 103.015 million people are internet poor in Nigeria out of an estimated 217.366 million people. In the world, Nigeria is followed by India and China, we learn. In Sub-Saharan Africa on the other hand, Burundi is the country with the highest percentage of the internet poor in 2022, that is 96.6% of its 12.026 million residents.
According to the latest broadband affordability data from the Alliance for Affordable Internet (A4AI), in Africa, one-gigabyte bundles cost less than US$3 in ten countries while in 17 countries it ranges between US$3 and 5. In the remaining countries, it is over US$5. For the A4AI, broadband internet is deemed affordable when it is less than 2% of average monthly per capita incomes.
High internet cost is one of the obstacles to digital transformation in Africa because it prevents millions of residents from accessing the socio-economic opportunities it offers.
For the International Finance Corporation and Google, the digital economy can help generate up to US$180 billion of GDP in Africa by 2035. For that, however, affordable internet is needed.
Muriel Edjo
After some 20 years of professional experience in the toy industry, Amir Shenouda returned to Egypt to implement a decade-long project, mumerz.com.
Amir Shenouda (photo, left) is the CEO of mumerz.com, an online shopping platform selling items specifically dedicated to mothers, babies, and children under 12 in Egypt. It offers a wide range of products in several categories, including food, clothing, toys, accessories for mothers, etc.
The platform was launched in 2021, by Amir Shenouda and Nadia Gamal Al-Din (photo, right) after a decade-long maturation that started in 2011. That year, Amir Shenouda joined, as a business development manager for mumzworld.com, which is also an e-commerce platform dedicated to mothers and babies in the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain, Oman, Jordan, and Lebanon.
While working for mumzworld.com, he got the idea to leverage the experience he acquired while working for U.S. toy manufacturer Toys“R”Us to create a mumzworld.com-like platform that would be focused on the Egyptian market.
He later left mumzworld.com to join Cartoon Networks as Retail Business Manager (from 2013 to 2014). From 2014 to 2018, he was a senior regional manager for Amazon’s Toys and Babies department, and from 2018 to 2021, he was the e-commerce director of Toy Triangle LLC, a Dubai-based toy store. In July 2021, after years of evaluating the market, he decided to launch mumerz.com.
Months later, on March 1, 2022, the entrepreneur successfully raised US$1.2 million in a pre-seed round, led by DisrupTech Ventures, to develop its market offerings.
Melchior Koba
In the past few years, global leaders in on-demand transportation have heavily invested in African markets. Bolt, Yango, and Uber are notable names but, their solutions are sometimes not efficient. Local startups like Moja Ride are building their solutions to address those minor inefficiencies.
Moja Ride is a Mobility-as-a-Service startup launched, in 2017, to make life easier for Ivorians. In March 2021, the startup created by Jean Claude Gouesse (photo, center), raised an undisclosed amount from Mobility 54, a venture capital fund set up by Japanese firm Toyota.
The eponymous platform developed by the startup is an alternative to ride-hailing giants operating in Abidjan. With its platform, Moja Ride wants to offer an urban mobility solution to its users but it also wants to help them build a network by offering simple, affordable, and efficient alternative mobility solutions.
The app allows ride-sharing between friends, neighbors, and co-workers to help save on daily travel expenses. It also allows transport operators to easily manage their fleets and routes.
Each of the rides planned through Moja Ride is insured for up to XOF2 million for individual accidents and up to XOF300,000 for healthcare coverage.
To facilitate payments, Moja Ride developed an internal solution based on the payment network Visa and fare collection O-City’s systems. To access its services, users just have to download the mobile app from AppStore or PlayStore and fill in a set of information. Its revenues come from commissions generated on rides booked and payments collected by drivers.
In October 2020, Moja Ride was selected to participate in the Africa Tech Summit Connects, a competition offering startups the possibility to raise pre-seed, seed, or Series A funding.
In 2021, the startup was claiming over 1,200 taxis and buses available for booking through its platform in Abidjan.
Adoni Conrad Quenum
Large U.S. tech firms are increasingly investing in Kenya. A few days ago, Microsoft inaugurated its tech talent hub in the country. It is now followed by Google, the world’s third-largest tech company by market capitalization.
Google announced, Tuesday (April 19), the launch of its first African development hub in Nairobi, Kenya. The U.S. tech firm also launched the recruitment of various tech skills to endow the product development center with skills necessary to contribute to innovation on the continent.
“We’re looking for talented, creative, and collaborative people who can help solve difficult and important technical challenges, such as improving the smartphone experience for people in Africa, or building products that will help everyone to thrive together,” reads a Google blog post announcing the vacancies.
According to the post, applicants must have great technical knowledge, a “passion for solving hard problems together with others” and “understand how people across the continent use their phones every day and the challenges they face.”
The African Product Development hub in Nairobi is part of Google’s efforts to support digital transformation in Africa.
In October 2021, during Google for Africa, a virtual event, Google CEO Sundar Pichai (photo) unveiled a US$1 billion investment to be rolled out over five years. The plan includes projects to provide fast, reliable, and affordable Internet access across the continent, create useful local products, and support entrepreneurs and small businesses that sustain African economies.
Muriel Edjo
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The video game industry is rapidly growing in Africa. It offers employment opportunities to millions of young enthusiasts and, on November 24, 2021, by approving the organization of the international cup, Beninese authorities proved their ambitions to capitalize on the opportunities offered by the industry.
The International Africa Gaming Cup, a competition bringing together African video game enthusiasts, will take place in the coming days, in Benin. The competition was unveiled during a press conference held, Wednesday, April 13, by the co-organizers Mike Hessabi (photo, right) and Médard Djékété (photo, left), respectively founder of Nicecactus Gamer and President of Africa Gamers.
Officially, the competition will be launched next April 23 with the regional qualifying and final phases between several Bennese gaming communities. After the regional phases, the continental phase will be between the best African teams at Cotonou Congress Center during a weekend-long show in July 2022.
According to Médard Djékété, three games will be played during the competition. They are namely Clash Royal, the most played mobile e-sport game in Benin, Tekken 7- a reference game, and Battlegrounds Mobile- a widely popular action and adventure game.
The organizers were authorized, on November 24, 2021, during a press briefing, to host the first edition of that gaming cup in Benin. During the press briefing attended by the Beninese Minister of the Digital Economy, Ms. Aurelie Adam-Soule Zoumarou, the organizers claimed the competition aims to make Benin the hub of E-sports in Africa.
For Mike Hessabi, with its internationally-renowned gaming community, Benin has what it takes to become the champion of that continental competition. Indeed, many young Beninese are illustrating themselves in international gaming cups.
“We have carried out a survey on the ground and we know that there are many active gaming communities in Benin,” he explained.
Nicecactus Gamer is an “all-in-one platform for gamers of all levels worldwide.”
It can host up to 2,000 online tournaments monthly.
Ruben Tchounyabe
Cybersecurity and data protection are important issues in the digital era. The solution developed by Youverify aims to address those issues in Nigeria, and in Africa as a whole.
YouID is a digital solution developed by Nigerian start-up Youverify to secure personal information and physical identifiers. It aims to help users share the least possible amount of information on the web by storing them in an encrypted format.
Thanks to its digital solution, Youverify, which was founded in 2017, by Gbenga Odegbami and Suru Avoseh, completed several funding rounds, including a US$1.5million round led by Orange Digital Ventures.
According to Gbenga Odegbami, Youverify CEO, YouID “constitutes a unique opportunity for the company to take further our ambition to simplify and secure its client’s internal processes, whether in the recruitment of staff, customer onboarding, etc.”
“Our ambition is to be the leading African player in verifying people and companies’ identities by making data protection and security the core of our proposal,” he added.
On behalf of its users, YouID automatically fills social media, e-commerce, and streaming forms with information previously submitted for storage on the encrypted digital platform.
To store their information on YouID, users first have to download the app from App Store or Play Store, create their accounts, and secure them using PIN codes or biometric data. Then, they will have to scan their faces to prove the accounts are created by humans, not bots. A third phase consists of scanning ID documents proving users’ identities. The last step is to add contact information through which the app can alert users when their information is compromised.
Youverify claims over 300,000 registrations and verifications since the launch of YouID.
Adoni Conrad Quenum
For about two years now, Simon Ward has been contributing his over 20 years of experience in the fintech and e-commerce industries to improve South African workers’ financial health. He gives them tools to reduce their debts and increase their savings.
Floatpays is a money management app launched in 2020 by tech enthusiast Simon Ward (photo). With over 20 years of experience as an entrepreneur and business leader in the fintech and e-commerce industries, Simon Ward has always wanted to make a positive impact on the living conditions of local populations in South Africa. The mechanical engineer graduated from the University of Cape Town and obtained an operational management certificate from the University of Derby in England. He has been one of the chief technology officers of the photo-printing firm PhotoBox. He has also been a chief technology officer for Prodigy Finance, a financial institution that provides loans to international master's students.
For the serial entrepreneur, Floatpays was born from his desire to lift Africans out of poverty by helping address the usual cause of that phenomenon: poor financial management. Financial education and budget planning are the essential skills needed to avoid unnecessary spending, he believes. To illustrate his point of view, he indicates that in his native country, South Africa, 75% of employed people spend their salaries before month-end, and more than 50% of them end up taking loans to survive.
His digital solution helps companies improve their employees’ financial health. Once deployed, it allows employees access to the accrued but yet to be paid salaries at any point of the payroll cycle. They can thus avoid taking loans and use the accrued earnings to cover their needs. Floatpays also offers employees flexible savings solutions by allowing them to change or stop their monthly contributions, or deposit funds into their savings accounts right from their phones.
“I launched Floatpays in 2020, as a social impact-driven business on a mission to help move employees out of bad debt cycles and into a savings culture. We educate employees on financial matters, support them with financial planning, and remove the need for any employee to reach out to payday lenders/high-interest credit solutions when mid-pay cycle liquidity becomes a problem,” says the founder and CEO.
In January 2022, Floatpays completed a US$4 million funding round to develop operations nationwide and initiate its African expansion.
Melchior Koba
The management of corporate sales and orders has constantly evolved in the past few decades. The era of big cash registers has passed to give way to digital solutions like TallOrder.
TallOrder is a cloud-based digital solution that helps SMBs manage sales and orders. Available via windows, iOS, and Android apps, the solution was developed by the eponymous startup launched in 2014 by Anna Groenewald and Dana Buys (photo). In January 2022, it completed a US$3.1 million funding round to complement the US$2.2 million it previously raised to accelerate its African expansion.
With TallOrder, the South African startup allows SMBs to avoid losing files, keeping duplicate data, or filling wrong inputs when using excel workbooks. "Creating a powerful, feature-rich, and broadly adaptable cloud POS solution requires significant development effort, both financially and time-wise," said Dana Buys, CEO, and co-founder of TallOrder.
TallOder can replace the IT department of retail, service, and hospitality companies, manage their internet security handle onsite and offsite backups and make disaster recoveries, software updates as well as database integrations. Employers can seamlessly submit quotes and invoices and access product information (stock, bill of materials, pricing) or customer data.
The platform also allows companies to get paid via popular platforms like SnapScan, Zapper, MasterPass, Yoco, ThumbzUp, MTN MoMo, Innervation, African Resonance, NetCash, DPO, and PayFast.
Currently, in Africa, TallOrder is present in South Africa, Uganda, Ghana, Kenya, Tanzania, Malawi, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Botswana, and Seychelles. In Asia, it is present in Indonesia. For its international market, TallOrder has an offer for hotels and guesthouses.
Its services are accessible at flat rates ranging from US$24.95 to 119.95.
Adoni Conrad Quenum