YouTube announced on Monday that it’s expanding video action campaigns (one of Google’s interactive ad types for video) to connected televisions (CTV) to make YouTube ads more shoppable. The company says this new move will help advertisers drive more online sales and grow their businesses. For context, when viewers see a video action campaign on…
The Engineering team at Facebook has revealed the underlying factors that led to six hours of global outage that also affected WhatApp and Instagram. The global social networking company lost billions of dollars to the outages that started about 4.43pm (WAT) on Monday. According to NetBlocks, which tracks internet outages and their impact, the outage had…
Less than a third of African countries have achieved the global goal of vaccinating 10% of their populations against Covid-19 by the end of September, according to the World Health Organization. This is an indicator of the challenge the continent is facing in procuring vaccines amidst their uneven distribution for poorer countries of the world….
Lagos-based startup smallChops is planning on expanding to other cities in Nigeria and across Africa having seen an average 20 per cent month-on-month growth since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Formed in August 2016 and first reported on by Disrupt Africa way back in 2017, smallChops allows users to order different finger food – “small chops” – packages…
South Africa’s water system is in trouble. In the 2020/21 financial year alone, there were over 55,800 pipe bursts, over a third of reservoirs have supply problems, and years of underfunding of infrastructure replacement and maintenance have drastically reduced the lifespan of around a quarter of the country’s asset base. If there’s one lesson we can…
People who visit a fancy place for the first time tend to take pictures to document the memory, sometimes by posting on social media. Being the authority on cool or quaint spots can be a ladder for influence, attracting advertisers and brand endorsements. But where do people find fancy places? For a birthday hangout two years…
According to a report published by the World Bank, it was observed that while Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) create 7 out of 10 jobs in emerging markets, access to finance has remained a key constraint to SME growth. The Report noted that access to finance is one of the most cited obstacles facing SMEs to…
The German government has pledged €100 million to the African Development Bank’s (AfDB) Sustainable Energy Fund for Africa (SEFA), demonstrating its support for efforts to harness Africa’s renewable energy potential and accelerate the continent’s transition to sustainable energy sources. The announcement was made at the United Nations High-Level Dialogue on Energy, which took place on…
The World Bank has approved $11.5bn in lending to Western and Central African countries for 98 operations. The World Bank made this known in its ‘Annual Report 2021: From crisis to green, resilient, and inclusive recovery’. The bank said: “In fiscal 2021, the bank approved $11.5bn in lending to Western and Central Africa for 98 operations, including…
The ninth edition of the Angel Fair Africa event will take place in Mauritius in November, with Dr James Mwangi and Esther Dyson as keynote speakers. The annual Angel Fair Africa is an event that brings together accelerators, incubators and emerging businesses from across the African continent and investors to do deals. This year’s edition takes place…
South African startup abela is supporting the informal economy with the same autonomy and security that banks offer to the formal economy via a QR code-enabled system. Launched in August 2020, abela started as a QR code-enabled payment platform offering users without a bank account the ability to receive tips and payments digitally. Since then, it has…
China, the most populous nation in the world, passed its first significant data privacy legislation in August. Moving forward, any global business or aspiring startup doing any type of trade or offering services online likely will be affected because they’ll be engaging with Chinese residents covered by the Personal Information Protection Law (PIPL). Although this seems like…
“New Zealand’s central bank is exploring the possibility of issuing a digital currency, saying the benefits it would bring include its potential use as a monetary policy tool,” reports Bloomberg. The central bank cites “the declining use, acceptance and availability of cash in New Zealand, and emerging innovations in private money, namely stablecoins.”While developing a central…
Last week, the Wall Street Journal published internal research from Facebook showing that the social media company knows precisely how toxic its own product is for the people who use it. But tonight, we learned how the Journal obtained those documents: A whistleblower named Frances Haugen, who spoke with CBS News’ 60 Minutes about the ways Facebook is poisoning…
Over 264 million of the global populations are affected by depression, according to the World Health Organization (WHO) report. It was also noted that the causes of depression include complex interactions between social, psychological, and biological factors. Life events such as childhood adversity, loss, and unemployment contribute to and may catalyze the development of depression….
During his address to the nation on Thursday evening, SA President Cyril Ramaphosa announced that the Department of Health would begin rolling out vaccination certificates as the government made its final effort to reach its goal of vaccinating over 33-million people by December 2021. Currently, 17-million doses of a COVID-19 vaccine have been administered, with…
In July, video conferencing mainstay Zoom announced that it was stepping into its first major acquisition buying cloud call centre service provider Five9 for $14.7-billion in an all-stock transaction. The deal was supposed to be finalised within “the first half of 2022.” Now, CNBC reports that Zoom’s agreement with Five9 has fallen through after Five9’s shareholders rejected the deal….
WhatsApp banned over 2 million accounts in the month of August to curb abuse and prevent harmful behaviour on the platform. The latest transparency report from WhatsApp, published to comply with the new Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules 2021, reveals that it banned a total 20,70,000 accounts in one month….
Every user has their pain point, and they’re looking for products or services that can help them address that pain point. When they encounter your offer, it’s a make-it-or-break-it opportunity for you to show them you have the solution. Make the right first impression, and you have a chance to convert your potential customer into…
LAGOS; September 30, 2021: The Nigeria Innovation Summit (NIS) 2021, the virtual edition, scheduled for Tuesday, October 5 and Wednesday, October 6 2021, has received the support of critical industry stakeholders. Nigeria Innovation Summit in its 6th year is an annual event that brings together stakeholders from different sectors of Nigeria’s economy to share ideas, trends,…
Former Vice President Al Gore has invested $600 million of equity into U.K. energy startup Octopus Energy Group via his Generation Investment Management vehicle, taking a stake of approximately 13% in the business. The investment means Octopus has attained a valuation of around $4.6 billion. Octopus has made a name for itself in energy circles largely because of its…
Pan-African fintech startup KamPay has launched a blockchain-based financial platform that is at the same time a payment system, a wallet and a lottery. Launched this year, KamPay comprises a digital wallet and token, which combined with ZymPay, a fiat payment gateway that presently exists between South Africa and Zimbabwe, will facilitate easy crypto-to-fiat exchanges and encourage…
Bitcoin rose on Friday to its highest level since around mid-September, bolstered in part by seasonal factors as well as supportive comments overall from US Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell on Thursday. In testimony to Congress, Powell said the Fed had no intention of banning cryptocurrencies, in response to a question from House Representative Ted Budd. Some…
The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has postponed the launch of the eNaira — its digital currency — slated to launch on October 1, 2021. According to The Punch, the launch was postponed to prevent it from clashing with the lineup of events planned for the Independence Day celebration. In a statement attributed to the CBN’s Director of Communications,…
A Nigerian e-Commerce website developed by a startup, Oaklinks.NG has launched its range of services into the market on the month that the nation is celebrating its 61 years of independence with a promise to offer Nigerians top range of goods and services, particularly gadgets. In a statement issued today, October 1st, to launch the e-Commerce website, Mr….
The Internet Society Foundation has launched a new grant program to advance Internet access and connectivity around the world. Known as the BOLT program, these grants aim to support teams of creatives, technologists, researchers, and social/cultural workers to develop solutions to Internet connectivity, particularly among communities where current technologies are unavailable or inaccessible. US$200,000 grants will be awarded to…
High hopes for seamless intra-Africa trade under the terms of the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) got a boost this week with the formal roll-out of a payments platform by the Africa Export-Import bank (Afreximbank), the continent’s trade finance institution. The platform is called the Pan-African Payment and Settlement System, or PAPSS, and was first launched…
Zimbabwe is cracking down on social media and mobile money platforms to root out alleged “illegal currency dealers” that the government blames for a plunge in the value of the country’s local unit of exchange. But economists and tech experts warn that this amounts to shooting the wrong target. Jee-A Van De Linde, an economist…
Nigeria President Muhammadu Buhari announced on Friday that the current Twitter ban would be lifted, but only if the social media giant met certain conditions. The president disclosed this during his televised broadcast to Nigerians on the country’s 61st Independence Day anniversary. He acknowledged the fact that Twitter is used to disseminate information. Still, he warned about…
The NFT space has had quite the year, and while it can be difficult to separate the billions of dollars in crypto speculation from the potential infrastructure shifts, plenty of mainstream tech companies are dipping their toes into the space and signaling future interest. This time it’s TikTok’s turn. The fast-growing social media platform, which…