As it attempts to finance share buybacks and investments to reform its business, Meta Platforms Inc., the parent company of Facebook, announced on Tuesday that it has raised $10 billion in its first-ever bond issue. The selling would assist Meta, the only major technology company without debt, in creating a more conventional balance sheet and…
The 25 businesses that will participate in Grindstone’s year-long program, which helps high-growth, innovation-driven tech start-ups become more investable, sustainable, and exit-ready, have been announced. Grindstone is situated in Cape Town. The program has two cohorts, one located in Cape Town and the other in Johannesburg, and it gives companies access to knowledge, networks, money,…
Among the 20 winners of the Migration Entrepreneurship Prize 2022 this year are firms from Nigeria, Ghana, Ethiopia, and Tunisia. The prize is awarded to socially-driven startups whose goal is to improve migrants’ inclusion in the Middle East and Africa. The Migration Entrepreneurship Prize, a public-private collaboration between Seedstars and the Peace and Human Rights…
This year, the 5th edition of the Connected Africa Girls Coding Camp was launched by ECA in collaboration with the government of The Republic of Namibia, UN Namibia, UN WOMEN, and the International Telecommunications Union (ITU). 100 participants from Namibia will physically attend this hybrid boot camp for young African women and girls between the…
Cote d’Ivoire and Togo are two new adjacent nations that the Nigerian solar-powered internet service provider Tizeti has stated it plans to operate in addition to expanding its operations within Ghana and Nigeria. Additionally, the corporation is thinking of listing its Nigerian subsidiary. The company is investigating an Initial Public Offer (IPO) in the stock…
The African Women Impact Fund (AWIF), a partnership between Standard Bank and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, has been awarded funding by Visa as of today (UNECA). The award will be used to meet the working capital requirements of 55 women who responded to AWIF’s call to action and have been a part…
The inclusion of coding as a subject in Kenya’s elementary and secondary school curricula was announced by the country’s president, Uhuru Kenyatta, last Friday at the State House in Nairobi. With this new breakthrough, Kenya becomes the first nation in Africa to permit the study of coding in the two early schools. At the event,…
New privacy capabilities for WhatsApp have been revealed, giving users “greater control over their chats and increased levels of safety when texting,” according to the company. The three new privacy features include the ability to leave group chats privately, the ability to choose who may see you when you’re online, and the ability to stop…
According to reports, the final stop of Google’s Equiano Subsea Cable, which aims to build a sea link between Europe and Africa, was Melkbosstrand in the Western Cape of South Africa on Monday. Initially, it was stated that the cable will arrive in South Africa by June 2022. The Equiano cable’s $14 billion voyage, which…
The top 50 finalists for the 2022 edition of Africa’s Business Heroes (ABH), a flagship philanthropic initiative launched by the Jack Ma Foundation to highlight and promote African businesses. The goal of Africa’s Business Heroes prize competition is to encourage and assist the next generation of African business leaders across all industries who are creating…
Zeepay, a Ghanaian mobile financial services firm that specializes in offering integrated mobile payment services, has raised $10 million, with Symbiotics BV leading the way with USD 9 million and a Mauritius-based fund investing USD 1 million, for a total of USD 10 million. The A.5 series medium term debt issuance is intended to help…
Dolos, a cybersecurity expert located in South Africa (formerly Panda Security Africa), has opened offices in Africa and the Middle East to provide cyber security solutions to its partners there. With a customizable program, a strong and broad product portfolio, and an ecosystem of technological integrations, Dolos offers MSPs and MSSPs a unique value proposition…
Anglo American, a mining firm based in South Africa, has started an incubator program through Zimele, it’s business development division. The program will primarily support young and female-owned firms in the North West, Limpopo, and Northern Cape provinces, which are close to the company’s operations. The objective is to assist 500 new firms in rural…
A seed round of $2.7 million has been secured by energy technology business Beacon Power Services (BPS), which provides data and grid management solutions to assist Africa’s power sector to distribute electricity more effectively. Seedstars Africa Ventures led the company’s seed round, which also included Persistent Energy, Kepple Africa Ventures, Factor[e], and Oridun Capital Management….
Qurious Labs, an Egyptian Web3-focused venture studio, has raised money from Openner in an effort to support fearless businesspeople in the MENA area who are developing Web3 businesses that leverage blockchain, virtual currencies, NFTs, and games to explore the Metaverse. Qurious Labs is able to collaborate with Web3 creatives and engineers that have incredibly low…
In order to encourage and hasten the digital transformation inside the boundaries of Nigeria, the continent’s most populous country, the Lagos State branch of the Global Shapers Community has launched an international cooperation with HP Life. The Project Digiterate program has been run by Global Shapers Community in Lagos for the past four years. The…
Licensed therapists may now be reached quickly and affordably via a platform created by the Nigerian business Blueroomcare. Blueroomcare, which was introduced around the end of last year, enables customers to speak with therapists via voice, video, and in-app messaging. Moses Aiyenuro, the startup’s founder and CEO, told Disrupt Africa, “We have a safe online…
The Digital African Women (TAW) program has officially launched with the aim of assisting and accelerating female-owned African tech firms as they transition from the concept stage to actual operations. Ethiopian, Senegalese, Tanzanian, and Tunisian female-led idea stage startups are invited to apply to participate in TAW, which is organized by the United Nations Economic…
Eko Innovation Center, Eko Carbon, and Commodity in collaborating with Generation Unlimited 9Ja on Friday, July 8th, 2022, launched the first climate mitigation hackathon tagged EkoClimathon 1.0. Eko Innovation Centre is one of the leading tech hubs in Nigeria, curating events like Art of Technology Lagos, and The Lagos Smart Meter Hackathon amongst others with Eko…
The assumption of business owners is to provide solutions that meet the needs of their customers, and as a result, raise the quality of lives of these customers as they use these products. Customers have had bad experience when a product that was promoted to meet certain need does not and leads to customers who become very logical before…
Banks cannot be everything to everyone. There are limits within formal banking environments that make it difficult for these financial institutions to serve all customers. For instance, many people seeking loans or favourable savings products struggle to provide collateral or afford the fees that would satisfy the regulations and requirements governing a traditional financial institution….
In June 2022, Mdundo.com, a music streaming business with a Kenyan base, reported 20.3 million monthly active users, exceeding the revised monthly target of 19 to 20 million subscribers and increasing by 74% from June 2021. For the fiscal year that ends in June 2025, the company, which unveiled its 2025 strategic direction in June…
According to recent data from the Russian cybersecurity company Kaspersky, social engineering and phishing scams were far more common in Africa in Q2 2022 than they were in Q1 2022. 10,722,886 phishing assaults were discovered in Africa in Q2 by the company’s security solutions, a 234 percent increase over the first quarter. The fastest surge…
A $5.6 million Series A fundraising round, headed by Mucker Capital, was successfully completed by Proto, a Canadian company that offers artificial intelligence (AI) customer experience solutions. Current shareholder Yolo Investments also participated in the round. The company helps contact center operators automate client interactions in their local tongues, including the National Bank of Rwanda,…
Global crypto bank Xend Finance, based in Nigeria, has announced the release of SwitchWallet, a free public wallet infrastructure, and XendBridge, a crypto payment API. A platform that offers everyone access to the global money market so users may save and invest in safe currencies has been developed by Xend Finance, which in 2019 participated…
In order to concentrate on reels, Facebook will discontinue its live shopping function in October. Beginning on October 1, 2022, you won’t be allowed to hold any new or scheduled Live Shopping events on Facebook, according to Meta’s blog. However, you won’t be able to make product playlists or tag products in your Facebook Live…
The second annual bootcamp for aspiring African game developers, GameUp Africa 2, has started. GameUp Africa 2 is a training program for prospective game creators that is run by Maliyo Games, a renowned game development studio. Its goals are to upskill African youth in the fundamental skills needed for Android game creation while supporting the…
Homzmart, an online marketplace for furniture and home goods located in Egypt, has raised a $23 million pre-Series B investment, increasing its total capital to roughly $40 million. In 2020, former Daraz COO Mahmoud Ibrahim and former Jumia head of logistics Ibrahim Mohamed founded Homzmart, a platform that enables furniture suppliers and merchants to communicate…
Cashlinq is a banking platform software as a service developed by Mugonat Systems Inc., a Zimbabwean software development and consultancy company that offers enterprise software solutions, website services, mobile apps, e-commerce, and chatbots. Cashlinq aims to empower entrepreneurs across the continent to offer superior banking services by making it simple for them to access high…
ZohoDay – Austin, Texas — Zoho Corporation, a leading global technology company, announced achieving a rate of 38% year-over-year growth and surpassing the 80 million user mark. In addition to ongoing global expansion, the company continues to grow its product portfolio and make investments in automotive, robotics, and health care technologies. Zoho also celebrated opening 59 new global hub-and-spoke…