KenGen, a Kenyan power generation company, has finished drilling seven geothermal wells in Ethiopia, four of which are at the Aluto-Langano site and three at Tule Moye. According to Business Daily, KenGen won a Sh7.6 billion ($65.6 million) joint contract with Kerui Petroleum Equipment Company and Shandong Kerui Oilfield Service Group in February 2019 to…
Elizabeth Rogo, President (East Africa), African Energy Chamber, has been appointed to the National Oil Corporation of Kenya’s board of directors. Elizabeth is a professional engineer with more than 21 years of experience in the energy industry. She is expected to lead the National Oil Corporation of Kenya’s efforts to improve oil and gas exploration,…
The nine startups chosen for the Fintech Incubation Programme have been announced by Nigeria’s technology innovation center Co-creation Hub (CcHUB), in collaboration with Google, the Ministry of ICT and Innovation Rwanda, and the Mojaloop Foundation. The Fintech Innovation Project, which includes the Fintech Incubation Program and other development initiatives, is part of Rwanda’s ongoing efforts…
With the introduction of a community fund, Reddit is giving new life to the dreams of several projects and creators. Reddit announced on Monday that it is launching a new initiative called Community Funds, with an initial investment of $1 million to support a variety of projects. The new fund is the result of six…
The Kenyan electric vehicle company Opibus has rebranded as ROAM, following a strategic shift in the company’s vision as a result of its expansion. Opibus, which was founded in 2017, is the leading provider of locally designed and manufactured electric vehicles. Its vision is to develop dependable and cost-effective products for the pan-African mass market….
Farmerline, a Ghanaian startup that bills itself as “Amazon for African farmers,” has received a US$6.4 million pre-Series A investment as well as another US$6.5 million in debt to help it expand. Farmerline, founded in 2013 by Alloysius Attah and Emmanuel Owusu Addai, collaborates with agribusinesses and farm associations to provide high-quality fertiliser and seeds,…
Afriex, a Nigerian payment platform that allows users to send and receive money for free to and from Africa, has raised $10 million in a Series A funding round. Nairametrcs reported on Tuesday that the money will be used to “expand its blockchain money transfer platform.” The company is now valued at $60 million. Sequoia…
Techstars, a global investment firm that provides early-stage entrepreneurs with access to capital, one-on-one mentorship, and customized programming, has launched the ARM Labs Lagos Techstars Accelerator Program in collaboration with ARM Labs, a Lagos-based innovation program focused on assisting fintech startups. The new accelerator program will invest in early-stage African fintech and proptech companies. “Lagos…
Insecta Studios, a creative company based in Nigeria that uses storytelling and design to connect brands and people, has launched Raknida, a platform aimed at providing high-quality and affordable wall arts that inspire people, promote overall well-being, support the economic advancement of young African artists, and fuse art and tech experiences that open up unique…
Stitch, a South African fintech firm, has introduced LinkPay, a service that allows customers in South Africa and Nigeria to link their financial accounts and pay securely via rapid bank transfer in seconds. The Stitch API enables developers to quickly connect apps to financial accounts, allowing users to exchange transaction histories and balances, confirm their…
The Central African Republic, a landlocked country roughly in the middle of Africa, has become the first African government to recognize Bitcoin as legal cash. The Central African Republic’s Ministry of Finance and Budget, as well as the Ministry of Digital Economy, Postal Services, and Telecommunications, have presented a joint document that recognizes Bitcoin as…
WhatsApp is working on providing additional premium capabilities to business accounts through a subscription plan. More features that WhatsApp is covertly developing will be included in the premium package. One of the new features is the ability to support a greater number of linked devices on a single business account. The Multi-device feature currently supports…
Zenda, a business based in the United Arab Emirates, has received $9.4 million in seed funding to help improve school tuition payment and management. By changing the way parents and guardians pay school fees, as well as how educational institutions conduct fee collection, the company wants to have an impact on the educational sector. Zenda…
Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, is the sole owner and operator of Twitter at the time of writing this article. The richest individual on the planet now owns the most popular social networking platform. Musk paid $54.20 per share for the company. This is, after all, the same price as his initial…
In light of recent developments and the resulting circumstance posed by the pandemic in 2020, many schools and institutions are planning to switch, and some have already switched, to online learning, teaching, conferencing, and meetings, resulting in an increase in users of conference platforms such as Zoom, and Google meet. More concerns should be raised…
The FBI has issued a warning about the BlackCat ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS), which it claims has victimized at least 60 entities worldwide as of March 2022, since its discovery last November. The ransomware, also known as ALPHV and Noberus, is notable for being the first malware written in the Rust programming language, which is known to…
Gravity Sketch, a London-based startup, has taken that concept into 3D, leveraging tools such as virtual reality headsets to let designers and others dive into and better visualize a product’s design as it’s being made; and the startup is now announcing a $33 million funding round to take its own business to the next dimension….
ArK Kapital, based in Stockholm, has secured a €150 million senior secured debt facility from Pollen Street Capital after raising €165 million in March to provide long-term alternative financing options. Through AI-powered financial forecasts and non-dilutive funding, the company will be able to assist startups in growing smarter. ArK Kapital, which was founded by six-time…
Syarpa, a Nigerian fintech startup, has raised US$500,000 in pre-seed funding to help it expand across Europe and Africa. Syarpa, which has over 2,000 users and has facilitated transactions worth over US$4 million since its launch, enables users to carry out both international money transfers and crypto exchanges by providing fiat and crypto payment solutions….
Tofino Capital has announced the first close of its $10 million funding round, with a goal of completing the round in nine months. Tofino Capital, founded by Eliot Pence and Aubrey Hruby, invests in early-stage companies in venture scalable markets that are underserved or underfunded by venture capital. Among the companies in its portfolio are…
Recur Technologies PTE, a Singapore-based financing platform, announced a $30 million equity and debt fundraising round from a group of Indian investors. Recur Club Technologies, the financial technology startup’s Delhi-based subsidiary, operates in India. InfoEdge Ventures, the investment arm of Info Edge (India), and Village Global have each invested $2 million in the parent company’s…
Unicorn Group, an investment firm, has launched its fourth entrepreneur incubation program, which is open to startups from a variety of countries for the first time. Unicorn Group is a pan-African investment firm that seeks out innovative ideas, startups, and early-stage companies in Africa’s technology and technology-enabled sectors that have the potential to become unicorns….
The idea of networking contributes to the growth and relevance of a startup. We are often familiar with the saying “no man is an island”. Running your business on a solo mode might retain the focus or vision of the business, it can also make progress speedily but it shuts the owner from the real experiences of other…
Trace and the Mastercard Foundation have collaborated to launch Trace Academia, a free, interactive, mobile-based learning application designed to help 26 million young Africans gain market-relevant skills. The Trace Academia App is available on Android and iOS and has been tested successfully in four African countries. Users can access courses in either English or French,…
The Africa’s Business Heroes (ABH) prize competition has announced a new Community Lead and ScaleUp Program to provide ABH applicants and finalists with more enhanced mentoring and networking opportunities. Now in its fourth year, applications for the ABH grant are now open in both French and English, and the competition has already attracted talented entrepreneurs…
A month after its first African landing in Togo, Google’s Equiano mega subsea cable has arrived in Lagos, Nigeria. The cable system’s second African landing will be in the Lekki Peninsula area of Lagos. The announcement was made in a tweet today, April 21, 2022, and comes just in time for the system’s highly anticipated…
In the daily rush for digital gold, more people are attempting to make money from cryptocurrencies. As a result of the insatiable demand for cryptocurrency, the number of criminals and con artists has also increased. The world appears to have gone ‘crypto-crazy.’ The popularity of digital currencies such as bitcoin, Monero, Ethereum, and even Dogecoin…
Time is the one commodity we don’t have a lot of in our fast-paced lives. And, as the pandemic has demonstrated, when we do have free time, we prefer to spend it with family and friends rather than on time-consuming and often onerous tasks such as banking, saving, or filling out forms. So, here are…
Paymob, an Egyptian digital payments company, has expanded its operations into Pakistan, with the goal of providing online, POS, and “Tap on Phone” payment options to Pakistani merchants. Paymob is an infrastructure technology enabler that provides payment solutions to empower digital financial service providers through mobile wallet technology. It was founded in 2015 by Islam Shawky,…
African startups raised approximately $5 billion in 2021, nearly tripling the amount raised in 2020. While the ecosystem has received more funding, technical talent has not grown at the same rate. According to the Africa Developer Ecosystem Report, the number of professional software developers in Africa will increase by 3.8 percent to 716,000 engineers by…