Author: Akin Naphtal

Kenyan startup FinAccess, which digitises Savings and Credit Cooperative Organisations (SACCOs) and farming cooperatives in the East Africa region, has raised US$500,000 in funding from Cape Town-headquartered venture capital (VC) firm HAVAÍC. Founded by CEO Barclay Paul Okari in 2017, FinAccess offers a market-leading, fully proprietary SaaS solution to SACCOs and co-ops. The company’s two core products are banking software solution Fincore and agricultural software solution Grobox. FinCore digitises and automates the entire financial back office and product functions of SACCOs, while Grobox is an operations management software solution for co-ops, which tracks and records inventory, production, sales, payments, and…

Prof. Isa Ali Ibrahim Pantami, minister of Communications and Digital Economy, has been conferred with a fellowship status by the Chartered Institute of Information Security (CIISec). The honour was bestowed on the minister after rigorous interviews and evaluations. With the award, Pantami becomes the first and the only African fellow admitted into CIISec, among 89 other fellows. CIISec Fellowship is awarded to individuals who have earned respect and authority within the Cybersecurity community and have demonstrated a commitment to develop the profession. CIISec (the Home of Cyber) is the only genuine information and cybersecurity institution granted the Royal Charter of…

A survey by The Worldwide Mobile Data Pricing 2022 has revealed a list of countries offering the cheapest and most expensive mobile data. The list, compiled by Cable.co.uk, analysed data from 5,292 mobile data plans from 233 countries. The report lists the cost of 1GB of mobile data in all 233 countries. Data from the report indicates that Sub-Saharan Africa is generally the second-most expensive region in the world for mobile data. The report further noted that Sub-Saharan Africa has just five countries among the top 50 cheapest in the world. The region also has five out of the ten…

Maybe Elon Musk doesn’t want a court battle with Twitter? After having his lawyers spin up a 165-page argument about why he no longer wants to go through with his $44 billion deal to buy the platform, Musk suggested hashing things out in public — perhaps before a jury of the Tesla fans, Dogecoin hodlers, and potential Mars colonizers among his Twitter followers — to get to the bottom of Twitter’s so-called bot issue. “I hereby challenge @paraga to a public debate about the Twitter bot percentage,” Musk proclaims to all 102 million members of his forum. “Let him prove…

The Nigerian Communications Commission has so far remitted N463 billion directly into the Federal Government’s Consolidated Revenue Fund (CRF) in the last five years. This disclosure was made while the Executive Vice Chairman of the Commission, Prof. Umar Garba Danbatta with the management team of NCC visited the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy, Dr. William Alo who briefed them on the status of the industry after his recent appointment to the Ministry. Prof Danbatta who led a team of two executive commissioners and directors of the Commission to the briefing listed successes recorded since 2015 by the…

Until recently, the Republic of Togo is regarded as a country on the left side of digitalization with a slow level of technological advancement to push the country into the global digital space. The emergence of technocrat and digital technology advocate, Cina Lawson as the country’s Minister of Digital Economy and Digital Transformation has positioned the country as a frontrunner in Africa’s digitalization and digital economy drive. Minister Lawson is currently leading Togo through a profound transition to an inclusive digital economy. Her initiatives as a minister have included diversifying private participation in Togo’s telecoms sector and spearheading regulatory reforms…

Nigerian startup Blueroomcare has launched a platform that makes it easy for users to speak to licensed therapists in a timely way at a reduced price. Launched late last year, Blueroomcare allows clients to communicate with therapists via in-app messaging, videos, and voice messages. “We have a secure online platform to help those facing life’s challenges by providing easy, affordable and private access to professional counselling,” Moses Aiyenuro, the startup’s founder and CEO, told Disrupt Africa. The roots of Blueroomcare can be found in Aiyenuro’s own experience of depression, which occurred in 2020 when he missed an exam. “I couldn’t…

Kenyan HR startup Crew HR &Payroll has rebranded as FaidiHR after it received an undisclosed amount of funding from SprintX, a US-based VC focused on early-stage startups. Founded in 2018, the startup now known as FaidiHR is an all-in-one cloud platform that allows small and medium enterprises in Africa to automate their HR processes. The platform helps to automate payroll, off-days, employee data, tasks, inventory, training, appraisals, and expenses. The undisclosed round of funding comes from SprintX, a venture studio owned by 3pm in Austin, United States (US). SprintX funds early-stage startups building platforms and marketplaces. FaidiHR will use the…

Kenya-based B2B and B2B2C insurance-as-a-service platform and API Lami has raised a US$3.7 million seed extension round to help it expand across Africa. Founded by Jihan Abass in 2018, Lami is a digital insurance platform that enables partner businesses – including banks, tech companies, and other entities – to easily and seamlessly offer digital insurance products to their users via its API. The startup, which last year was chosen by Catalyst Fund as part of the eighth cohort of its inclusive fintech accelerator and also secured US$1.8 million in seed funding, can also be used by partner businesses to manage…

Airtel has signed multi-year 5G equipment supply deals worth about $2.5 billion with Sweden’s Ericsson, Finland’s Nokia and South Korea’s Samsung to start deployment of the next generation networks from August in India. While the partnership with Ericsson and Nokia has been long-standing, Samsung is the new addition, with India’s second largest telecom company officially shutting out Chinese vendors Huawei and ZTE from its 5G deployments. “Our network agreements are finalised and Airtel will work with the best technology partners from across the world to deliver the full benefits of 5G connectivity to our consumers,” Bharti Airtel managing director Gopal…