Author: Akin Naphtal

Appoints Dr Olatunji as NDPB Pioneer National Commissioner The federal government of Nigeria has approved the establishment of the Nigeria Data Protection Bureau (NDPB). This followed a request made by the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Prof Isa Ali Ibrahim (Pantami). The NDPB has been established in line with global best practices and will focus on data protection and privacy for the country, among others, according to the statement signed by Spokesperson to the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Mrs Uwa Suleiman. The successful implementation of the National Digital Economy Policy and Strategy (NDEPS) for a Digital Nigeria…

Kenya’s Lami has acquired fellow Nairobi-based insurtech startup Bluewave in order to drive rapid growth and expand its presence to new African markets. 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…

Meta Platforms, the company formerly known as Facebook, just had the worst trading day in its history as a public company. The company’s shares closed down more than 26% on Thursday, shaving off nearly $240 billion from its market value, after a rough earnings report released after trading hours on Wednesday. Not only did Meta (FB) report a rare and worse-than-expected profit decline during the final three months of last year, it laid out a series of challenges to its core advertising business and revealed for the first time just how much money it’s losing on its shift to the metaverse.  The company also reported a slight-but-striking decline…

This was revealed during the release of the end-of-year report on venture capital investments in Africa. Further checks in Crunchbase and Tracxn — platforms that track funding rounds in startups and private companies globally — reveal that the company closed the round in August 2021. PalmPay came into Nigeria’s payments scene in June 2019. Five months later, it launched with a $40 million seed round — the largest of its kind on the continent — from Chinese investors such as Chinese phone-maker Transsion via its Tecno subsidiary, NetEase and wireless communications hardware firm Mediatek. The startup also took money from Chinese investors for…

Nigerian mobility fintech startup Moove, Uber’s exclusive vehicle financing and vehicle supply partner in Sub-Saharan Africa, has secured US$10 million in debt financing to enable it to expand across key markets. Founded in 2019 by British-born Nigerians Ladi Delano and Jide Odunsi, who have successfully built three other businesses in Africa over the last eight years through venture studio Grace Lake Partners, Moove is democratising vehicle ownership in Africa by providing revenue-based vehicle financing to mobility entrepreneurs. Moove embeds its alternative credit-scoring technology onto ride-hailing and e-logistics platforms, which allows access to proprietary performance and revenue analytics of mobility entrepreneurs…

Setting up a bank can be a long, expensive process with complex regulatory and compliance hurdles to overcome. However, with the emergence of Banking-as-a-Service (BaaS), an entity can provide banking services without batting an eyelid. With BaaS, non-banks including FinTech, and other entities such as professional bodies or schools can offer their own branded financial products such as debit, credit, or loyalty cards. In other words, BaaS opens up banking to third parties supporting the evolution of new services and enabling greater financial transparency. BaaS is assuming great importance because it offers a great potential to expand banking services, disrupting…

MTN Nigeria has officially announced that its Series One offer for the sale of 575 million shares held by MTN Group in MTN Nigeria to Nigerian investors has been oversubscribed following the successful completion of the public offer on Tuesday. In a statement issued and signed by the company’s secretary, Uto Ukpanah, the offer was oversubscribed with a valid application for a total of 801.97 million units, leading to the activation clause of an additional 86.25 million MTN shares. “In all 661.25 million MTN Nigeria shares were allotted. A total of 126.720 retail investors submitted valid applications and received full…

According to Global consultancy Turner & Townsend’s latest Data Centre Cost Index, the construction sector is in the midst of an international supply chain crisis as it continues to recover from the impact of Covid-19. Despite this adversity, 70% of this year’s survey respondents were optimistic that stronger-than-ever demand proves that the data-centre industry is recession-proof. The Index – which is in its fifth year – looked at global markets consisting of 44 locations including Nairobi and Johannesburg in Africa. Findings show that increasing costs in every market due to a year of supply disruption, did not deter data centre demand in…

The demand for software engineers is expected to grow by 22% between 2020 and 2030, according to a report by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. This figure is larger than the 4% average for other careers. One would be out of touch with reality to say they haven’t noticed this phenomenon in Lagos, Africa’s startup capital city, where mid to senior-level engineers are leaving in droves to seek better pay and opportunities in companies outside Africa. Andela has been pivotal to placing the continent’s tech talent globally. But since the unicorn changed its business model to a pure marketplace focusing on senior developers,…

Casava, Nigeria’s first 100 per cent digital insurance company, has secured US$4 million in pre-seed funding to provide affordable and accessible insurance products for millions of Nigerians. Launched last year, Casava aims to make insurance affordable for income earners by leveraging technology, behavioural science and empathy. The startup is a vertically integrated company with a wholly-owned microinsurance carrier in Nigeria and a full technology stack to power it. The US$4 million pre-seed funding round was led by Target Global with participation from Entrée Capital, Oliver Jung, Monzo founder Tom Blomfield and Stash founders Ed Robinson and Brandon Krieg. African founders…