Author: Akin Naphtal

Kenya-based EV startup BasiGo has closed $4.3 million in seed funding, three months after setting up operations in East Africa’s biggest economy, to provide clean-energy mass transit vehicles in a country that is heavily reliant on fossil-fuel buses. The startup said it will use the new funding to set up an assembly plant in Nairobi and to launch the sales and delivery of its electric buses. Already, BasiGo has set up a charging and servicing depot adjacent to the country’s main airport, the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport, in the capital, Nairobi. It has also imported two electric buses for the pilot program. The…

Nigerian vehicle repair and maintenance startup Mecho Autotech has raised a US$2.15 million seed funding round to expand its capacities and acquire more customers. Founded in 2021 by Olusegun Owoade and Ayoola Akinkunmi, Mecho Autotech offers repair and maintenance services to businesses and consumers through in-house and third-party service capacity which has passed rigorous assessments. The company has both workshop – Mecho Shops – and mobile service – Mecho Mobile – capabilities, and has so far onboarded over 7,000 third-party mechanics to its platform. Last year it was a participant in the S21 batch of the Y Combinator accelerator, and…

Leading African economies that have struggled to improve their infrastructure, business conditions and overall competitiveness are generally performing better against other emerging markets in areas that measure their digital skills and sustainability. That’s one of the findings of the 2022 Agility Emerging Markets Logistics Index, a ranking of the world’s 50 leading emerging markets. Kenya ranks 28th in the overall Index but is 17th in digital readiness. South Africa, ranked 24th in the overall index and 21st in digital readiness. Likewise, Ghana is 32nd overall and 23rd in digital readiness. The Index, now in its 13th year, ranks countries for…

An internationally recognised currency exchange platform, Grey, has been accepted into Y Combinator’s Winter 2022 startup batch. The instant exchange service company recently changed its name from Aboki Africa in a bid to use a more international-friendly moniker. The startup also recently raised an undisclosed amount of pre-seed funding from Ingressive Capital and Abdul Hassan, co-founder and CEO of Mono and other investors. Idorenyin Obong and Femi Aghedo launched Grey in July 2020. The simple problem they wanted to solve, which they faced, was to help Nigerians exchange the foreign currencies in their domiciliary accounts to local currency — which…

Cassava Technologies has appointed Tesh Durvasula as the new Chief Executive Officer of Africa Data Centres effective 7 February 2022. He will be responsible for driving growth, innovation and strategy of Cassava Technologies’ data centres to meet Africa’s accelerating demand for data and digital infrastructure. Durvasula is an experienced technology and real estate industry executive with a 25-year track record of successful leadership and value generation in the digital infrastructure sector. He will lead the ADC team as the organisation rapidly expands its footprint of hyperscale data centres throughout Africa with a plan to add an additional ten data centres…

Africa Data Centres (ADC) has announced that its long-serving CEO, Stephane Duproz, has been replaced in the role by Tesh Durvasula. Cassava Technologies – a new holding company created last year for businesses such as ADC, Distributed Power Technologies and Liquid Intelligent Technologies – said in a statement on Monday that Durvasula will take the reins with immediate effect. “Durvasula is an experienced technology and real estate industry executive with a 25-year track record of successful leadership and value generation in the digital infrastructure sector,” Cassava said in Monday’s statement. “He will lead the Africa Data Centres team as the…

Airtel Africa recorded an earnings surge that helped its after-tax profit almost double to more than half a billion dollars in the nine months to December, according to its unaudited earnings report issued today, Friday, February 04, 2022. The reported revenue grew by 21.7% to $3,492m while constant currency underlying revenue grew by 24.8%. Constant currency underlying revenue growth was recorded across all regions: Airtel Nigeria up 29.0%, East Africa up 24.4% and Francophone Africa up 19.0%; and across all key services, with revenue in Voice up 16.1%, and in Data and Mobile Money both up 37.2%. Underlying EBITDA was…

A report issued by a panel of experts looking into the July 2021 riots has found that South Africa’s recently-introduced Cybercrimes Act would have given the state additional tools to clamp down on the looting and riots, and could be used to prevent future unrest from taking place. President Cyril Ramaphosa appointed the panel following a spate of orchestrated public violence, destruction and sabotage that impacted KwaZulu Natal and parts of Gauteng in July 2021. The three-member panel included human rights lawyer, Advocate Mojanku Gumbi, former deputy head of the South African Secret Service, Silumko Sokupa, and University of Pretoria’s…

The Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) has urged President Muhammadu Buhari to use “his good offices and leadership position to urgently review and rescind his reported approval for security agencies to access people’s personal details via National Identification Number (NIN)-Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) linkage without due process of law.” SERAP also urged President Buhari to send executive bills to the National Assembly to repeal and reform all laws, which are inconsistent and incompatible with Nigerians’ rights to privacy, dignity and liberty. The Guardian had exclusively reported last week that one year after the NIN-SIM policy came into force, the…

Nigerian ride-hailing and shared mobility startup, Transtura has completed the acquisition of WazoMoney, a fintech startup that provides simplified payment solutions as it sets to launch its payment and marketplace solutions for the mobility sector. The company believes this will help unlock the enormous opportunities in the transportation value chain in Nigeria and other Africa countries. Transtura commenced full-scale operations in October 2021, launching its shared mobility service in Lagos. The company has continued to record massive traction since launching, with thousands of riders queuing in its three major routes to use its shared ride service. The startup is now…