Author: Staff Writer

Global financial services group Visa is set to spend $200 million to acquire 20% stake in Nigerian based payments group, Interswitch. According to a Sky News report, both companies are in advanced talks and the transaction could be announced as soon as this week. Update: Both companies have put out…

Electroneum (ETN), a cryptocurrency startup based in England, has launched its mobile top-up service across 15 mobile operators in Uganda, Nigeria and Tanzania. This brings the total number of countries to six. It launched mobile top up in Brazil across four top mobile network operators This means that Electroneum users…

Reports has emerged citing Uber’s entry in the Online Ads space. According to Techcrunch, Uber will become an ad platform, selling space inside its Eats app to restaurants hoping to lure in more food delivery orders. Though it’s not yet clear how the ads will work or look, they may help…

The Nigerian Senate has reintroduced a bill seeking a 150,000 Naira fine and/or 3 year jail sentence for the abuse of social media in the country. Interestingly, the bill was jettisoned some years ago after Nigerians cried against its promulgation citing it as a draconian and anti-social media” law. In…

Chinese smartphone maker, Xiaomi, has introduced a new smartphone, the Mi Note 10 which is the world’s first 108MP penta camera smartphone. The Mi Note 10 is the global variant of the Mi CC9 Pro which launched in China on the 5th of November. The Mi Note 10 will sold…

Google launched a new local Traffic Tab on Google Maps in Nigeria on Wednesday. At the 3rd Google for Nigeria event held early in the year, Google launched navigation instructions in a Nigerian accent. At the same event, it also promised to launch improved navigation maps for Lagos commercial bus…

WeFarm, the world’s largest farmer-to-farmer digital network announced that it has raised $13 million in a Series A round of funding to expand its network of farmers. This round is being led by True Ventures, with AgFunder, June Fund; previous investors LocalGlobe, ADV and Norrsken Foundation; and others also participating. This brings…

Stanbic IBTC has launched the Stanbic IBTC @ease wallet, in line with its commitment to deepen financial inclusion and drive its digitization agenda. The product is set to provide a unique range of financial services to the informally served, the underbanked and the unbanked on various structured platforms with the…

Interswitch has announced its entrance into the health-tech space with the acquisition of 60% stake in eClat Healthcare Limited, a Nigeria-based health technology company that aims to improve healthcare delivery in Africa. Founded in 2012, eClat Healthcare Limited specializes in assisting healthcare service providers in planning, designing and operating their…

MTN’s 3rd quarter results released yesterday showed a revenue growth of 12.1% to N854 billion ($2.3 billion). The positive trend was mainly driven by increase in voice and data revenues. Even though the number of subscribers grew slightly by 100,000, from 61.5 m in Q2 to 61.6 million in Q3,…

Fiat Chrysler (FCA) and French Peugeot owner PSA Group have agreed to merge thereby creating a new giant auto manufacturing company with combined revenues of $190 billion and about 410,000 employees. The move comes less than five months after Fiat Chrysler abandoned merger talks with PSA’s French rival Renault. Each…

South African based Insurance tech startup, Pineapple, has won first place in the US-based Ventureclash challenge. Eleven businesses pitched at a final event for a share of the prize money. Pineapple is a peer-to-peer insurance provider that allows individuals to insure their possessions simply by snapping a picture and uploading…

Five African entrepreneurs are among 24 high impact entrepreneurs from 12 markets, selected to join Endeavor’s global community. They were selected recently at the 91st International Selection Panel (ISP) in Istanbul, Turkey. The ISP is the culmination of a rigorous multi-step selection process to identify high-impact entrepreneurs who demonstrate the…

The new online lead generation platform integrates seamlessly into Opera’s scalable advertising ecosystem in Nigeria.

Airtel Africa, a leading telecommunications service provider, and Finablr, a global platform for payments and foreign exchange solutions, have entered into an extensive global partnership that will see the two companies bringing together their complementary capabilities. As an outcome of the arrangement, Airtel Africa mobile money operations will be integrated…

Kenyan logistics company, Sendy has secured a $2million investment from Dutch-based Goodwell Investments. According to Goodwell, “the money will move the company closer to achieving its mission of improving the access of lower income groups to good quality basic products and services, at much lower prices. ” Sendy’s user-focused technology…

Decagon, a software engineering institute founded by Chika Nwobi, is now a GitHub Partner School. This makes Decagon the first Nigerian talent accelerator to become a GitHub Partner and one of eight GitHub Campus Partner Schools in Africa. Decagon is a software engineering institute ushering in a new phase of…

Seedstars World, a Swiss-based startup competition in emerging markets, and the African Development Bank on Tuesday announced a strategic partnership to implement its innovative ‘job creation track’ model to support youth employment and entrepreneurship in Africa. The partnership is in line with the Bank’s entrepreneurship and innovation lab under its…

Airtel Africa, the African entity of telecoms giant, Bharti Airtel, has reported an 8.4% revenue growth to $1,640 million in H1 with Q2 growth accelerating to 9.8%.  In constant currency terms, revenue grew 11.4% in H1 and 12.6% in Q2. The constant currency revenue growth of 11.4% was driven by…

Access Bank, one of the foremost banks in Nigeria is set to acquire 93.75% of Transnational Bank in Kenya as the consolidation of banks in Kenya hots up. Transnational Bank is one of Kenya’s tier-4 bank and posted a $693,904 loss in 2018. This is coming barely seven months after…