African Tech Roundup

Timothy Kotin ​was born and bred in Ghana. ​​He is the co-founder and chief executive of SuperFluid Labs​--​ an ambitious African data analytics firm which supports enterprise clients spread across multiple sectors. Superfluid has offices in Kenya, Ghana and Germany.

Kotin holds an MPhil. in E​ngineering for ​Sustainable ​D​evelopment from the University of Cambridge and a B.Sc. in ​Electrical ​E​ngineering and ​Computer Science from Harvard University. Prior to co-founding Superfluids Labs, he worked as a research scientist at IBM as part of a team which developed financial services innovations for multinational enterprise clients in Africa. Before that, he worked for Dalberg’s New York and Nairobi offices— playing consultant to key public and private sector development actors such as the U.S. Government, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Open Society Foundations and the UN Foundation.

In this conversation with Andile Masuku, Timothy relates how he and his team at Superfluid Labs have built a sustainable business around delivering business value through developing and deploying data analytics solutions, and explains why technical founders in his line of work who fail to rope in solid business development-oriented co-founders are likely to choke when reeling in the big fish.

The Facebook-sponsored TechCrunch Startup Battlefield competition which took place in Nairobi recently brought together fifteen African startups for a glitzy pitch session that offered entrants the chance to win $25,000, as well as the opportunity to go on and compete for $50,000 at the Disrupt Cup, which will be held in Silicon Valley next year.

After the Kenyan logistics startup, Lori Systems, won the Nairobi event murmurings of alleged tournament rigging started doing the rounds and eventually surfaced in media reports. This palava has got Andile Masuku and Musa Kalenga wondering what, if any, value startup competitions are adding to Africa's emerging tech ecosystem, and has inspired them to interrogate the motives and modus operandi of various commercial interests who are looking to position themselves as enablers of Africa's tech industry.

Also in this African Tech Round-up podcast, Musa and Andile discuss South Africa’s recent data breach-- the largest in the country’s history, ponder the merits of Kwese's partnership with VICE, and chat about SAP's diabolical admission of guilt made to U.S. authorities-- over a $6.7 million corporate bribe paid to secure a sizeable Transnet contract in South Africa.

Music Credits:

Music by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Music licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

Electrical engineer, Yannick Lefang, is the Founder and CEO of Kasi Insight-- a research and advisory firm that provides African consumer data and actionable insights. Since 2013, Yannick's firm has been intent on empowering business leaders and entrepreneurs with the game-changing insight they need to tap into the continent's fast-growing markets.

In this conversation with Andile Masuku - taped at Afrobytes Tech Conference 2017 - Yannick explains why even some of the most-quoted macroeconomic statistics published by leading NGO's and top-flight global consultancies can be misleading. He also gives some real-world examples of how research conducted by his firm has helped clients meet business objectives.

Sean Godoy is the Founder and Executive Director of Divercity Property Solutions. He has cross-sector experience in the property industry in both South Africa and the UK.

In this conversation with Andile Masuku, Sean explains why he's excited about the global rise of real estate tech aka proptech. He believes that this trend could facilitate the democratisation of land and property ownership in Africa and help iron out the continent's complicated post-colonial land and property situation.

Adebayo “Ade” Alonge is the Nigerian co-founder of RxAll, a platform which provides patients in the developing world with authenticated and verified medicines. Prior to this, Ade was a strategy consultant with the Boston Consulting Group, and before that, he spent eight years working a Sanofi, Roche, and BASF.

In this absorbing, not-so-quick chat with Andile Masuku, Ade unpacks the state of play within Nigeria's pharmaceutical mass market, and explains how RxAll is enabling direct access to affordable, high-quality medicines while helping to reshape drug purchasing habits within markets rife with counterfeit product.

South Korea has reportedly become the latest notable nation to follow the likes of Nigeria and China by outlawing the use of cryptocurrency. Given these developments, policymakers all across the continent are no doubt mulling over the merits of banning Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs). They are probably concerned that by shunning cryptocurrencies, they might end up being on the outside looking in on a lucrative financial trend that may well prove impossible to rein in regardless.

In this episode of the African Tech Round-up podcast, cryptocurrency enthusiast, Simon Dingle, joins Andile Masuku and Musa Kalenga to discuss the great Bitcoin surge that is fueling the world's current obsession with virtual money.

Simon explains why some people are displeased with the likes of PR journalism outfit, Memeburn, and CBS's cable channel, Showtime, for allegedly taking advantage of their audiences to mine crypocurrency. And in the wake of all the recent moving and shaking by some African virtual currency exchanges such as Luno, BitPesa and BitMari, Simon also factors in on what separates mediocre platforms from great ones.

Music Credits:

Music by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Music licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

Bertil van Vugt is Business Development Lead at the Amsterdam-based organisation, VC4Africa.

In this quiet chat with Andile Masuku, taped at Afrobytes Tech Conference 2017, Bertil gives us a sense of the mind space tech industry business opportunities occupy in the average European. Given his vantage point, he's also well-placed to factor in on how Africa's tech ecosystem is coming along in terms of growth.

Finally, Bertil also unpacks the noble rationale behind the recent launch of VC4Africa's online startup academy (https://academy.vc4a.com), and explains why he's bullish on the e-learning trend.

Michuki Mwangi is the Regional Development Manager for Africa at the Internet Society where he has worked in the African Regional Bureau to promote Internet growth and sustainability since 2008.

As the Internet Society is celebrating its 25th year anniversary in 2017, Michuki reflects on the progress being made to enable more and more Africans harness the life-changing potential of the internet. Among other things, Andile Masuku asks him who can be trusted to help bring Africa online given the numerous political and commercial interests around the world who are keen to exploit the internet to advance selfish ambitions.

A few weeks ago, Africa's richest man, Nigeria's Aliko Dangote, baffled many pro-African investment proponents by telling Bloomberg that if things go the way he plans, come 2020, a significant chunk of his wealth will be deployed abroad.

In this African Tech Round-up episode Andile Masuku and Musa Kalenga are joined by Bitmari co-founder and self-proclaimed "pre-racial thought leader", Sinclair Skinner, for an unfettered family-style straight-talk session which literally went all over the place-- including reacting to Mr Dangote's recent revelation.

Beware the scorching candid views and unintentional hot takes on everything from Naspers' problematic links to South Africa's apartheid past and Tanzania's new drone delivery program, to the big ticket maneuverings happening in South Africa's fintech scene courtesy of South Africa's wealthiest black man, Patrice Mostepe.

Music Credits:

Music by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Music licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

**Apologies for the poor sound quality**

Adedana Ashebir has recently been tasked with heading up Village Capital's business on the continent.

In this conversation, Adedana walks Andile Masuku through some of the thinking behind and the findings published in Village Capital's implicatory Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation funded report called Breaking the Pattern: Getting Digital Financial Services Entrepreneurs to Scale in India and East Africa.

Among other things, this fintech-focused research highlights the fact that more than 90 percent of funding for East African fintech start-ups typically goes to expatriate founders (European or North American), and the fact that despite East Africa posting a record haul in terms of start-up investment ($84.7million or R1.13billion) over the last two years, a whopping 72 percent of that funding has gone to just three companies - namely, M-Kopa, Off-Grid Electric and Angaza.

Adedana factors in on the lively debate that's ensued in the wake of the report being published, and shares candid insights on the awkward dynamics of navigating the continent's emerging tech scene as a repat.