African Tech Roundup

It’s the 4th of July, and in honour of the fact that our biggest audience outside of Africa is based in the USA, this week’s African Tech Round-up episode has a decidedly American spin.

Playing guest-host in this instalment is very good friend of the show, aka “The American Homie”, Trevor Wolfe— Co-founder and CEO of Delvv.io.

Trevor is fresh off a plane from Europe and the States where he’s successfully closed a round of funding for his crowdsourced research startup. In addition to factoring in on the week’s headlines, Trevor shares some interesting insights on what it takes to launch and operate a tech startup on the continent, while maintaining a global outlook. But that’s not all, folks…

This week’s show also features two Stateside-based personalities who are extremely active on Africa’s tech scene— namely, Maya Horgan Famodu, Founder and CEO of Ingressive, and Toro Orero, Co-founder and Managing Partner, at DraperDarkFlow.

Listen in to hear Maya share some of what she’s observed while leading high profile investment tours to Africa, and explaining what operating in Silicon Valley is like on the day-to-day. Then tune in to listen to Toro share what he and Tim Draper look for in startups they hope to invest in, as well as dish on the pros and cons of running an Africa-focussed VC firm that’s headquartered in Silicon Valley.

Music Credits:

Music by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Music licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

One of the more surprising things that came out of a recent conversation Andile Masuku had with BT’s Managing Director for Sub-Saharan Africa, Oliver Fortuin is his answer when asked (somewhat unfairly) what disruptive trend could potentially render BT redundant in the next decade. His answer? The trend towards consolidated media ownership. Listen in to this week’s African Tech Round-up to hear Oliver unpack that answer.

Meanwhile, the French Urban television network Trace TV’s acquisition of Kenyan, pan-African VOD service Buni.tv made headlines last week. Buni.tv is believed to be one of the largest African VOD services offering home-grown content. Trace TV has revealed that this acquisition is part of their plans to gear up for the launch of a VOD platform called Trace Play later in 2016.

Now, it does seem that aside from keeping an eye out for competitors like iROKOtv, DSTV and Netflix, aspiring VOD service providers like Trace TV might do well to anticipate the moves being made by the likes of South Africa’s Telkom, Zimbabwe’s Econet Group and offshore players like BT— because by Oliver’s own admission, incumbents like BT don’t plan to quietly “stay in their lane” and watch the world pass them by.

Music Credits:

Music by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Music licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

Despite the considerable push-back Uber has experienced in certain African markets, the firm’s march towards utter and complete world domination continued last week as they launched in Tanzania’s capital city, Dar es Salaam.

Dar es Salaam is the 3rd African city Uber has taken to in as many weeks (following Luanda, Uganda and Accra, Ghana) and their 475th location worldwide. Since launching in Johannesburg in 2012, Uber has quietly gone about silencing many of the doubts that sceptics have had about the viability of their business model in African markets that typically show little regard to hype-driven startups that roll in from the West expecting an easy ride. (No pun intended.)

Basically, what might have appeared to some as being a casual African safari is gradually developing into a case study on lean, mean execution. Only time will tell if a home-grown platform like Little Cabs— the ride-hailing service Safaricom is set to launch, will be able to rain on Uber’s parade.

Be sure to listen into this week’s episode of the African Tech Round-up to hear Andile Masuku chat with Matthew Lee— a plumber turned corporate executive who now heads up African operations at the German open source software firm, Suse.

Matthew shares insights on how well Africa is keeping up with the rest of the world in terms of producing world-class software applications, and points out key growth areas that could benefit from the increased roll-out of OSS solutions.

Music Credits:

Music by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Music licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

Ever wonder what it might be like to run a startup that’s owned by a successful tech company, backed by one of Africa’s wealthiest entrepreneurs? Well, one thing is for sure— it’s no walk in the park. At least, that’s according to Charles Murray.

Charles is a director of a messaging and internet calling app called ttrumpet that’s looking to capture a big share of Africa’s digital vouchering market. ttrumpet-- dubbed a "lifestyle app", is a subsidiary of Fastcomm, a tech group that boasts having billionaire businessman Patrice Motsepe as one if its shareholders.

In this conversation, Charles tells Andile Masuku why he reckons that ttrumpet isn’t just another mobile app, and shares how his company plans to thrive in an ever changing social media landscape.

On Friday, June 10th 2016 MTN’s stock price on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange jumped by 20%. This happened in the wake of the news that the firm’s nine-month Nigerian nightmare might finally be coming to an end.

MTN has reportedly struck a deal with the Nigerian government, and is set to pay the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) $1.7 billion over three years— significantly less than the $5.2 billion they were initially fined for flouting SIM card registration regulations months ago.

While MTN’s shareholders are no doubt breathing a sigh of relief, the company is not out of the woods yet, as according to the NCC, one of the conditions linked to the monetary settlement is the requirement that MTN list its Nigerian subsidiary on the Nigerian Stock Exchange “as soon as is commercially and legally possible”.

While the jury’s still out on whether this is the last we’ll hear of this story, one thing is certain, this case sets one heck of a precedent, and that can only bode well for corporate Africa.

Also in this week's African Tech Round-up, we feature part of a conversation Andile Masuku had with Charles Murray-- who is a director of the messaging and internet calling app, ttrumpet.

Listen in to hear Charles talking about why he reckons ttrumpet isn’t just another mobile app, and sharing some of the pressures and perks of growing a startup that is a subsidiary of relatively successful tech group (Fastcomm) backed by one of the continent’s wealthiest entrepreneurs, Patrice Motsepe.

Music Credits:

Music by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Music licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

If there were a race to being Africa’s largest media and internet company, out of fairness to other firms in the running, Naspers would probably be asked not to enter.

After seeing its share price rise to an all-time high on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange last week— reaching R2,320.73 per share, pushing its market value to R1,02 trillion (±$6,7 billion), it’s now a matter of “catch me if you can” as far as any of the firm’s competitors closing in on them.

In this week’s African Tech Round-up, Andile Masuku shares some of the reasons why Naspers stock is such a hot ticket at the moment, and dishes on the firm’s latest high-profile investment in a popular American e-learning platform.

Andile also catches up with the Founder of Venture Capital For Africa (VC4A), Ben White. Ben’s organisation has recently published a report called the 2016 Venture Finance in Africa which highlights growing investor appetite in African early stage startups. Listen in to hear him unpack some of their findings, and give Andile a sense of the current state of play on Africa’s VC scene.

Turns out Ghana’s top cop— Inspector General of Police John Kudalor thinks that blocking social media access across the country might be necessary to ensure Ghana’s national security on election day in November 2016.

Mr Kudalor reckons that Ghana might do well to learn from the example set by other countries on the continent and around the world that have take similar steps in the recent past— Uganda no doubt being top of mind.

It's likely that the Inspector General’s comments might have been made to test public sentiment on the issue ahead of the polls. However, if the chill we're picking up on Twitter is anything to go by, Ghanaians don’t seem to be terribly concerned at the prospect of having to survive 24 hours or so without access to Facebook and Twitter come November 7th. Ah, well…

Meanwhile, in place of our discussion segment on the African Tech Round-up this week, we feature part of a recent in-depth conversation Andile Masuku had with Stephen van Coller, who is the Chief Executive for Corporate and Investment Banking at Barclays Africa.

Listen in to hear Stephen tell Andile how Barclays Plc’s imminent plans to shed its investments in Africa will impact the business he runs, and why he is confident that fintech startups on the continent will never completely disrupt incumbents within the financial services industry.

Bonus: Look out for a comment made by Nigeria’s leading podcaster, Andre Blaze Henshaw, on why he reckons that podcasting as a medium is going to be huge in the media scene of the future.

Music Credits:

Music by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Music licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

Brian Anderson is the Head of Sales and Business Development at Fidelity National Information Services (FIS), a NYSE-listed firm specialising in banking and payments technology as well as consulting and outsourcing solutions— which acquired one of the world’s leading financial software and technology services companies SunGard in 2015. The company services 20,000 clients in 130 countries and has 55,000 employees and $9.3 billion in revenue. Brian speaks to Andile Masuku about the company's next big idea targetting developing markets in Africa-- an online stokvel (savings club) solution.

Late last week a violent attack on two Uber partner vehicles in the Sandton Central Business District led to the injury of three police officers who attended the scene to calm things down, and also resulted in the damage of two law enforcement vehicles.

The assault on the Uber partners’ cars is said to have been carried out by a group of meter taxi drivers unhappy with Uber’s disruption of their livelihood. One man has reportedly been arrested in connection with the incident.

Meanwhile, the quiet chat with Brian Anderson featured in this week’s African Tech Round-up in place of our regular debate segment takes on a decidedly more civil tone. Brian is the Head of Sales and Business Development for Africa at NYSE-listed banking and payments technology firm, Fidelity National Information Services (FIS)— the company that acquired financial software company SunGuard late last year.

Listen in to hear Brian talk to Andile Masuku about an ambitious new platform that FIS is poised to launch to help promote financial inclusion on the continent.

Music Credits:

Music by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Music licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

Vodacom is finally pulling the plug on their disastrous six-year attempt to roll out M-Pesa in South Africa. (The service will be shut down on June 30th 2016.)

Funny thing is, Vodacom CEO Shameel Joosub has blamed his company’s diabolical failure to meet their target of enlisting at least 10 million active users on South Africa’s relatively well-established banking industry. (By the end of 2015 they had only managed to onboard a paltry 76,000 active users.)

However, Joosub’s assertion does not sit well with our guest on this week’s episode of the African Tech Round-up— the brilliant and insightful, Dominique Collett.

Dominique knows a thing or two about what works and what doesn’t in terms of mobile money innovation on the continent. Following a successful exit at the incredibly successful fintech startup she co-founded-- Tyme (acquired by the Commonwealth Bank of Australia for a rumoured ±USD30 million), Dominique has gone on to become a financial services investor and innovation architect who is now a Senior Investment Executive at Rand Merchant Insurance Holdings (RMI), as well as the Head of Alpha Code, RMI’s nippy financial services incubator/accelerator.

Listen in to this week's discussion to hear Tefo Mohapi, Andile Masuku and Dominique ponder what lies ahead for Africa’s mobile money scene.

Music Credits:

Music by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Music licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0