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Vodacom, a pan-African technology group, processed nearly $548 billion in mobile money transactions over the past year, signalling that the telecom giant’s future lies beyond phone calls and data bundles. In a trading update for the quarter ended June 30, 2026, released on Monday, the company said its mobile money platforms, including Safaricom’s M-PESA, processed nearly $548 billion in transactions over the 12 months to June 30, 2026. The milestone comes weeks after Vodacom completed its acquisition of an effective 20% stake in Safaricom, increasing its shareholding to 55% and giving it controlling ownership of East Africa’s largest telecom operator. While the South African-headquartered operator built its business on voice and data, its future growth strategy is now firmly centred on digital financial services across the continent. Vodacom’s latest quarterly trading update reveals a company undergoing a profound transformation. The Safaricom transaction not only expands its geographic footprint but also accelerates its ambition to become a leading pan-African fintech player. According to the trading update, financial services now contribute more than 22% of Group service revenue, up from 13% before the transaction, while mobile money platforms processed nearly $548 billion over the past year. Those figures signal that fintech, not traditional telecoms, is becoming the company’s primary growth engine. “This quarter marked a defining moment for Vodacom with the completion of our acquisition of a controlling stake in Safaricom,” said Shameel Joosub, Vodacom Group chief executive officer (CEO). “This strategically important transaction represents a major milestone in our Vision 2030 journey, significantly enhancing the Group’s scale, diversification and long-term growth prospects.” The acquisition strengthens Vodacom’s position in Kenya through Safaricom while broadening its exposure to fast-growing digital finance markets across Ethiopia, Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mozambique and Lesotho, alongside its established operations in South Africa and Egypt. The deal also gives Vodacom greater access to M-PESA, Africa’s largest mobile money platform, at a time when digital payments, remittances and financial inclusion are reshaping the continent’s financial services landscape. Joosub said the stronger financial services business had prompted the company to raise its long-term ambitions. “Reflecting this stronger growth profile, we have upgraded our medium-term Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) and operating free cash flow growth targets from double-digit to early-teens growth,” he said. The company also increased its Vision 2030 revenue ambition from more than R200 billion ($12 billion) to more than R300 billion ($18 billion), reflecting confidence that fintech, digital services and higher-growth African markets will become increasingly important contributors to future earnings. While South Africa remains Vodacom’s largest and most cash-generative market, the latest results illustrate why the operator is looking across Africa for growth. Joosub said South African service revenue grew 2% during the quarter, supported by an improvement in prepaid performance. Egypt delivered one of the strongest performances across the group, with service revenue increasing 32.8% in local currency, while financial services revenue surged 73%. Vodacom’s International business, which includes Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Lesotho and Mozambique, recorded 14% normalised service revenue growth. Beyond mobile connectivity, digital services generated R7.8 billion ($467 million), representing almost 23% of Group service revenue. Financial services remain the largest component of that business. Vodacom is also expanding the role of financial technology across its markets. During the quarter, its Tanzanian operation launched what it described as Africa’s first mobile money tap-to-pay solution, allowing more than 22 million M-PESA customers to make contactless payments directly from their mobile wallets. In the Democratic Republic of Congo, the company used anonymised mobile data analytics to support Ebola preparedness and public health planning, demonstrating how its digital platforms are extending beyond financial services. The Vodacom trading update noted that the acquisition of Safaricom represents more than a larger telecom footprint. It cements the company’s transition from a connectivity provider into a diversified technology business spanning mobile networks, digital platforms and financial services. True scale demands moving beyond surface-level integrations to robust execution. We’ve filtered the noise out of Moonshot 2026, optimising the conference strictly for high-calibre connections between startup founders, global financial operators, enterprise leaders and individuals rewiring Africa’s technical frameworks. Get 20% off Early Bird tickets for a limited time.
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For millions of South Africans, tax season still feels like an annual ritual of gathering documents, checking deductions and submitting returns. Inside the South African Revenue Service (SARS), the country’s revenue authority, however, tax season looks very different. Long before many taxpayers log into eFiling, artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning and advanced data analytics have already assessed risk, matched third-party information and helped determine which returns deserve closer scrutiny. What was once a labour-intensive process driven largely by manual audits is becoming a technology-powered operation fuelled by data. The shift marks one of Africa’s most significant examples of AI being deployed at scale in government. Beyond improving tax collection, it offers a glimpse into how algorithmic decision-making is reshaping public institutions and the relationship between citizens and the state. SARS has quietly become one of the continent’s most sophisticated users of AI, embedding data science across virtually every stage of tax administration, from auto-assessments and fraud detection to compliance verification and audit selection. The approach reflects a broader trend of African governments using AI not only to improve efficiency but to close revenue gaps in digital economies. “SARS uses data science, machine learning and AI as part of its broader modernisation programme to continuously innovate and improve tax compliance processes,” Siphithi Sibeko, Head of Communication and Media at SARS, told TechCabal in an interview on Monday. “The SARS strategy focuses on the customer experience and applying these capabilities to ensure that ‘tax just happens’.” The scale of the technology’s impact is already becoming visible. According to Sibeko, the SARS compliance programme contributed R304 billion ($18.2 billion) during the 2024/25 financial year. AI-assisted fraud detection and verification prevented more than R417 billion ($25 billion) in impermissible refund outflows over the past five years. Sibeko further stated that 100% of verification cases and 88.41% of complex audit cases are now selected using automated risk-assessment functionality, illustrating how algorithms have become central to identifying compliance risks. Rather than relying solely on information submitted through tax returns, SARS built a comprehensive digital picture of taxpayers by integrating data received under its statutory mandate from employers, financial institutions, medical schemes, retirement funds, insurers, investment managers and other reporting entities. It also receives information from domestic government registers, foreign tax authorities and cryptocurrency reporting frameworks. In a July 1 statement, SARS said the enhancements are designed to make tax compliance “simpler, faster and more secure” for millions of taxpayers, adding that as of 1 July 2026, more than 1.9 million taxpayers had been auto-assessed, with about R8 billion ($479 million) in refunds paid out within 72 hours. That expanding data ecosystem has become particularly important as South Africa’s e-commerce market expands. Online retail sales are projected to reach R130 billion ($7.8 billion), representing nearly 10% of total retail sales, reflecting the growing volume of digital transactions that generate taxable income and data trails. Income generated through freelancing platforms, remote work, e-commerce businesses and crypto assets often leaves digital trails that traditional tax systems struggle to follow. AI now enables SARS to analyse these complex datasets at a scale that would be impossible through manual investigation. “The focus is not on any single technology, but on a platform approach that integrates data, analytics, AI and modern compliance capabilities to make compliance easier for honest taxpayers and harder to evade for those who choose not to comply,” Sibeko told TechCabal. “We are seeing increased participation in the digital economy, which reinforces the importance of ensuring that all taxable income is declared, regardless of how or where income is earned.” SARS insists that technology is designed to support, not replace, human judgement despite the growing reliance on AI. Despite its growing reliance on AI, Sibeko noted that technology supports rather than replaces human decision-making. Risk indicators generated by its AI systems are reviewed through governance processes and human oversight, with the models continuously refined to improve accuracy and minimise false positives before any enforcement action is taken. He believes that the human-in-the-loop approach will become important as governments worldwide grapple with questions around AI accountability, transparency and citizens’ rights when automated systems influence public decisions. For South Africa, the implications extend well beyond tax collection. SARS’ Modernisation 3.0 strategy aims to create a smart, digital and data-driven revenue authority built around digital identities, unified taxpayer records and AI-powered compliance systems. As governments across Africa search for ways to improve revenue collection without increasing tax rates, SARS is demonstrating that AI may become one of the most powerful fiscal tools available. True scale demands moving beyond surface-level integrations to robust execution. We’ve filtered the noise out of Moonshot 2026, optimising the conference strictly for high-calibre connections between startup founders, global financial operators, enterprise leaders and individuals rewiring Africa’s technical frameworks. Get 20% off Early Bird tickets for a limited time.
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This is Follow the Money, our weekly series that unpacks the earnings, business, and scaling strategies of African fintechs, financial institutions, companies, and governments. A new edition drops every Monday. Africa’s startup ecosystem raised roughly the same amount of venture capital in the first half of 2026 as it did a year earlier. Startups across the continent raised about $1.4 billion in the first six months of the year, broadly matching H1 2025 despite a global venture capital market that remains cautious, according to Africa: The Big Deal, a monthly funding tracker. But a closer look at where the money went tells a different story. The question is no longer whether capital is flowing into African startups, but where it is going. Rather than being spread across hundreds of young companies, venture capital is increasingly concentrating in a small group of mature businesses with proven business models and established revenues. The startups raising the largest rounds are attracting more money than ever before, while founders seeking their first institutional backing are finding fewer investors willing to take the risk. The 30 most-funded startups absorbed 84% of all disclosed capital raised during the first half of the year, according to data from TechCabal Insights. The remainder was shared among more than 100 other ventures. Stability is the new order According to TechCabal Insights, startups secured $1.44 billion across 146 disclosed transactions during the first half of the year. Yet the number of deals fell 42% year on year, suggesting investors are writing fewer but significantly larger cheques. Mid-sized rounds between $10 million and $99 million accounted for 66% of total funding, while early-stage rounds below $500,000 represented just 19% of all deals, underscoring investors’ retreat from riskier bets. The shift has been years in the making. In 2020, African startups closed 454 early-stage deals, 38% more than the 282 recorded in 2021, according to TechCabal Insights. Since the first half of 2021, rounds below $500,000 have fallen from 52% of deals to just 19% in H1 2026. Africa: The Big Deal also found that the number of ventures raising more than $100,000 fell to 190 startups, the lowest tally since at least 2021. The sharpest decline came among companies raising between $100,000 and $1 million, which dropped from 179 startups in H2 2025 to just 100 in H1 2026. The trend extends well beyond Africa. The data tracker firm notes that globally, venture capital is becoming concentrated into fewer companies, particularly in markets such as the United States where artificial intelligence continues to attract outsized investment. Even grants are slowing For a time, grants helped cushion the retreat in venture capital. Development finance institutions (DFIs) and philanthropic organisations increasingly financed experimentation that private investors had become reluctant to support. According to Africa: The Big Deal, 2025 recorded the highest number of disclosed grants above $100,000 since 2021, with 160 grants awarded to 154 ventures. So far, however, 2026 is running well behind that pace. During the first quarter, only 15 disclosed grants worth more than $100,000 were announced, totalling roughly $4 million, compared to 27 grants worth about $20 million during the same period a year earlier. DFIs remain critical to the ecosystem. Between 2022 and 2024, DFIs accounted for roughly 45% of commitments into Africa-focused venture funds. That figure fell to 27% in 2025 as global venture fundraising entered a third consecutive year of contraction. “If grants are meant to help de-risk innovation and keep the early-stage engine running, those Q1 numbers should worry us a bit,” Africa: The Big Deal wrote. “So, yes: totals are holding up. But the ecosystem’s future is written in the base. And right now, the base is thinning, in small equity cheques, and (so far this year) in grants too. If this trend continues, Africa might still be producing big rounds in 2026, while silently starving the pipeline that produces the next generation of breakout companies.” Those early-stage rounds rarely dominate headlines because they account for only a small share of total capital deployed. Yet they finance product development, customer acquisition, and market validation, the investments that eventually produce tomorrow’s Series A companies and unicorns. Some investors are deliberately swimming against the tide. Launch Africa Ventures, whose portfolio includes more than 180 companies across 25 African countries, completed 15 new investments in 2026, focusing on precisely the early-stage cheque sizes many investors have abandoned. “If nobody writes that cheque in 2026, there’s no Series A class in 2029,” Uwem Uwemakpan, Head of Investments at Launch Africa Ventures, told TechCabal in July. “We’d rather own that pipeline than inherit someone else’s gap in three years.” The companies carrying the ecosystem After a sluggish start to the year, June rescued the funding market. Electric mobility company Spiro announced a $327 million financing round, Flutterwave reportedly secured about $100 million, while MNT-Halan completed another major raise, according to Africa: The Big Deal. Those transactions transformed what would otherwise have been a disappointing first half into one that appeared broadly flat year-on-year. Spiro’s financing alone accounted for nearly one-quarter of all startup funding raised during the first half of the year. Debt becomes part of the growth story While equity remained the largest source of startup capital at $818 million during the first half, debt financing climbed to $614 million across a record 36 transactions, according to TechCabal Insights. The research outfit argued that founders are increasingly using non-dilutive, asset-backed financing to expand while avoiding further equity dilution. The rise of debt reflects the changing profile of companies attracting investment. Businesses operating electric vehicle fleets, logistics networks, and energy infrastructure possess tangible assets and predictable revenues that lenders are comfortable financing. Egypt leads, but concentration remains Egypt attracted the most funding during H1 2026, raising $327 million, followed by Nigeria with $254 million, Kenya with $126 million, and South Africa with $83 million, according to Africa: The Big Deal. Together, the traditional “Big Four” accounted for 58% of total funding. Looking only at equity investments, however, Nigeria led
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