“We had no clear path about how this was going to turn out”: Day 1-1000 of Blaaiz
Two years ago, Ifelade Ayodele began his mornings glued to the app store. He refreshed the dashboard, checking how many people had downloaded Blaaiz, the cross-border payments startup he had launched in 2023, since he last looked. Blaaiz had about 500 users at the time, but Ayodele would tell you that he knew most of them by their first name. Today, Ayodele says he no longer monitors app downloads. The customers he keeps tabs on are banks, fintechs, payment companies, and financial institutions, integrating the payment infrastructure he built. To understand how he switched from building a consumer-facing app to a payment infrastructure, you have to go back further than Blaaiz’s first version, a Telegram bot, and beyond the day he decided to quit his job in 2024. In 2022, Ayodele worked as a management consultant at Accenture’s UK office, advising financial institutions and working on projects that took him across multiple countries. He recalled that while travelling for work, he encountered the familiar challenge of cross-border payments: exchanging currencies was expensive, and transferring money digitally was slow. “What was most apparent to me was the symptoms,” Ayodele told TechCabal in an interview on Thursday. “Why can’t I change money easily? Why is it impossible to get fair rates? I was dealing with the symptoms. For me, it was all about creating an app that had a smooth user experience.” Convinced that the problem was worth fixing himself, Ayodele left the certainty of consulting, teamed up with his co-founder and chief technology officer (CTO), Gbenga Oni, and started building Blaaiz. Blaaiz is building in Nigeria’s cross-border payments market, where personal remittance inflows reached $20.93 billion in 2024, according to the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). The size of these flows presents an opportunity for companies building the infrastructure that powers them. Day 1: Too many hats and the Telegram bot On his first day as a founder, Ayodele was stepping into the unknown. Leaving Accenture meant walking away from a stable consulting career into uncertainty. There was no roadmap or assurance that anyone would use what he and Oni were about to build. “It was exciting to try out something that I had not done before,” he said. “But I was also anxious. We had no clear path as to what we were going to do or how this was going to turn out, but we decided to give it a shot.” With just two people building the company, job titles became blurred. Ayodele said that at the beginning, he was the CEO, but he was also the product manager, business analyst, compliance lead, and the person speaking to regulators about licences. “There were no clear KPIs (Key Performance Indicators), no structure,” he said. “Anything that came up, we just got it done.” The first iteration of Blaaiz was a Telegram chatbot. Customers looking to send money would message the bot, choose from a list of options, receive a payment link, and continue the transaction through a series of prompts. To find those first customers, Ayodele told TechCabal that he leaned on his network and posted the Telegram link on his WhatsApp status almost every day, asking friends to try the product and inform him of what was broken. “At that point, it was not about making money; it was about getting people to trust what I was building,” he said. That trust eventually gave Blaaiz enough momentum to launch a standalone mobile app in early 2024. Day 500: The app was not the answer By early 2024, Blaaiz had outgrown the Telegram bot. Ayodele explained that after months of navigating regulatory requirements, Blaaiz launched as a standalone mobile app, focused on retail cross-border payments. Initially, Blaaiz supported the Canada-Nigeria payment corridor before expanding to Europe and the UK through partnerships with Tier 1 banks, whose names Ayodele declined to disclose. However, the launch of the new app only introduced a new obsession for Ayodele. “There was a little bit of obsession with how many downloads we had in a day and where they were from,” he said. “At some point, I knew all our customers by their first names.” That closeness gave him an unfiltered view of what customers genuinely wanted. Ayodele said he observed that customers wanted more payment corridors and more supported currencies. Blaaiz could satisfy some of those requests, but some required infrastructure that the startup did not have access to. Curious to discover if the problem was unique to Blaaiz, Ayodele said he began studying about 10 competing remittance apps, which he did not disclose. He stated that many platforms supported a handful of payment corridors, while promising more countries and services labelled as coming soon. He realised that the bottleneck was the underlying infrastructure. “It became obvious that the rails the customers wanted, we couldn’t provide them in the way they wanted them,” he said. “It began to dawn on us that it was not a Blaaiz-specific problem.” Ayodele concluded that the real opportunity lay in building the infrastructure that would allow remittance apps, fintechs, and payment companies to expand into new markets without doing the heavy lifting themselves. By late 2024, Blaaiz began repositioning itself from an app that helped consumers move money to a payments infrastructure company that integrated with banks and payment rails to enable financial institutions to offer cross-border payments to their customers. “There was a bit of a conflict in our messaging, but we knew what we wanted, and then we just stayed true to our new value proposition,” Ayodele said. In his telling, that transition was facilitated by the heavy investment the team put in while building the consumer app. He added that moving from a consumer-facing app to selling infrastructure came with challenges, including more exhaustive due diligence processes and strengthening its compliance position across jurisdictions to secure banking partnerships and users. Day 1000: Playing the long game By 2025, the challenges that came with Blaaiz’s pivot were beginning to pay off. Blaaiz had become profitable,
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Bango thinks food prices shouldn’t depend on which trader you ask
There are no fixed prices in Nigeria’s commodity markets. Buy a basket of tomatoes from one trader and walk a few stalls down; the next trader might quote a different price, and the basket itself might not contain the same quantity. For consumers who do not regularly visit markets, navigating that uncertainty can be frustrating. It was this kind of uncertainty that caught the attention of Ademuyiwa Taofeek, one of Bango’s co-founders, during the 2024 Sallah festivities. The holiday is a Muslim celebration marked by communal prayers, family gatherings, and cooking bulk meals. While shopping for baskets of tomatoes and peppers in Lagos, he observed that prices were higher than in producing regions like Jos, a city in Plateau State, North-Central Nigeria. When Taofeek questioned the price difference, he received a familiar explanation: it was due to the logistics cost of transporting produce from northern farming communities to Lagos. Curious, Taofeek decided to test the assumption himself. He sourced the same commodities from Jos, paid to transport them to Lagos, and discovered that even after transport costs, he still spent less than he would have buying them locally. The experience made him believe that consumers have little visibility into what food commodities cost outside the markets closest to them, and that was a problem. When he shared the experience with Caleb Adenegan, who recounted the incident to TechCabal and would later become Taofeek’s co-founder, the pair began discussing how technology could help close that information gap. Before Bango, Adenegan had experimented with building products, including Curri AI, an educational tool that helped teachers create lesson plans and classroom materials and Weeb, a social networking product. Together, Taofeek and Adenegan saw an opportunity to create a platform where buyers could share what they paid for food commodities, where they bought them, and who sold them. That idea became Bango, a community-driven platform launched in November 2025. Adenegan told TechCabal in an interview in February that the model mirrors how Nigerians have traditionally shared market information. “Back in the day, the older generation spoke to each other,” Adenegan said on the call. “People would tell their neighbours where they got an item cheaper. Now the information system is fractured, and it leaves room for sellers to say any price and buyers don’t have an option but to buy it.” Bango operates in Nigeria’s food and drink market, which is estimated to reach around $98.97 billion by 2033. A 2019 report by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) revealed that 56.65% of total household expenditure was spent on food. Bango is trying to carve out a place in that market by helping consumers make more informed food purchasing decisions. How Bango turns market intelligence into a product When users open the web app, they see a feed of recent price submissions from other users. A user can search for a specific commodity, such as a basket of tomatoes, and then see results that display a range of prices tied to a market, including its location, the seller’s name and phone number, and the date and quantity of purchase. Bango dashboard. Image source: TechCabal The data is submitted by buyers of the commodity. To submit an entry, a user inputs the commodity name, the price they paid, quantity, market name, state, and location, and attaches a photo. Those submissions become part of the database that future buyers rely on, thereby creating a feedback loop. However, Adenegan explained that as users adopted the platform, the founders discovered that information alone did not solve the problem. A buyer could find a lower price for tomatoes, peppers, or onions on Bango, but that did not necessarily mean they could access those commodities. “We have tried to inform people and tell them that these commodities are cheaper elsewhere with Bango,” Adenegan said. “That helps solve the problem to an extent. But what if we can guarantee you this price directly from the farmers?” That question led to the development of Shopr by Bango, a commerce layer built on top of the startup’s price intelligence infrastructure. Currently operational only in Abuja, Nigeria’s capital city, Adenegan explained that Shopr enables users to purchase commodities directly through Bango. He said the startup sources produce from a network of farmers and suppliers and has processed between 40 and 50 orders since launching in June. The service also includes what Adenegan described as shared delivery. Rather than treating each order as a standalone delivery, the company groups orders from customers in the same locality and distributes the logistics costs across them. To make the model work, Adenegan stated that certain commodities were allocated to specific ordering days. Customers within a particular location are then encouraged to place orders on those days, enabling Bango to aggregate demand and reduce fulfilment costs. The startup currently handles deliveries through its own logistics infrastructure, a decision, Adenegan said, was deliberate. “We cannot outsource understanding that process to a third party,” he said. “ We need to understand the process ourselves before we can say we want to bring in a third party to partner with us on it.” Shopr is not the final piece of Bango’s strategy. According to Adenegan, Bango is preparing to launch Bango Market Day, a waitlist-based system that allows buyers to collectively purchase large volumes of commodities. Under the model, users indicate the quantity of a commodity they want to buy, after which Bango aggregates demand and coordinates supply through its farmer network. “Our major aim as an entity is to make sure that people can get cheap food commodities at a very low price regardless of how far the market might be from the person,” he said. How the model operates Bango currently generates revenue through Shopr, where customers pay both a service fee and a delivery fee on each order. According to Adenegan, the startup has grown largely through word-of-mouth, attracting up to 2,500 users. Bango’s Shopr competes directly with commerce platforms like Chowdeck, Mano, GoLemon, and other quick commerce
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Stabyl emerges from stealth with $2.7 million for Africa’s FX infrastructure
Many remarkable stories can trace their beginnings to the University of Oxford. J.R.R. Tolkien wrote much of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings there. Between 2021 and 2022, a conversation about stablecoins between two Master of Business Administration (MBA) students on the school’s basketball court sparked a story that would eventually become a startup. At the time of the conversation, Prince Nnamdi Ekeh was the co-CEO of Konga Group following the merger with his online marketplace Yudala, giving him a front-row seat to the challenges of payments and foreign exchange. Zachary Schwartzman, the second of the courtside pair, had gotten interested in African tech after covering the initial public offerings (IPOs) of Jumia as a Wall Street analyst. Their conversation circled the use of stablecoins and how they could solve real problems in markets like Nigeria and across Africa. Years later, they would start Stablyl, a fintech startup co-founded by Ekeh, Schwartzman, and Michael Anyi, a software engineer with over a decade of experience building financial infrastructure. Emerging from stealth with a $2.7 million pre-seed investment led by Konga, the startup is a liquidity exchange for financial institutions and payment service providers, built to make foreign exchange liquidity easier to access and settlements nearly instantaneous. Net foreign exchange inflow into Nigeria’s economy was $6.92 billion in February 2026, according to the Central Bank of Nigeria’s monthly economic report. Yet, the infrastructure through which that liquidity moves is fragmented, with payment service providers, banks and large institutions relying on multiple relationships to source foreign exchange. “Our goal is to connect these participants on one platform, creating the deepest and most accessible liquidity pool on the continent,” Schwartzman said. How Stabyl works Stabyl is neither a consumer-facing app nor a cross-border payments platform. The problem it aims to solve lies at the point where financial institutions source foreign exchange before a payment can be made. Ekeh illustrated this with the example of a large institution like Konga. He explained that when the e-commerce company needs foreign exchange, its treasury team typically reaches out to multiple banks, payment service providers, and liquidity providers to compare rates and source liquidity. By the time approvals are received and counterparties respond, market prices may already have shifted, forcing the process to begin again or settle at a less favourable rate. Stabyyl’s solution is to replace those fragmented bilateral negotiations with a central limit order book (CLOB), in which buyers and sellers of foreign exchange can automatically post and match orders. “Everybody on Stabyl can create a transaction, and that transaction gets matched and queued immediately, Anyi told TechCabal in an interview on Friday. “That entire process of having to make calls, hold transactions, figure out rates and do all this manual labour is completely removed.” The startup said its liquidity is aggregated from participating payment service providers (PSPs) and financial institutions, and maintains its own liquidity reserves with unnamed selected partners to ensure liquidity remains available when demand exceeds natural market activity. On Stabyl, settlement occurs across both traditional banking infrastructure and blockchain networks. For fiat transactions, Stabyl noted that it partnered with KongaPay as its official naira settlement partner. On the stablecoin settlement side, wallet infrastructure is provided by DFNS, a multi-party computation (MPC) wallet provider. The company noted that it currently supports USDT (Tether) and USDC (USD Coin) stablecoins. Still, it maintained that its infrastructure is blockchain-agnostic, selecting networks based on cost, speed, settlement finality, and the needs of its institutional clients. “Stabyl is connecting stablecoin rails with fiat banking rails because you can’t separate the two,” Ekeh noted. “Stablecoins are great, but they’re not great on their own. You still need to convert back to local currency.” In practice, when a PSP deposits naira on Stabyl through KongaPay, it can then place an order at its preferred exchange rate or match one already available on the platform. Once the transaction is executed, participants can settle and withdraw in either fiat currency or stablecoins. For institutions that want to integrate the infrastructure directly into their treasury systems, Stabyl also noted that it provides Application Programming Interface (APIs) that offer programmatic access to its liquidity pool. The business of building the infrastructure Many FX businesses in Nigeria make money by capitalising on the exchange rate spread, meaning they buy currencies at a low rate and sell them at a higher rate. Rather than holding inventory and earning a spread, Stabyl said it charges a take rate on each transaction processed through the platform. The company did not disclose the figure but said it intentionally keeps it low to incentivise institutions to push more volume through the platform. “What we want to do is grow the liquidity pot,” Schwartzman said. “That is where we see the opportunity: by growing liquidity for clients. We believe that will allow clients to provide more liquidity, do more trades, and be more successful.” Stabyl’s emergence from stealth comes as Nigeria’s regulatory environment for digital assets has shifted considerably in its favour. The CBN lifted its ban on cryptocurrency transactions in 2023, and the Securities and Exchange Commission followed with its Accelerated Regulatory Incubation Programme, bringing virtual asset service providers into a formal compliance framework. “The regulatory direction is clear,” Schwartzman said. “We would rather build this infrastructure correctly from the start, working hand-in-hand with regulators, than arrive late to a settled market.” In the same space, companies like Onafriq, Yellow Card and Fincra are building payment infrastructure across Africa. Stabyl, however, maintained that these companies are its potential customers, not competitors. “We’re trying to provide liquidity to other liquidity providers, foreign exchange companies, payment service providers and financial institutions,” Schwartzman said. “So, if we look at everything as a pie, we’re not trying to gain market share from this pie. We’re creating more dough to make this a bigger pie for everyone.” The company stated that the pre-seed funding from Konga will be used for regulatory licensing, infrastructure build, and compliance. Beyond capital and being its naira
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Why Africa’s telcos are embracing Starlink instead of fighting it
Until January 2023, when Starlink launched in Nigeria—its first African market—the continent’s telecom industry operated on a simple assumption: connectivity had to be built from the ground up. Mobile operators have spent decades investing billions of dollars in towers, fibre networks, spectrum licences, and, more recently, data centres to connect millions of people across Africa. The farther a community was from existing infrastructure, the more expensive and difficult it became to serve. Starlink’s arrival challenged that logic. By delivering high-speed internet directly from low-Earth orbit satellites, the company introduced a new connectivity model that bypassed many of the infrastructure constraints that have long shaped Africa’s telecom industry. Three years later, as Starlink expands across the continent and attracts a growing subscriber base, mobile operators are being forced to rethink not only how they extend coverage but also how they compete, invest, and grow. Starlink now operates in 27 African countries and delivers faster download speeds than most traditional fixed broadband providers, according to the latest data from Ookla’s Speedtest Intelligence, released on June 15. In response, operators including MTN, Airtel, Orange, and Vodafone are forging partnerships with satellite companies to expand rural coverage, lower network costs, and unlock new revenue opportunities. The result is a fundamental shift in Africa’s telecom playbook. Starlink reaches an “estimated half a million users by the end of 2025 in Africa, out of around 10 million globally, with the Americas and Asia leading,” according to the Ookla report. Subscriber data remains scarce across Africa, as only a handful of telecom regulators publish such figures. In Nigeria, the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) reported 91,991 Starlink subscribers in Q4 2025, making it the country’s second-largest internet service provider. Kenya’s Communications Authority reported 19,470 subscribers in September 2025, while Rwanda’s Utilities Regulatory Authority (RURA) recorded 4,489 subscribers in Q2 2025. Starlink’s rise has been driven largely by frustrations with Africa’s broadband infrastructure. Across many African countries, consumers and businesses continue to face unreliable fibre connections, limited broadband availability, slow speeds, and restrictive data allowances. In areas where fibre does not exist, Starlink offers something that traditional providers often cannot: fast internet delivered almost anywhere. Mukesh Chandra, former chief technology officer at Globacom and telecom infrastructure consultant, said the comparison between satellite broadband and terrestrial networks often overlooks the technical limitations that continue to favour fibre and mobile infrastructure. Chandra explained that satellite internet cannot completely avoid delays because signals must travel between Earth and satellites before reaching users. This makes response times slower than on mobile networks. By contrast, 5G was built to reduce these delays, making activities such as video calls, gaming, and real-time applications run more smoothly. While Starlink has shown impressive download speeds across several African markets, Chandra argued that bandwidth delivered through satellites cannot match the scale of fibre-backed mobile networks. “Bandwidth delivered through satellite cannot be compared with bandwidth delivered through fibre. Fibre will always be superior,” he said. “Satellite communications are most effective in areas where fibre or microwave infrastructure cannot be deployed and where operators lack network coverage.” Not a threat, a collaboration When Starlink first entered African markets, many analysts predicted a showdown between satellite broadband and mobile operators. That feared showdown has largely failed to materialise. The economics simply do not support it. While Starlink’s monthly subscription fees are competitive in some markets, including Ghana and Zimbabwe, the service remains out of reach for many Africans because of the high upfront cost of equipment, which ranges from $200 to $700. Even as the company continues to expand its footprint, reaching 27 African countries after securing a licence to operate in Côte d’Ivoire on June 17, the cost of entry remains a significant barrier to mass adoption. The technology also suffers from practical constraints. Users need specialised hardware, indoor coverage remains weak, and Direct-to-Device services still support only limited functionality. These realities have convinced operators that satellite internet is unlikely to replace mobile networks. Instead, it offers an opportunity to solve one of the industry’s most persistent challenges: rural connectivity. Chandra believes this explains why operators increasingly view Starlink as a partner rather than a competitor. “There is significant scope for satellite communications in Nigeria, particularly in offshore and remote areas where terrestrial networks struggle to reach,” he said. “But satellite services and mobile networks are designed for different purposes.” That view is increasingly shared across the industry. “Ultimately, we have to embrace LEO satellites; they are not going away,” MTN Group CEO Ralph Mupita said during the company’s Capital Markets Day on June 11, monitored by TechCabal. “We have already started one or two partnerships, particularly in Zambia with Starlink.” MTN began a proof-of-concept trial of Starlink’s Direct-to-Device technology in Zambia on March 7, while MTN South Africa conducted successful voice and SMS trials with satellite provider Lynk Global during the same period. “We are embracing the technology; we are not running away from it,” Mupita said. “A person connected at home will increasingly be using a combination of these technologies.” MTN did not respond to the request for additional comments for this story. The same shift is playing out across the industry. In December 2025, Airtel Africa partnered with SpaceX to distribute Starlink broadband and support Direct-to-Device services across its 14 African markets. Vodafone followed in March 2026, partnering with Amazon’s Project Kuiper to provide satellite connectivity and backhaul services across Africa. In June 2025, Orange signed a multi-year agreement with Eutelsat OneWeb to support enterprise connectivity, government services, and mobile backhaul. Alastair Jones, Head of Investor Relations at Airtel Africa, noted that terrestrial or earth-bound, physical telecom infrastructure investments remain the company’s primary priority even as they lean into satellite ecosystems. “We see satellite technology as complementary and likely to co-exist to enhance the customer proposition,” Jones told TechCabal in an emailed response. “As you may know, we have partnered with Starlink across our markets, reflecting the complementary nature of satellite technology to our offering.” Why the collaboration is growing Despite decades of telecom investment, large
Read MoreGoogle Pixel 11 vs. Pixel 10: Should you upgrade this year?
Table of contents Pixel 11 vs Pixel 10 at a glance What’s changed Price Release date Pixel 11 Pro vs Pixel 10 Pro Pixel 11 Pro XL vs Pixel 10 Pro XL Pixel 11 Pro Fold vs Pixel 10 Pro Fold Should you upgrade? The Pixel 10 is already on shelves, but information about the Pixel 11 keeps piling up. If you bought a Pixel 10 last year, or you’re still deciding on a new phone, this guide breaks down everything we know so far. Google hasn’t confirmed a single Pixel 11 spec yet. Everything else here is based on speculations, mainly a Telegram post from a leaker called Mystic Leaks that surfaced on May 4, 2026, along with render images shared by OnLeaks. We’ve tagged every Pixel 11 detail as speculation, so you know exactly what to trust and what to treat as a rumour. Here’s how the two phones compare. Pixel 11 vs Pixel 10 at a glance What’s changed Here’s a closer look at what’s different between the two phones. 1. Design and display The Pixel 10’s screen measures 6.3 inches, with a resolution of 1080 by 2424 and a refresh rate ranging from 60 to 120Hz. Peak brightness tops out at 3,000 nits. The Pixel 11 looks set to keep the same screen size and resolution, but leaks suggest a small brightness bump, peaking at around 3,100 nits. Renders shared by OnLeaks, via Android Headlines, show a few changes on the outside. The camera bar switches to an all-glass, single-tone look instead of the two-tone aluminium strip on the Pixel 10. The bezels look thinner, too, and the body is rumoured to be about 0.1mm thinner overall. One thing missing from the back of the Pixel 11: the infrared temperature sensor. Google is reportedly removing it from every model to make room for a new feature called Pixel Glow. 2. Camera The Pixel 10 already has three rear cameras. There’s a 48MP main lens, a 13MP ultrawide, and a 10.8MP telephoto with 5x zoom. The Pixel 11 is rumoured to get a new 50MP main sensor, internally codenamed chemosh, which would mark the first hardware change to the base model’s main camera in a while. Leaks haven’t confirmed details for the ultrawide or telephoto lens, and there’s no sign the base Pixel 11 will get the camera upgrades rumoured for the Pro models. Most of the camera gains this year are expected to come from software, such as an upgraded Cinematic Blur mode and new AI video tools running on the Tensor G6 chip. 3. Performance and chipset The Pixel 10 runs on Google’s Tensor G5 chip, built on a 3nm process, paired with a Samsung Exynos modem. The Pixel 11 is rumoured to switch to the Tensor G6, built on a smaller 2nm process, and swap the Samsung modem for a MediaTek M90. If that holds, it would be the first Pixel phone without a Samsung modem, which could help with the connection issues some Pixel owners have reported over the years. There’s one catch worth watching. Android Authority points out that the Tensor G6’s new GPU appears to be based on older 2021-era graphics architecture, so gaming performance gains might be smaller than expected. Then there’s the RAM question. The Pixel 10 ships with 12GB of RAM across the board. Leaks suggest the Pixel 11 base model could drop to 8GB, with 12GB only available on higher storage tiers. Even the leaker who posted this detail marked it with a question mark, so treat it as a possible downgrade rather than a confirmed one. The timing lines up with a global memory chip shortage that’s pushing manufacturers toward cheaper RAM configurations in 2026. 4. Battery and charging The Pixel 10 has a 4,970mAh battery, and it charges at 29W over a cable or 15W wirelessly with Qi2. Leaks put the Pixel 11’s battery at 4,840mAh, about 130mAh smaller. Charging numbers haven’t leaked yet, so we’re assuming Qi2 wireless charging carries over until Google says otherwise. A smaller battery alongside a possible RAM cut means the Pixel 11 will need the new chip’s efficiency gains to hold onto similar battery life. 5. AI features Google announced Gemini Intelligence at The Android Show on May 12, 2026. To use it, a phone needs a Gemini Nano v3 flagship-level chip, at least 12GB of RAM, and several years of guaranteed software updates. The Pixel 10 meets every one of these, so it already has access to Gemini’s full AI features. This is where the RAM rumour gets interesting. If the base Pixel 11 really does ship with 8GB of RAM, it would fall short of Google’s own 12GB requirement and miss out on Gemini Intelligence entirely. 9to5Google has pointed out that this makes the 8GB leak look shaky, since locking the cheapest Pixel 11 out of Google’s headline AI feature would be an odd move. Treat this as an open question rather than a settled fact, since nothing here has been confirmed by Google. Pixel Glow is the other big addition. It’s an RGB LED light built into the camera bar that replaces the old infrared temperature sensor, and it lights up during AI activity or when your phone is face down to show notifications. Leaks suggest every Pixel 11 model gets it, including the base phone. Since Pixel Glow needs new LED hardware, it’s unlikely to reach the Pixel 10 through a software update. Price The Pixel 10 launched at $799. Pricing for the Pixel 11 hasn’t leaked in any concrete way, but most outlets expect it to start near $799, too, with some predicting a $50 to $100 increase. A few things make a price increase likely this year. Memory chip prices have jumped by close to 70% since early 2025, and the cost of building phones has risen by double digits across the board. Samsung already raised the price of its Galaxy S26 by $100 compared to the S25, while Apple kept iPhone
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A Soweto startup’s unlikely journey from gadgets to AI healthcare
When Seati Moloi launched Khoi Tech, an AI-driven wearables for health startup, in Soweto, South Africa’s largest township, in 2020, few would have imagined that a startup known for making wireless earphones and smartwatches would one day be pitching healthcare technology to British investors. But from June 8-12, Moloi returned to London Tech Week for a second consecutive year, not to showcase consumer gadgets, but to present AI-powered health and workplace wellness technologies developed in Soweto. In a small office far from the venture capital corridors of Sandton and Cape Town, Khoi Tech is attempting something few African startups have achieved: building a globally competitive healthtech company from township roots. The startup, which first gained attention for its Afripods wireless earphones and Afriwatch smartwatches, is now developing AI-powered employee wellness, remote patient monitoring and driver fatigue management platforms for businesses and healthcare providers. Its evolution from consumer electronics maker to enterprise healthtech startup reflects a broader shift in African innovation, where township-born companies are increasingly building technologies designed not only for local markets but for global problems. “To represent South Africa at London Tech Week for a second consecutive year is both an honour and a responsibility,” Moloi told TechCabal in an interview on Friday. “It is a powerful reminder that world-class innovation can emerge from township communities such as Soweto and compete on any global stage.” Founded in Soweto and backed largely with internally generated revenue and founder reinvestment, Khoi Tech initially built its reputation through consumer devices such as the Khoi Afripods true wireless earphones and the Khoi Afriwatch1 smartwatch. The products helped establish the company as one of the country’s emerging home-grown consumer technology brands. But by the time Moloi arrived in London this year, the company had evolved far beyond wearables. “While our initial focus was primarily on hardware products such as the Khoi Afriwatch1 and Khoi Afripods1, we returned in 2026 with an expanded portfolio that included business solutions addressing real challenges in healthcare and the mining sector,” Moloi said. Today, Khoi Tech develops an ecosystem of devices, software applications and software-as-a-service platforms aimed at improving health, safety and operational efficiency. Moloi stated that the township company’s employee wellness platform uses connected devices and analytics to help employers monitor workforce wellbeing and productivity. The company’s remote patient monitoring technology enables doctors and healthcare providers to track patients outside traditional clinical settings, while its driver fatigue and health management platform uses biometric data and proactive alerts to improve safety in logistics and transport operations. “We didn’t succeed despite being from Soweto; we succeeded because we are from Soweto. The environment forces you to iterate rapidly, understand hyper-local logistics, and build absolute resilience into your business architecture from day one,” he said. The Soweto-born founder said Khoi Tech also developed sports analytics tools that provide real-time biometric and performance data to teams and coaches, as well as family wellness platforms that consolidate household health information to encourage preventative care. Artificial intelligence (AI) increasingly sits at the centre of these offerings. “At Khoi Tech, we are integrating AI into our health-tech solutions to transform large volumes of health and wellness data into meaningful insights,” Moloi stated. “By leveraging AI, we aim to enable proactive health monitoring, early identification of trends and risks, and improved decision-making for healthcare providers, employers and policymakers.” The transition from consumer electronics to enterprise health technology appears to be resonating internationally. As one of nine South African startups selected by the UK-SA Tech Hub, in partnership with Telkom and Disraptor, Khoi Tech used London Tech Week to engage investors, government officials and potential technology partners. According to Moloi, the company is now in serious discussions with several venture capital firms and has established partnerships with technology companies from elsewhere in Africa as it explores expansion opportunities across the continent and potentially into the United Kingdom. Yet building a global technology company from the famous Soweto township that is home to South Africa’s two renowned Nobel Peace Prize winners, Nelson Mandela and archbishop Desmond Tutu, has not been without challenges. “Operating outside traditional technology hubs such as Sandton and Cape Town can present challenges, including reduced access to investors, business networks and support ecosystems,” Moloi said. But he believes being rooted in the famous township has also given Khoi Tech a competitive advantage. “Being founded in Soweto has given us a unique perspective and a strong understanding of the challenges faced by underserved communities,” he told TechCabal. “This proximity enables us to identify real-world problems and develop practical, affordable technology solutions.” For Moloi, Khoi Tech’s journey is part of a larger ambition to prove that Africa can create, own and export world-class technology. “Africa must move beyond consuming technology to creating and owning it,” he said. 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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Why Agnes Aistleitner trusts founders’ discipline more than genius
The first thing you notice about Agnes Aistleitner, a partner at Africa-focused venture capital firm First Circle Capital, is that she answers questions as though she has been thinking about them for years. Her opinions are tempered by the time she has spent listening to founders, watching businesses succeed and fail, and learning which assumptions hold up in reality. We meet at Artcaffé in Village Market, inside Nairobi’s diplomatic zone, where aid workers, diplomats, founders, and investors walk in and out of meetings that may, or may not, change the future. Aistleitner speaks directly, laughs easily, and answers questions without the fog that clouds VC. An Austrian by birth, she now divides her life between Nairobi and Kampala, searching for founders worth backing and convincing investors to place bigger bets on Africa. Before we begin the interview proper, we spend several minutes catching up on the sluggish investment climate, the difficulty of raising money in today’s market, why elections always make capital nervous, and whether Kenya’s politics this time will once again freeze decisions. She orders hibiscus tea with samosas. I settle for hot chocolate and a croissant. Then she glances at her watch. “I try not to eat after four,” she says, before breaking into a laugh that suggests the rule is occasionally negotiable. The coincidence catches me off guard. It is a discipline I have also been trying to cultivate—sometimes successfully, often not. For someone who spends her days deciding which founders deserve funding, Aistleitner speaks remarkably little about money. She talks about discipline, learning, persistence, and showing up when companies are failing rather than disappearing. Our conversation begins where all interesting journeys do, not her career, but with home. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. You grew up in Austria and built a career that eventually brought you to East Africa. What part of the world did you discover in Nairobi and Kampala that you couldn’t find back home? I’ve been in many countries—Jordan, Ukraine, Japan— and I felt like I wanted to spend some time here and see what’s going on on the continent. What I found in Kampala and Nairobi was a kind of rawness and possibility that is harder to find in Austria. Austria is great. It is beautiful, stable, organised, with a very high quality of life. But because so many systems already work, there is less space to feel that you can build something from scratch and have it matter. In East Africa, the gaps are visible. That can be frustrating, but it is also energising. You see problems everywhere, but you also see people building around them, through them, despite them. I guess you can ascribe this to youthful curiosity; Uganda and Kenya are great, and Austria is great. When you visit Austria now, what feels foreign to you? And when you return to East Africa, what reminds you that you are still an outsider? When I go back to Austria, what feels foreign is how structured and predictable everything is. I appreciate it more now than I did when I was younger, but it also feels a bit strange. There is a certain order to life, to careers, to institutions, to expectations. Culturally, I’m so direct that people find me abrasive at times. East African culture reminds me a lot of Japan in weird ways. Communication is very indirect. And then, of course, I am a Muzungu (caucasian). That reminder follows you around whether you like it or not. It does not matter how long you have lived somewhere or how much you care about the place. You are still seen through a certain lens. I think the mature thing is not to be offended by that, but to understand it, keep learning, and not assume belonging is something you can simply declare for yourself. What did your parents imagine you would become when you were young, and how different is that life from the one you ended up living? Well, I come from a very simple background, grew up on a farm, my father is a roofer and mechanic, and I didn’t really meet my parents’ expectations for life. I’d be sitting as a hairdresser, admin, or office worker somewhere near my hometown. But it’s okay. What I did get from that background was very valuable. I learned how to work hard early. I learned that nobody is coming to save you. I learned that if something needs to get done, you do it. And I learned not to look too much for validation from other people, because when you come from a background where your ambitions do not make sense to the people around you, you either stop or you build the internal muscle to keep going. Agnes Aistleitner speaking at Ars Electronica Festival 2024. Image source: First Circle Capital You spend your days evaluating founders. What is the most important quality you’ve seen in great entrepreneurs that never appears in a pitch deck? It’s always about the ability to grow as a person, persistence, and that drive to learn and improve. Great entrepreneurs are learning machines, but they put in the work; you’ve got to put in the work. A lot of founders are smart. Many are charismatic. Some are very good at fundraising. But the ones who become truly great are the ones who keep improving. They become better managers, better sellers, better capital allocators, better communicators. They grow into the company before the company outgrows them. And then there is persistence. Not motivational-poster persistence. Actual persistence. The kind where you wake up after something went badly, and you still do the next thing that needs doing. Venture capital is often described as a business of conviction. Tell me about a moment when your conviction cost you something—money, reputation, or sleep. I actually think “conviction” is sometimes the wrong way to frame venture capital. VC is a probability distribution business. You are looking for enough shots on target where the upside is
Read MoreApple just raised prices: See which devices cost more now
Table of contents Which Apple products got more expensive? Full Apple price increase breakdown Which Apple products are still at the old price Why Apple raised its prices Is the iPhone affected too? What about prices outside the US? Should you buy now? How long will prices stay high? Sub Heading 2 Apple raised prices on several of its devices on Thursday . The price hikes hit the Mac, iPad, Apple TV, HomePod, HomePod mini, and Vision Pro lineups. Apple says the increase is tied to a global shortage of memory and storage chips, driven by the huge demand for AI data centres. This article breaks down every affected product, the old and new prices for each, and what it means for you if you were planning to buy an Apple device soon. Which Apple products got more expensive? Apple’s online store briefly went offline on Thursday morning and came back up with new prices already in place. Here is the full list of products affected. Mac: MacBook Neo MacBook Air (13-inch and 15-inch) MacBook Pro (M5, M5 Pro, and M5 Max) iMac Mac Studio (M4 Max and M3 Ultra) Mac mini (M4 Pro) iPad: iPad (A16) iPad Air (11-inch and 13-inch) iPad Pro (11-inch and 13-inch) iPad mini Other devices: Apple TV 4K HomePod HomePod mini Vision Pro The increases range from $30 to $1,300, depending on the device. Full Apple price increase breakdown Here is exactly how much more you will pay for each device now, compared to the old price. Apple did not change the storage or memory on any of these models, so you are paying more for the same hardware as before. Mac price changes iPad price changes Apple TV, HomePod, and Vision Pro price changes Apple had already discontinued its cheapest Mac mini back in May, before this latest round of increases. Today’s price hike affects the higher M4 Pro Mac mini configuration, which moved from $1,399 to $1,599. Keep the two changes separate when you compare prices. Which Apple products are still at the old price Some Apple products were left out of this price increase. They include: iPhone (every current model) Apple Watch AirPods Studio Display and Apple Pencil So if you want an iPhone, Apple Watch, AirPods, or Studio Display, you can still buy them at the old price for now. Why Apple raised its prices Apple blamed the increase on a shortage of memory and storage chips. In a statement, the company said the rapid growth of AI data centres has created a huge surge in demand for memory and storage, and that it has never seen prices rise this fast. Apple added that it had protected customers from the cost increases for as long as it could, but has now reached a point where it needs to raise prices on some products. CEO Tim Cook had already warned this was coming. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal on June 17, he described the shortage as a “hundred-year flood” and said he had never seen anything like it in over 40 years on the job. The shortage stems from chip makers such as Micron, Samsung, SK Hynix, and Kioxia shifting more of their production to high-bandwidth memory used in AI servers. That leaves less memory for everyday devices like laptops, tablets, game consoles, and smart speakers, which pushes prices up. Is the iPhone affected too? The iPhone was left out of this round of price changes, but that could change soon. Analysts expect Apple to raise iPhone prices later this year, most likely when the iPhone 18 launches in September. Estimates on how much more you might pay vary widely. JPMorgan expects an increase of around $50 Evercore expects an increase of around $100 Counterpoint Research expects an increase of $150 to $200 TechInsights expects an increase of as much as $270 on some models Apple is not alone here. Other companies have already raised prices because of the same memory shortage. Microsoft raised Xbox console prices, with some models going up by $150 Samsung raised prices on its Galaxy S26 lineup Dell, HP, Lenovo, Acer, and ASUS have raised laptop prices, too Sony and Nintendo have also raised prices on their gaming consoles What about prices outside the US? The increase applies to Apple’s online store worldwide, including the UK, where the MacBook Neo went from £599 to £699. For African markets like Nigeria, South Africa, Kenya, and Ghana, there is no confirmed local price change yet. Apple does not run direct stores in these countries. Instead, devices are sold through authorised resellers like iStore, and local prices depend on currency exchange rates, import duties, and reseller margins, in addition to Apple’s own pricing. This means prices in these markets could rise eventually, but the change will likely take time to show up, layered on top of the usual currency and import cost shifts you already see locally. Should you buy now? If you want a MacBook or iPad, buying now could save you money for a short while. Some retailers, like Amazon, still had old prices live during Prime Day, which ends on June 26. Once that sale ends, expect prices everywhere to match Apple’s new numbers. Apple’s Back to School promotion is also expected to return around July 1, which often includes free AirPods or gift cards with select purchases. That could help offset some of the new pricing if you are a student. If you are after an iPhone, Apple Watch, AirPods, or Studio Display, there’s no rush since those prices have not changed. Just keep in mind that more increases could come later this year. How long will prices stay high? Experts expect the chip shortage to continue for years. Chip maker Micron expects tight supply to continue beyond 2027. Intel’s CEO has said relief is unlikely before 2028. Some analysts think the pricing pressure could last until 2030. This means the new Apple prices might be here to stay, even after
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The global debate over AI warfare is coming to Nairobi
Much of the conversation about artificial intelligence (AI) in Africa has focused on talent, startups, research, and infrastructure. The continent could soon find itself in more consequential conversations, like how AI will reshape warfare. The debate is significant because Africa remains one of the world’s most conflict-affected regions. The continent accounted for over 40% of the world’s armed conflicts in 2025. As AI becomes embedded in military systems—from surveillance and targeting to autonomous drones—Africa will be among the first places to face the consequences of these technologies. On Tuesday, Kenya was confirmed as the host of the Fourth Summit on Responsible Artificial Intelligence in the Military Domain (REAIM), set for April 2027. The summit is the world’s leading forum on military AI governance, bringing together governments, defence officials, technology companies, and researchers to debate the technology’s military applications. “Our discussion explored how Kenya can build practical connections between the REAIM process and the AI Action Summit, particularly around responsible AI, security, dual-use technologies, capacity building, and the role of states in shaping concrete implementation pathways,” Kenya’s special envoy on technology, Phillip Thigo, posted on his LinkedIn after meeting Reto Wollenmann, deputy head of Swiss Section for Arms Control and Disarmament. AI on battlefields AI is moving into defence faster than governments are developing rules to govern it. That governance gap extends even in other sectors, including finance, healthcare, and education. AI adoption has outpaced the creation of comprehensive legislation to govern its use. Across the world, militaries are already using AI to analyse intelligence, identify potential targets, coordinate logistics, monitor cyber threats, and support battlefield decision-making. Autonomous drones have become a defining feature of modern conflicts from Ukraine to the Middle East. Defence planners increasingly view AI as a strategic capability on par with satellites, cyber weapons, and advanced missile systems. Africa is largely absent from the development of these technologies. But it will not be absent from their consequences. That reality helps explain why Kenya’s appointment as host is more significant than just another international conference coming to Nairobi. Previous REAIM summits have been hosted in The Hague, the Netherlands (2023), Seoul, South Korea (2024), and A Coruña, Spain (2026). For the first time, an African country will help shape discussions around technologies that could influence global security for decades. The timing is also notable because military AI governance remains unsettled. There is no global treaty governing autonomous weapons. Further, there are no internationally accepted laws that define the role humans should play in AI military systems. There is also no consensus on accountability when an autonomous system causes civilian harm. The world’s major powers agree that safeguards are needed, but disagree on what those safeguards should look like. As a result, military AI remains one of the few major technological domains where the rules are still being written. Africa’s role in military AI Historically, Africa has entered such conversations late. The continent played a limited role in shaping Internet governance. It had little influence over the development of social media platforms despite becoming one of their fastest-growing markets, according to Geopoll. It has often adopted digital systems designed elsewhere, only to spend years responding to their unintended consequences. Military AI presents an opportunity to avoid repeating that pattern. The issue is not simply weapons. Much of the technology being discussed at REAIM has dual-use applications. Computer vision systems used to identify military targets can also power mass surveillance. Facial recognition systems deployed for security purposes can be used for civilian monitoring. Predictive analytics designed for intelligence gathering can influence law enforcement and border management. This only means that the distinction between military and civilian AI is becoming blurred. For African governments, that raises a different set of questions. How should states balance security and privacy? What safeguards should exist around AI-powered surveillance? And how should governments regulate technologies that are simultaneously commercial products and national security assets? These questions are urgent as governments across the continent, including Kenya, Uganda, Egypt, and Nigeria, expand investments in digital identity systems, surveillance infrastructure, and cybersecurity. The military AI debate is therefore becoming part of a conversation about state power. Africa’s security realities may also give the continent a perspective that differs from those of major military powers. The United States, China, and Europe focus on state-on-state competition and geopolitical rivalry. Many African governments are more concerned with terrorism, piracy, insurgencies, organised crime, and border security. AI systems developed for conventional warfare may not be suited to these environments. Likewise, governance frameworks designed for wealthy countries with strong institutions may not translate easily into regions where technical expertise, regulatory capacity, and digital infrastructure remain uneven. Kenya’s significance That creates an opportunity for African countries to influence the evolution of global military AI governance. Kenya has already been positioning itself for that role. The country co-hosted REAIM 2024 in Seoul, South Korea, sits on the United Nations Secretary-General’s High-Level Advisory Body on AI, helped advance the first UN General Assembly resolution on AI, and has hosted regional consultations to increase African participation in military AI discussions. What appears to be happening is that Kenya is attempting to establish itself as a bridge between advanced economies, developing frontier AI systems, and emerging markets that will eventually adopt them. However, the significance extends across the continent. For much of the AI boom, Africa’s role has largely been framed in terms of inclusion. The discussion focused on how the continent could gain access to computing resources, attract investment, develop local talent, and ensure African languages are represented in AI systems. Military AI introduces a different conversation about governance, sovereignty, and ultimately, power. Countries that influence AI governance today may shape international security for decades. In the same way early internet governance decisions shaped the digital economy, decisions made over the next few years could determine how autonomous weapons, AI-enabled surveillance, and algorithmic decision-making are regulated globally. The countries present when those decisions are made will have an advantage. The countries absent from the conversation may
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Cardano shifts from blockchain pilots in Africa to deciding what gets built
After years of funding blockchain pilots, startup programmes and public-sector projects across Africa, Cardano, a global blockchain company that operates the cryptocurrency ADA with $5.45 billion in market cap, is turning its attention to a less visible question: who decides what gets built, funded, and prioritised across the ecosystem. Founded in 2017, Cardano built its presence in Africa through its startup programmes, digital identity projects, and government partnerships, including a widely publicised education credentials initiative in Ethiopia. Blockchain companies, as part of their distribution strategy, typically back developers and sometimes provide funding, such as grants, and resources to enable them to build on their networks. Several blockchains build developer ecosystems through ecosystem-building, a community-driven strategy. Others, including Stellar and Sui, have taken a similar approach. Cardano, which has previously supported early-stage crypto startups through accelerators, now wants to perform open-heart surgery on the model itself, restructuring the process that comes before writing cheques. Cardano is placing governance at the centre of its Africa strategy, allowing community members to vote on which ecosystem projects receive funding, how it allocates funding, and which high-potential projects should be prioritised. Other blockchains have invested heavily in ecosystem-building, but Cardano believes giving communities greater influence over decision-making will help it attract and retain builders over the long term. “The gear shift is real, but it’s less about commercial strategy and more about governance maturity,” Alex Maaza, the Ecosystem and Enterprise Growth Lead at the Cardano Foundation, the Swiss-based non-profit entity that oversees the blockchain, said. That thinking is most visible through Project Catalyst, Cardano’s community funding programme. The initiative allows participants to submit proposals and vote on which projects receive funding. According to Maaza, around 150 Africa-related projects have received between $2.5 million and $3 million through Catalyst, spanning agricultural traceability, education, humanitarian coordination, and off-grid energy. Project Catalyst started as a grant programme where community members voted on which projects received funding. Cardano has since expanded that voting system to include decisions about treasury spending and the network’s future development. “We spent years prototyping decentralised decision-making through Project Catalyst,” said Maaza. “Since 2025, that model has evolved into direct on-chain governance, with token holders voting on how to deploy the Cardano treasury.” The move is part of Cardano’s effort to make governance a defining feature of the ecosystem. Cardano Foundation wants developers, entrepreneurs, and community members to decide how treasury funds are spent, which projects receive funding, and how the network develops over time, rather than leaving those decisions to a foundation or a small group of developers. Cardano’s governance model addresses a question that has followed the crypto industry for years: can blockchain networks genuinely distribute decision-making, or does influence ultimately remain concentrated among a small group of participants? Critics argue that voting power in many projects often rests with large token holders, even when governance systems are designed to be community-led. Cardano believes participation can extend beyond token ownership alone. More than 700 developers, founders and community members helped shape Cardano 2030, the network’s long-term roadmap, Maaza said. Who decides where the money goes? Until recently, Project Catalyst was the primary funding mechanism available to startups building on Cardano. According to Maaza, Catalyst funding supported accelerator programmes run by organisations including the SDG Blockchain Accelerator, Draper University, Techstars and CVh Labs. The programmes are managed by those organisations rather than by the Cardano Foundation. The Foundation also launched the first cohort of its own accelerator programme. In total, 70 startups participated in the programmes in 2025, according to Maaza. The ecosystem has also introduced new funding structures, including the Cardano Builder DAO and the Draper Dragon Ecosystem Fund, known as the Orion Fund. In April, the fund launched with a reported $80 million focus on real-world assets and institutional decentralised finance (DeFi). Cardano says this approach is already influencing how it runs programmes in Africa. Maaza pointed to the Cardano Africa Tech Summit (CATS26), held in February, as an example. Rather than operating as a traditional conference, the event brought together more than 500 developers across 12 African cities to build projects and participate in ecosystem activities before culminating in Nairobi. He added that the community funded the programme and gave local builders a greater role in shaping its outcomes. Enterprise adoption remains a major objective “There’s only one blockchain where Africa, or any geography or industry, can genuinely shape the roadmap rather than just receive it,” Maaza said. That view is shaping the Foundation’s engagement with regulators as African governments develop frameworks for digital assets and blockchain businesses. Maaza cited Kenya’s Virtual Asset Service Providers framework as an example of the regulatory clarity many enterprises have been waiting for before making long-term commitments. Cardano still tracks familiar industry metrics such as monthly active users, transaction volumes, and total value locked (TVL). Maaza said another measure matters just as much: whether people building within the ecosystem have a meaningful role in deciding where resources go. “The goal was never to bring Cardano to Africa,” he said. “It’s to build something with Africans that they actually own a piece of.” Cardano has spent years bringing blockchain projects to Africa, but it is now handing part of that process to the people building on the network, a change that will become visible not in governance votes but in the businesses and services that emerge from them. 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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