Nigeria launches three-year plan to upgrade Internet system
Nigeria is moving to overhaul its Internet infrastructure over the next three years as demand for connectivity outgrows the limits of its current addressing system. Nigeria still relies heavily on an older Internet system, Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4), that limits how many devices can connect, even as millions of people come online and data use surges. The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) is now pushing for a transition to Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6), the latest global standard for identifying and routing devices, designed to replace the ageing IPv4 system, which has been in use since the 1980s. Nigeria’s shift to a new Internet standard comes as demand for data continues to surge. In January 2026, total Internet consumption reached 1.39 million terabytes (TB), a 38.4% jump from the previous year. Moving to the new standard will determine whether Nigeria can sustain reliable connectivity, support new technologies, and keep pace with a digital economy that is rapidly outgrowing its existing limits. To drive the plan, the NCC inaugurated the Nigerian IPv6 Council, which will bring together government agencies, telecom operators, and private companies to speed up the transition. “The inauguration of this Council is a national statement that Nigeria is ready to lead in the next chapter of the global Internet,” Aminu Maida, NCC Executive Vice Chairman, said at the launch on Thursday. Nigeria’s adoption of IPv6 is still around 5%, far behind emerging countries like Saudi Arabia, India and Gabon, where usage has crossed 40%. Meanwhile, the older system, IPv4, has run out of new addresses, making it harder to support the rapid growth of smartphones, apps, and connected devices. That constraint is becoming more visible as demand for Internet connectivity grows. The expansion of 5G networks, the proliferation of connected devices, and the rise of cloud computing and artificial intelligence (AI) are placing increasing strain on legacy infrastructure. IPv6, with its vastly larger address capacity and more efficient routing, is seen as critical to sustaining that growth. “IPv6 is a necessity for national competitiveness, security, and economic sovereignty,” Maida said, pointing to the risks of falling further behind in a global digital economy that is rapidly standardising around the protocol. However, the transition is not straightforward. While global IPv6 adoption has reached 45.5%, several technical barriers remain. Devices running only IPv6 cannot directly communicate with IPv4-only servers, forcing organisations to operate both protocols simultaneously. This dual-stack approach adds complexity that many IT teams are reluctant to manage. But the transition is not simple. Most networks still run on a mix of old and new systems. Because IPv6-only devices cannot directly communicate with IPv4-only servers, organisations are forced to operate both at once. This “dual-stack” approach keeps systems running but adds cost and technical complexity that many teams are slow to adopt. There are also security challenges. Many modern devices come with IPv6 enabled by default, which can create blind spots if organisations are only monitoring older IPv4 traffic. In some cases, data can bypass existing security controls entirely. At the same time, IPv6’s longer and more complex address format makes configuration harder, increasing the risk of errors and misaligned security policies. Coordinating Nigeria’s IPv6 rollout To manage these risks and speed up adoption, the newly inaugurated council is expected to play a central coordinating role. Originally set up in 2014 as part of the IPv6 Forum, its mandate has now shifted from advocacy to execution. The council’s core task is to deliver a national deployment strategy with clear timelines, including a pathway to move Nigeria into the ranks of Africa’s leading adopters within three years. The council will also track progress through quarterly reporting and an annual national review. It is also expected to close the skills gap by working with the African Network Information Centre (AFRINIC), universities, and professional bodies to train a new pipeline of IPv6-certified engineers. A key part of the strategy is to use the government as a lead adopter. Ministries, departments, and agencies are expected to migrate their networks, websites, and digital services to IPv6-compatible systems, either through dual-stack configurations or fully native deployments. The goal is to create demand signals that ripple through the broader ecosystem. The council will also engage telecom operators, Internet service providers, data centres, and financial institutions to remove barriers to deployment and encourage private investment. This includes advising the NCC on incentives, procurement standards, and regulatory frameworks that could accelerate adoption.
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What M-PESA did for fintech, Bernard Chiira wants for assistive tech
Last Friday afternoon—one of those deceptively calm ones that sit lightly over the chaos of a Lagos day—Bernard Chiira appeared on my screen from Nairobi. He sounded relaxed, almost unguarded, speaking with the ease of someone who has told parts of this story before, but not quite like this. Chiira was born in central Kenya with brittle bone disease, a condition that meant fractures, surgeries, and long hospital visits from as early as two weeks old. But his story, like many that seem defined by limitation, bends instead toward possibility. When we speak, it feels like reliving parts of his struggles. As someone who has a disability, I find parts of his journey familiar: the negotiations with systems not designed for you, the improvisations, the small wins that can go unnoticed. He laughs easily, even when recalling being expelled from nursery school after just a month because his condition was considered too delicate. Things began to shift at Joytown, a special boarding school where independence was taught as a skill. He would later insist on moving into mainstream education, studying computer science, and eventually working in innovation, long before disability became central to his work. Today, he is the co-founder of Innovate Now and leads the Assistive Tech for Disability Trust, building one of Africa’s first ecosystems for assistive technology. He believes people with disabilities should not just use technology, they should build it. The challenges, he says, are structural—limited capital, weak policy alignment, and products that often miss users’ realities. But he sees this as a long game. Like M-PESA once did for fintech, he believes assistive tech will find its moment. “Even five million people accessing the right assistive technology,” he says, “would mean everything.” In his spare time, he plays chess, spends time with his family, and speaks wherever he can. The mission, he insists, is bigger than him. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. Before Innovate Now, what was life as a person with disability like? I was born in central Kenya with brittle bone disease, which caused repeated fractures in my right leg from two weeks old until I was about 19 or 20. I had many surgeries. Inclusion started at home. My parents accepted all their children equally, even though some had disabilities and some didn’t. My mother gave up her career to care for four kids with disabilities, and my father was the sole provider. When I started nursery school, the doctors said I had great potential. But after a month, the school expelled me because my condition was too delicate. So I went to a special boarding school called Joytown. There, because everyone had disabilities, they trained us for life independence, music, and public speaking. One year, I ranked first in the country in public speaking, a skill I now use every day as a CEO. After nine years, I refused to go to another special school. I wanted to adjust to the real world. My parents found a regular high school with the right attitude, even if it wasn’t physically accessible. I studied computer science, worked in a university innovation lab, and became an incubation manager supporting tech startups from 2012 to 2019. At university, I met my wife in the choir. We now have four children. Everything was a struggle—education, work. But people in Africa generally accept people with disabilities. The failure has come from systems and leaders who don’t prioritise our needs. Was there a time when the absence of assistive technology made things difficult for you to do? Yes. Because of my physical disability, I’ve used different types of assistive tech. For mobility, I primarily use crutches; I’ve been using them since kindergarten. I can dance with crutches, something most people don’t think is possible. The challenges came from getting the wrong devices. Early crutches were metal and heavy. When you fall while using underarm crutches, you’re trapped because they support your entire body. I switched to lighter aluminium elbow crutches, which worked well. At one point, a local workshop made a prosthesis for my shorter leg. It was so heavy that when sitting, I had to keep my legs straight. It didn’t work. I also wore a raised shoe with a big platform to compensate for the nine-inch difference. It became dangerous; I twisted and got another fracture. I also developed scoliosis around age 11 or 12. They gave me a brace—an upper-body orthosis. But because I was in boarding school and it needed frequent adjustment as I grew, a strap damaged my clavicle bone. I abandoned that, too. What happens when people don’t get the right assistive tech? They abandon it, or it causes more harm than good. When people lack information, access to repair services, or have no choice, it impacts their quality of life. I experienced all this as a child. Benard Chiira speaking at a past event. Image source: Innovate Now Was that what led you to come up with this idea of persons with disabilities building alongside developers of assistive technology? Actually, no. I never in my wildest dreams thought I would work at the intersection of disability and innovation. I left Strathmore in 2019. As an incubation manager, I had an external-facing role. One day, professors from University College London’s Global Disability Innovation Hub visited. They were researchers in disability innovation. Never before had I discussed disability and innovation in the same context—they were two separate worlds. They received funding from the UK government following the 2018 Global Disability Summit, a joint initiative between Kenya and the UK. They wanted to launch a programme in Kenya because we were already known for innovation, like mobile money. They believed assistive products don’t exist partly because there’s no local industry. They asked if I would help develop the project. I felt a personal connection. I left my permanent job to launch Innovate Now in Africa as co-founding director. We started at Amref Health Africa. I was a one-person team.
Read MoreGlovo says Nigeria is its fastest-growing market after expansion push
Glovo, the global on-demand delivery platform that entered Nigeria in 2021, has said the country emerged as its fastest-growing market in 2025. At its Future of Commerce 2026 summit in Lagos on Wednesday, the company disclosed that it has invested over ₦37 billion ($27 million) in Nigeria, and delivered 38 million items over the past year, nearly doubling the value generated for businesses on its platform. The growth validates a strategy Glovo has been building since its launch in Nigeria. The company considers the country as a long-term anchor market and is investing more in its local operations. “At Glovo, we are focused on empowering SMBs (small and medium businesses) with the tools, technology and access they need to grow, scale, and compete effectively in a rapidly evolving digital economy,” said Reni Onafeko, Glovo Nigeria’s general manager. “By fostering collaboration across the public and private sectors, we are creating opportunities that drive sustainable growth and long-term impact.” That growth places Nigeria at the centre of Glovo’s African strategy, where the company currently operates in five other markets, including Morocco, Tunisia, Kenya, Uganda, and Côte d’Ivoire. Since entering Africa in 2018, Glovo disclosed that it has invested over €250 million ($292 million) across the region, and Africa now accounts for 25% of its global business. Nigeria’s online food delivery market size surpassed $1 billion in 2025 and is projected to reach $2.7 billion by 2034. The space has seen intensified competition from local players like Chowdeck and HeyFood, alongside global platforms like Glovo. Together, they are turning Nigeria into one of Africa’s most active on-demand economies. As global delivery platforms search for scale in emerging markets, Nigeria’s over 200 million population, 55.8% urban density, and online penetration of 45.4% makes it a market capable of supporting on-demand commerce at scale. Being Glovo’s fastest-growing market suggests these factors are beginning to translate into sustained demand. “Nigeria is a very exciting market,” said Dima Rasnovsky, Regional General Manager at Glovo Africa, during his address. “Nigeria has two things: population and momentum. There are a lot of good trends[…] It’s like a wave here, and if we (Glovo) are part of the wave, it is exciting. The market is going forward, and it is great to be part of the journey.” At the product level, Glovo is leaning on incremental improvements of its technology and service offerings to drive growth. Onafeko noted that product and technology changes accounted for 35% of sales growth in merchants within the past year, reflecting how user experience tweaks were shaping demand. In March 2026, the company introduced a road safety feature for its riders in collaboration with the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC), which provides the agency with real-time feedback on behaviours such as speeding and braking. Since its launch, the tool has seen 60% adoption among riders, which the company says is part of its goal to improve efficiency and safety across its network. At the summit, Glovo also mentioned plans to expand into more locations across Nigeria in 2026, targeting underserved areas beyond the 11 cities it currently operates in. While exact locations and timelines were not revealed, this expansion, according to Onafeko, is in response to demand from businesses and customers in these areas. The company also said it would double down on multi-category commerce, moving beyond food into groceries and retail, as other on-demand platforms race to become full-service marketplaces rather than single-category apps. In December 2025, Chowdeck partnered with GoLemon, a Nigerian grocery delivery startup, to supply groceries to its dark stores—retail outlets designed exclusively to fulfil online orders—and offer customers same-day grocery delivery through the Chowdeck app. “You can’t build the largest marketplace without tapping into everything else,” Onafeko added. “Glovo is already very strongly positioned in this area, but we intend to double down… and remain deeply committed to our role in the Nigerian economy.”
Read MoreSwoop raises $7.3 million seed for African super app, food delivery first
Swoop, an Eswatini food delivery startup, has raised $7.3 million in seed funding to support its expansion into Nigeria as it pursues its super-app model outside its home country for the first time. The round, backed by Silicon Valley investors including Long Journey, Variant, Version One, Dune Ventures, Soma Capital, and Zero Knowledge Ventures, will fund the buildout of a consumer platform starting with food delivery. Walter Kortschak and Base Capital also participated. Swoop’s seed raise is one of the largest seed rounds disclosed by an African consumer startup, and nearly as large as the $9 million Series A that Chowdeck closed in August 2025 after four years of operations and expansion into 11 cities. “It’s super hard to build a super app, and our investors recognise that. They recognise that you need a bit of runway and foundation to be able to do the things that you need to do operationally,” said Demola Adesina, Swoop’s Nigerian country manager. Swoop believes Nigeria’s food delivery market—valued at $1.1 billion in 2025—has more room to grow than its competitors suggest. According to Nigerian payments processor Paystack, which processes payments for Swoop and all the major food delivery companies in Nigeria, the sector grew by 187% between 2021 and 2024. Nigeria’s ratio of food ordered for delivery to food consumed outside the home is far lower in the country than in peer markets in Africa or Southeast Asia, and the real opportunity lies in converting non-consumers rather than poaching existing users, Adesina said. “We think that the food delivery space in Nigeria is still significantly under-penetrated. Our target is not existing consumption but the users that are not consuming,” he said. “We are not getting into a war with other platforms. We are trying to grow the pie.” Swoop, formerly known as Thumo, launched in Eswatini in August 2025 and acquired 6,000 users in its first month, according to co-founder Aubrey Niederhoffer. Edwin Ruiz, another co-founder, told local press in Eswatini that the goal was to build a pan-African super app combining food, groceries, and rides. The startup is starting with food delivery in Yaba, a neighbourhood in Lagos Mainland, already served by Chowdeck, Glovo, and FoodCourt, its competitors in Nigeria’s growing food delivery sector. “There is more confidence regarding regulatory risk, and international investors committing capital to us proves that,” Adesina said. “Beyond that, I am passionate about Nigerians. There is better market education and more interest in positively changing consumer habits. We think this is the perfect time to build on that.” Swoop says it uses a network of independent riders rather than an employed fleet, generating revenue through commissions on restaurant sales and customer handling fees. While riders retain 100% of delivery fees, the startup applies a 7% service charge to fund operations. Adesina declined to disclose the startup’s fee structure or unit economics, saying current fees are low because the priority is user acquisition. He added that the company is not interested in a price war. “Our approach is to find the reason why some people are not consuming [through food delivery] and to make them consumers. We are not just slashing prices and getting into a price war,” he said. Picking food delivery as the first vertical in a multi-product approach allows Swoop to acquire daily customers that create a habit with the app, a proven but costly growth engine for its super-app ambitions. OPay, one of Nigeria’s largest fintechs, initially bundled food delivery and ride-hailing with its payments wallet to drive daily usage for its wallet before shutting down the non-fintech products. “Food delivery is a metric for how developed the ecosystem is. If you get food delivery right, you can essentially be the node of the ecosystem,” Adesina said. “We believe that if we have a group of customers around that node, we are able to translate that into other areas and verticals,” he shared, adding that Swoop will let its users determine the next vertical to launch. Nigeria’s ‘difficult’ food delivery market Food delivery in Nigeria is a tightly contested sector that has claimed many startups and local divisions of well-funded international companies like HelloFood, Jumia Food, Bolt Food, and OFood, as the unit economics rarely work at scale. According to Jumia’s 2022 financial report, its food delivery arm lost $1.80 for every $10 it made. The logistics and marketing costs exceeded the revenue made from the order, which meant Jumia was essentially paying customers and restaurants to use the service. These unit economics are a primary reason why Jumia eventually shuttered its food delivery business in late 2023. Despite Jumia Food’s shutdown, Chowdeck, the largest food delivery platform in Nigeria, serves two million registered users with over 20,000 riders operating across 14 cities in Nigeria and Ghana while maintaining profitability, a rare feat for young food delivery startups. Swoop’s strategy will require acquiring high-volume, lower-income customers on the outskirts of Lagos and in smaller cities, where local restaurants and quick-service outlets dominate, if it is to create a new set of food delivery consumers. Whether Swoop becomes a success depends on three things: what it builds after food delivery and in what order, a monetisation strategy that ensures it is profitable, and whether it can scale beyond Yaba and Lagos before it runs out of cash.
Read MoreNigerian telecom customers to receive airtime refunds after disruptions, says NCC
Nigeria’s telecom subscribers will receive airtime refunds as compensation for poor service experienced between November 2025 and January 2026. The refunds will begin on Friday, April 24, according to the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC). The NCC said operators failed to meet required performance benchmarks in several parts of the country following a March 29, 2026, directive. While this is not the first time the regulator has ordered compensation for service failures—MTN and Celtel (now Airtel) were fined in 2008—the latest directive signals a more assertive approach to holding telecom operators accountable. The NCC said it has also directed tower companies responsible for many of the outages to channel their compensation obligations into upgrading tower infrastructure. These investments, separate from their annual capital plans, will be monitored by independent auditors to ensure compliance. “It’s actually compensation for the quality of service experience you may have had,” NCC’s Executive Vice Chairman and chief executive officer, Aminu Maida, said at a press briefing on Thursday in Lagos, adding that subscribers will begin receiving alerts via SMS detailing the credits applied to their lines. Unlike previous enforcement approaches, which assessed service quality at the state level, the NCC said it has shifted to a more granular system. Performance is now measured at the local government level, allowing the regulator to better capture variations in network experience across the country. “What we have now adopted is to carry out the assessment at local government levels,” Maida said. “This ensures that whatever we measure is as close as possible to what subscribers actually experience.” Under this framework, operators are evaluated across multiple network layers—2G, 3G, and 4G—against key performance indicators set out in the commission’s quality of service regulations. Where operators fall short, penalties are imposed, part of which is now being redirected as compensation to affected users. Maida acknowledged the gap between demand and current network capacity but pointed to ongoing investments by operators as a sign of progress. In 2025, the industry invested over $1 billion upgrading networks, importing equipment, and building new towers. According to Maida, one operator has already invested $1 billion in infrastructure this year. “Things actually improve, but we need to be patient,” he said, noting that infrastructure expansion remains the primary driver of better service quality. According to him, operators deployed just under 300 new sites last year. In contrast, they have committed to rolling out about 12,000 sites in 2026. So far, around 2,800 have been completed, including new builds, spectrum additions, and upgrades such as converting 3G sites to 4G and deploying 5G in select locations. “You can see we’re already moving way ahead of what we did last year,” he said. Operators say they are complying with the directive while continuing to invest in network improvements. MTN Nigeria said in a statement on Thursday that all affected customers will receive airtime compensation in line with the NCC framework, describing the directive as one that “places customers at the centre of regulatory decision-making.”
Read MoreMauritius’ new AI policy makes ethics mandatory, not optional
While many African countries race to deploy artificial intelligence, Mauritius has made governance and ethics the starting point of its AI strategy, rather than a problem to solve after the technology is in use. Central to the strategy is the FAIR framework, a set of guidelines that governs how AI systems are designed, deployed, and managed. It sets clear expectations across sectors and applies to the entire AI lifecycle, from design and development to deployment, monitoring, and eventual decommissioning. Mauritius’s approach reflects a broader shift in how African countries may position themselves in the AI landscape. While larger markets such as Nigeria and Kenya emphasise scale and ecosystem growth, and South Africa focuses on institutional regulation, Mauritius is advancing a governance-led model centred on enforceable standards. The Mauritius National AI Strategy 2025–2029, alongside the FAIR Guidelines introduced in April 2026, is designed to be vendor-neutral and border-agnostic. Any AI system operating within the country, regardless of origin, must comply with a unified set of ethical and operational standards. Imported AI tools are subject to the same level of scrutiny as domestic systems. The framework requires compliance with principles of fairness, accountability, inclusiveness, integrity, and responsibility. In high-risk sectors such as fintech and gaming, systems must undergo bias audits to mitigate discriminatory outcomes. Accountability provisions also require foreign providers to designate locally based representatives who can be held responsible for system outcomes. Any AI system that affects individuals, organisations, or public interests in Mauritius falls within the framework’s scope, reflecting a recognition that AI risks are not bound by geography and that governance should be determined by impact rather than origin. Although the FAIR Guidelines are currently non-binding, there are no immediate legal penalties or fines for non-compliance—at least not yet; they are designed with a clear legal and policy trajectory. They are expected to shape government policy, inform sector-specific regulations, influence procurement standards, and eventually underpin future legislation. In effect, Mauritius is building a regulatory framework that can evolve alongside the technology, rather than locking in rigid rules too early. This contrasts with approaches like South Africa’s Draft National AI Policy, which proposes steep penalties—including fines of about $530,000 or up to 10 years in prison—for serious ethical breaches. The Mauritius approach allows the country to remain flexible while still establishing a stable reference point for accountability. Policymakers, regulators, businesses, and even courts can rely on these principles as AI adoption expands. The framework has four pillars: fairness, accountability, inclusiveness, and integrity. Each addresses a specific risk that has emerged in global AI deployment and is tied to concrete expectations. Fairness focuses on preventing bias. AI systems must not discriminate based on income, gender, ethnicity, or geography, the policy stated. This is particularly important in a small and diverse society, where flawed systems could quickly exclude entire groups from access to services or opportunities. To address this, the guidelines emphasise the use of representative local datasets and require bias testing, especially in high-impact sectors such as finance and public services. Accountability tackles one of AI’s most persistent challenges: the “black box” problem. Under the FAIR framework, there must always be a clearly identifiable party responsible for an AI system’s decisions. This includes defining liability, maintaining audit trails, and establishing mechanisms for redress when harm occurs. AI decisions are not meant to be opaque or unchallengeable. Inclusiveness ensures that the benefits of AI are widely distributed. Rather than concentrating advantages among large firms or urban populations, the strategy promotes AI literacy through initiatives like “AI for All,” supports small and medium-sized enterprises, and expands access to digital infrastructure. The goal is to prevent a new form of inequality—what the policy’s authors describe as a potential “digital divide 2.0.” The final pillar, integrity and responsibility, addresses the technical and ethical robustness of AI systems. It covers data governance, privacy, cybersecurity, and safeguards against misuse, including fraud and manipulation. For a government that plans to integrate AI into public service delivery, trust in system reliability is essential. What sets Mauritius apart is not just the inclusion of these principles, but how they are embedded into the broader economic strategy. The FAIR framework is tied directly to procurement decisions, system design, and policy development. It is positioned as a baseline requirement, not optional guidance. This reflects a broader strategic choice: as a small, open economy of just 1.26 million people and a roughly $15 billion GDP, Mauritius cannot compete on scale with larger economies like South Africa, with an over $400 billion GDP. It is not that South Africa and Nigeria are ignoring trust. The difference lies in priorities and timing. Mauritius is using its smaller size to position itself as a focused, “boutique” AI regulator, while South Africa and Nigeria must balance building trust with driving the scale of growth their larger economies demand. In doing so, it hopes to attract investment, build partnerships, and integrate into global AI value chains. The country’s economic ambitions reinforce this direction. AI is seen as a new growth pillar, alongside traditional sectors like manufacturing, whose contribution to GDP has steadily declined—from over 20% in the late 1990s to about 10.7% in 2020, and only a modest recovery to roughly 12.8% in 2024. According to the policy, the country now sees AI as a way to revitalise these sectors, improve efficiency, and create new opportunities in areas such as fintech, logistics, and the ocean economy. To drive this transformation, Mauritius is building institutional capacity in the form of an AI Council. The council would be supported by public and private sector stakeholders, and international experts, who will oversee implementation, coordinate projects, and measure socio-economic impact. Incentives such as tax credits, grants, and regulatory support are also being deployed to encourage adoption. This governance-led approach stands in contrast to other African AI strategies. Nigeria, for instance, is prioritising large-scale deployment and talent development, with governance structures still evolving. Kenya is focused on building a regional innovation hub and a powerful AI sheriff, while South Africa is leaning
Read MoreKenya’s BuuPass enters corporate travel market with new booking product
BuuPass, a Kenyan mobility startup, is expanding beyond its consumer roots with the launch of a corporate travel platform, Gavanpass, as it looks to capture a largely undigitised segment of Africa’s enterprise economy. The Nairobi-based company told TechCabal on Thursday that more than 20 enterprises across Kenya—including banks, fintechs, insurers, and manufacturers—are already using the platform to manage business travel. The move marks a strategic expansion for BuuPass, which has spent the past eight years building a consumer-facing marketplace for bus, rail, and flight bookings. Since its founding in 2017, the company says it has sold more than 30 million tickets and processed over $100 million in travel transactions in the past year alone, primarily across Kenya, Uganda, and South Africa. With Gavanpass, BuuPass targets finance and procurement teams that oversee corporate travel budgets, as well as operations staff who coordinate trips. The platform integrates bookings for flights, hotels, buses, ground transfers, and group travel into a single system, while embedding approval workflows, policy controls, and real-time spend tracking. “Finance leaders have been telling us their problem is bigger than consumer travel,” BuuPass co-founder and co-CEO Sonia Kabra told TechCabal. “They need one platform that handles everything, but also gives them the controls they actually need.” Corporate travel accounts for an estimated 3–5% of enterprise revenue globally, but in many African markets, the category remains heavily manual. Bookings are mostly handled via phone calls or messaging apps, while approvals are dispersed across email chains, and reconciliation can stretch weeks, particularly for companies operating in multiple currencies. The company argues that existing global corporate travel tools are poorly adapted to African operating environments, where currency volatility, supplier fragmentation, and cross-border travel present unique challenges. “Most enterprise software is built elsewhere and then localised,” said Wycliffe Omondi, BuuPass co-founder and co-CEO. “We built this from the ground up with African finance and procurement teams.” The launch comes as African startups look to enterprise software as a path to more predictable revenues, amid tougher funding conditions and rising pressure to demonstrate profitability. FrontEnd Ventures, an early investor in BuuPass, said the new product reflects the founders’ track record of building products that respond to user needs. “Gavanpass applies the same instinct to the enterprise market,” said Njeri Muhia, a general partner at the firm. BuuPass plans to roll out Gavanpass across sub-Saharan Africa in the coming months, betting that regional companies—especially those with operations in multiple countries—will adopt a unified system to manage travel spend and compliance.
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👨🏿🚀TechCabal Daily – New airtime lenders are in town
In partnership with Lire en Français اقرأ هذا باللغة العربية Wazzup. In the world of Kenyan elites, wristwatches are becoming the new real estate. Yes, instead of land plots, some of the crème de la crème are now putting money into pre-owned luxury watches, because apparently, you can wear your investment and flip it later for profit. What makes this wild is how much it makes sense. Unlike property, a watch doesn’t need permits or months to sell. It can be liquidated in days and carried across borders on your wrist. If you were to invest in something unconventional, what would it be? In other news, Nigeria’s elections have a retention problem. A new Zikoko Citizen report predicts what participation in the 2027 election might look like, drawing on trends from previous cycles, and explores what could bring about a massive turnaround. Read the full report here. — Yemi FCCPC approves five airtime and data lenders M-Tiba to shut down health savings app Absa Kenya is spending $23M on digital banking Chery’s new EV in South Africa World Wide Web 3 Events Telecoms Nigeria’s consumer protection watchdog approves five airtime lenders Image source: The Punch After Nigeria’s largest telecom operators MTN and Airtel temporarily suspended airtime lending last week, new players have swooped in to take their place—at least temporarily. On Wednesday, the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC), Nigeria’s consumer protection watchdog, approved five companies to operate airtime and data lending services: Total TIM Nigeria Limited, Rane Interactive Medien CLS Limited, Mode NG Applications Nigeria Limited, Cloud Interactive Associate Limited, and Coverage Broadband Limited. The move comes as Globacom and T2, which round up the four telcos operating in Nigeria, have also quietly paused their own lending services, according to our checks. Will telcos resume airtime lending? Airtime lending has not been scrapped; it is being reorganised. Under the FCCPC’s 2025 regulations, services like MTN’s Xtratime are now classified as consumer credit, requiring proper licencing, disclosure of fees, and clearer accountability. For users, the immediate question is what happens to existing debt. Telecom operators haven’t addressed this yet. There is another wrinkle. The newly approved lenders, it is worth noting, do not yet have listed consumer-facing apps in the FCCPC’s disclosure, making it unclear how Nigerians can actually access these services for now. Between the lines: This is opening the door to new competition. Telcos have long dominated airtime credit, but once they secure approval and return, they may find themselves sharing that space with licenced third-party lenders operating under stricter rules. What is really happening? Airtime credit is being pulled into the formal lending system, where the business is clearer, and the players are easier to hold accountable. 20+ Markets. One API. Fincra connects your business to Africa’s payment rails without building market by market. For collection, payout, FX, and settlement through a single integration. See what this means for your business. companies M-Tiba is shutting down its health savings wallet Image Source: M-Tiba A curious little back story: In 2025, a cyberattack hit M-Tiba, a Kenyan healthtech platform, and went undetected for ten days. That attack exposed the personal and medical information of nearly five million Kenyans, including insurance claims, patient information, and clinical records. What’s the news here? The same platform is now shutting down its My Health Funds (MHF) wallet, the feature that allowed people to set aside money strictly for healthcare. M-Tiba users have begun receiving refunds of the amount in the wallet into their M-PESA accounts without requesting withdrawals. There is no confirmed link between the breach and the decision to shut down the wallet, but the timing raises eyebrows. Plus, the explanation that CarePay Limited, M-Tiba’s operator, gave is… thin. The official line is that it is evolving and will now shift its focus to “improving health insurance management.” Beyond that, there is very little detail on why the wallet is being retired, how many users were affected, no clarity on how affected users transition, and no real sense of what this new focus will look like. Will this mean deeper partnerships with insurers? A new insurance-led product? Or a full pivot away from individual users entirely? For now, it seems like a product shutdown wrapped in a vague strategy shift. While one can make guesses about what might be happening behind the scenes, this is one of those moments where CarePay needs to spill a bit more tea. TECHCABAL 4.0 In March 2013, TechCabal published its first article. Thousands of stories later, the work continues, and today, it goes deeper. TechCabal has always been free. That’s not changing. We’ve opened a new layer. Reporting that goes further, built on sources you won’t find anywhere else, and told in ways we haven’t tried before. You’re among the first to see it. Getting in takes less than 15 seconds. You’re one step away from the other side. Click the button below to see what TechCabal 4.0 looks like and what it means for you. Become an Insider banking Absa Kenya is spending $23.2 million on digital banking Absa Kenya headquarters in Nairobi. Image source: Absa Across Africa, walking into a bank branch is becoming a backup plan, as digital payments deepen. Absa Kenya, the country’s seventh-largest bank by assets, is leaning fully into that shift. The lender says it plans to spend up to KES 3 billion ($23.2 million) annually on technology as it pushes more customers toward mobile and self-service banking. The investment is not new, but it is becoming routine. Absa spent KES 2.16 billion ($16.7 million) on technology in 2025, and now treats digital spend as a recurring cost of staying competitive. The payoff is already visible: 94% of all transactions now happen outside branches, a sharp jump from roughly 40–50% a decade ago. This is less about innovation and more about survival. Kenya’s banking sector has long been shaped by mobile money, and customer expectations now revolve around speed, convenience, and always-on access. Traditional banks are adjusting
Read MoreAbsa Kenya to spend $23.2 million a year in digital banking push
Absa Bank Kenya will spend up to KES 3 billion ($23.2 million) a year on technology to deepen its digital strategy, according to a Business Daily report, as the lender seeks to move more customer activity to mobile and other self-service channels. The bank said the recurring investment will make transactions easier and support its push into digital banking, even as competition intensifies and customer expectations shift away from branches. The change reflects a broader migration across Kenya’s banking sector towards mobile and self-service channels, a trend accelerated by the country’s entrenched mobile money ecosystem and rising expectations for instant, always-on financial services. “Typically, we now do KES 2 billion ($15.4 million) to KES 3 billion ($23.2 million) of investments per year [in technology], and 2025 was no different in ensuring we are migrating transactions to digital platforms. We are making it easier for our customers to transact with us,” Absa Kenya chief executive Abdi Mohamed told Business Daily. The bank spent KES 2.16 billion ($16.7 million) on technology in 2025, underscoring how quickly digital investment has become a fixed cost in its operations. About 94% of all transactions in 2025 took place outside branches, compared with roughly 40–50% a decade ago, according to the lender. The technology push comes as Absa continues to reshape parts of its consumer banking leadership around digital banking. In February, the bank appointed former M-Pesa Africa chief executive Sitoyo Lopokoiyit to head its personal and private banking division, a move widely read as a signal of where it expects retail growth to come from. Lopokoiyit, who built his reputation overseeing the expansion of M-Pesa, is expected to bring mobile banking experience to retail and affluent banking at a time when the boundaries between banks and fintechs are becoming blurred. Efficiency gains The efficiency gains are already visible in the bank’s cost base. Other operating expenses fell 21% to KES 7.35 billion ($56.9 million) in the year to December 2025, with management attributing much of the decline to digitisation and automation. The impact of the technology push has also been reflected in performance metrics. Absa’s cost-to-income ratio—a measure of banking efficiency—improved to 36.5% in 2025 from 46% a year earlier, helped by lower costs and improved revenue generation. Net profit rose 10% to KES 22.9 billion ($177.3 million) over the period, suggesting that efficiency gains from digitisation are beginning to support bottom-line growth, even as investment spending remains elevated.
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Kenya’s M-TIBA refunds users after shutting health savings wallet
M-TIBA, a mobile health platform run by Kenya-based healthtech startup CarePay, is shutting down its My Health Funds (MHF) wallet that lets customers set aside money specifically for healthcare. On April 8, users began receiving refunds directly into their M-PESA wallets without initiating withdrawals, indicating payouts are already underway. Five M-TIBA users confirmed to TechCabal that they had received the funds. The decision marks a shift in M-TIBA’s model, from a consumer health savings wallet to an insurance management platform. The move, however, leaves users who depended on the service to set aside small amounts for care without a clear alternative for planning or paying for treatment. CarePay declined to comment for this story. M-TIBA first informed users on March 3 via SMS and its website that the MHF wallet would be discontinued, stating that access to insurance benefits on the platform would remain unchanged. An SMS from M-TIBA notifying users about the discontinuation of the MHF wallet. Source: Screenshot from an M-TIBA user Users were asked via SMS to withdraw their balances via USSD or receive M-PESA refunds by March 8, 2026. M-TIBA also said it would process refunds using verified details, with any unresolved balances sent to the Unclaimed Financial Assets Authority, the government agency that holds unclaimed funds until owners come forward. Refunds began on April 8, and users who had not withdrawn their balances by the March 8 deadline received their wallet savings automatically. On its website, CarePay said withdrawals would be free, and funds would remain safe, but did not fully explain why the savings product is being retired. “M-TIBA has some exciting updates on how we’re evolving to better serve you and millions of others,” the company said on its website, without providing further detail. Launched in 2015, M-TIBA built its early momentum on the idea of ringfencing healthcare funds so they cannot be spent elsewhere. The MHF wallet allowed individuals, employers, and donors to allocate money strictly for medical use across a network of providers. It provided an option for users who could not afford insurance but wanted a structured way to save for care. CarePay said on its website it will focus on “improving health insurance management,” pointing to a model where insurers and partners drive usage rather than individual savings. “Since we launched the M-TIBA wallet, we’ve helped many people save and access healthcare, and thanks to your trust, we’re growing into something even bigger and better,” CarePay said on its website. “That’s why we aim to focus on improving health insurance management to ensure more people get access to more affordable healthcare and a better experience.” CarePay has not disclosed how many users are affected, the total value of refunds, or how many accounts may be transferred to the Unclaimed Financial Assets Authority due to failed verification. It has not outlined clear alternatives for users who cannot transition to insurance products. The shutdown follows scrutiny in 2025 after a cyber attack exposed user data, as reported by TechCabal. M-TIBA said it will delete personal data once MHF accounts are closed, in line with its privacy policy. It has yet to disclose whether the decision is linked to security, compliance, or cost pressures.
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