TechCabal Daily – South Africa’s $315 billion power plan
In partnership with Share this newsletter: Lire en Français اقرأ هذا باللغة العربية Good morning If you’ve enjoyed our exclusive stories over the past year, you can now sign up to receive them as soon as they’re published. Receive breaking news alerts directly to your inbox. Stay informed with crucial updates by clicking this link. In today’s edition Swvl swerves towards profitability South Africa’s $315 billion power plan Nigeria’s stablecoin launches in February Cellulant’s quiet layoffs Microsoft and OpenAI face fresh lawsuit The World Wide Web3 Job openings Companies Swvl swerves towards profitability GIF source: Tenor Mobility startup Swvl just flipped the script with the announcement of its first-ever net profit of $2.1 million. The company also posted an operating profit of $13.4 million. Compared to H2 2022 when the company posted $56 million in operating losses, this is a huge swerve! Swvl’s reversal of fortune from struggling to profitable business is notable, as the company has faced recent struggles such as currency devaluation in Egypt, its biggest market, and reduced appetite from investors to back startups, resulting in its woes on the public market. So how did Swvl turn the tides? Muktar Oladunmade has the deets in From Bleed to Bloom: Swvl Posts First Ever Profits. Access payments with Moniepoint Moniepoint has made it simple for your business to access payments while providing access to credit and other business tools. Open an account today here. Energy South Africa’s $315 billion power plan Image Source: ESI Africa So here’s the good news: South Africa has plans to end load-shedding for good. The bad news though, is that it will take a couple of years. Last week, energy minister Gwede Mantashe published the country’s Integrated Resource Plan (IRP) which is basically South Africa’s plan for stable electricity supply from now till 2024. Ending power cuts and meeting demands: The IRP sets out two timeframes: 2023–2030 to stabilise South Africa’s power and end load-shedding, and 2031–2050 to generate enough power for the future. The plan involves various energy sources like gas, solar, wind, and batteries to eliminate load-shedding. An ironic emoji, but load shedding in South Africa has worsened since 2007. The country suffered at least 4,000 hours of blackouts last year—that’s about half a year without electricity! To solve this present problem, the IRP may see South Africa add new power sources—6,000MW of gas, 1,500MW solar, 3,000MW wind, and 2,000MW battery storage—by 2027. All of this is pretty expensive too, with costs ranging from R5.9 trillion ($315 billion) to R8.4 trillion ($449 trillion). Will Eskom survive till then? The plan notes that Eskom will continue to provide energy to the country, but that may not come to fruition as the struggling electricity-generating company is at risk of shutting down for harmful emissions. Its 2023 results showed that the company is emitting more harmful particles in the air with every watt it produces. The company’s former CEO also said several private companies are gearing up to provide whatever electricity Eskom cannot supply. We can see this happening with energy startups on the continent, last year, raising over $500 million. This includes a $48 million raise by South African solar energy startup Wetility. Meanwhile, if you’ve got comments on the IRC, you’ve got till February 23, 2024, to accept the minister’s invite for comments or you’ll have to forever hold your peace. Economy Nigeria’s stablecoin launches in February Image Source: Google In more ironic news, Nigeria’s apex bank has confirmed that the country’s stablecoin, the cNGN, will launch on February 27, 2024. Why is this ironic? Well, in October 2023, the World Bank listed the naira as one of the worst-performing currencies in Africa, stating that the currency fell by 40% in 2023. Another report states that the naira unexpectedly dropped by 67% in 2023. While you’d think that the Zimbabwean dollar would be top of the list for worst-performing currencies—and it is on the list—it’s not atop it because the Zim dollar has been steadily devaluing since 2009. The naira has been devaluing too, but the 40%—67% devaluation happened within such a short period, it brought the naira to everyone’s attention. So will a stablecoin help? Theoretically, stablecoins help with currency stability because they’re backed by stable assets, but as we’ve noted, the naira has been anything but stable this past year. The other promises of stablecoins—lower remittance fees + financial inclusion—might not be enough to help Nigeria’s ailing currency. And we know this because Nigeria has already implemented what many consider to be an even better digital currency, a CBDC. In October 2021, after banning banks from providing services to crypto companies, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) launched Africa’s first central bank digital currency (CBDC), the eNaira, for similar uses—increasing remittance inflow and border trade and financial inclusion. eNaira, e No Gree: Two years after its launch though, the eNaira barely accounts for 0.50% of the currency-in-circulation in Nigeria. In May 2022, the IMF reported 802,000 transactions, fewer than the 919,000 downloaded wallets. By 2023, Bloomberg’s report revealed a rise in wallets to 13 million and a 63% increase in transaction value to ₦22 billion. Can the cNGN succeed where the eNaira failed? The CBN’s argument for the cNGN is that since it’s co-created by commercial banks and not controlled by the CBN like the eNaira is, interoperability will be better. But the slow uptake of the eNaira was due to several factors from a few use cases, to an uninformed public and bad tech. We predict that the cNGN will fall into the same echo chamber. What do you think? Secure payment gateway for your business Fincra payment gateway enables you to easily collect Naira payments as a business; you can collect payments in minutes through cards, bank transfers and PayAttitude. Create a free account and start collecting NGN payments with Fincra. Layoffs Cellulant confirms December layoffs Remember last week when we said Cellulant might have laid staff off in December 2023? TechCabal can now confirm that the layoffs
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