Starlink importation, use are an offence in Botswana, says regulator
Botswana’s telecoms regulator has warned the public against the importation, use, and reselling of Starlink devices in the country. The importation, use, and reselling of Starlink devices are punishable offences in Botswana, according to the Botswana Communications Regulatory Authority (BOCRA). Starlink is not yet licensed in the country and the regulator has stated that it is currently vetting the service’s application. “Starlink has not authorised anyone to import, [use] and/or sell its devices in Botswana,” BOCRA said via email. “Anyone doing so without authorisation from Starlink would be committing an offence [against Starlink].” It is unclear what charges Starlink could bring against offenders but per Starlink’s terms of use, importation into and reselling in a country where the service is yet to launch is not allowed. Reports indicate that some owners of Starlink devices, who claim to be using them for personal use, are being barred from entering the country with them at the Kazungula border post with Zambia, where the service has officially launched. “I was told to return the device to Zambia, and I was not allowed to cross the border into Botswana with it,” one person, who asked not to be named, told TechCabal. Another person who tried to bring in a Starlink device was told by border control to call the regulator for permission. Their request was unsuccessful. “Until BOCRA licenses the service and allows us to let the devices in, the devices will not be allowed into the country,” a customs agent told TechCabal. Despite being against importation and reselling, using the “roaming” option, it is legal for Starlink users to utilise the devices in different locations on the continent, including countries where it is yet to be licensed. This requires that the user has legally bought the device in a country where Starlink has been licensed. Starlink resellers like Starsat, based in Mozambique where the service has been licensed, seem to be taking advantage of this “loophole” to offer the import and delivery of Starlink units to countries including South Africa, Botswana, Namibia, and Zimbabwe. However, according to MyBroadband, last week Starlink cut off the accounts of hundreds of customers who bought the Starlink kits via Starsat and other resellers, citing a violation of terms of use.
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Next Wave: Venture investing is for everyone. Especially corporations
Cet article est aussi disponible en français <!– In partnership with –> <!–TopBanner Join us for TechCabal Battlefield, Moonshot’s startup competition where you can showcase your startup idea to a global audience and an esteemed panel of judges and stand a chance to win up to 2.5 million naira in funding for your business! Click to register for TC Battlefield First published 11 Febuary, 2024 Investing venture capital may be one of the esoteric branches of high finance, but the core concept of venture investing—taking distributed risks on the chance of enormous upside and limited downside—is not something that only nominal venture capitalists should do. Governments, and corporations especially, should be bigger venture investors than they currently are. Why? Because venture investing is a philosophy about risk versus returns more than it is a financial activity. This does not simply mean that governments should pour more money into startups—even though they should. Or that corporates should create more programmes that finance early businesses—even though it would be welcome. The point is that when large organised groups of people (whether they are governments or corporations) lose ambitions that are moonshots and cease to venture beyond comfortable cocoons, they inevitably lose an essential dynamism that is part of the human experience. “Venture investing is for everyone” means that investing resources, not just money, into a process, with the potential for big positive returns, even if there’s a risk of losing everything, is progress nonetheless. Next Wave continues after this ad. TechCabal is taking Moonshot Conversations to Nairobi! We’re excited to invite you to our inaugural edition of Moonshot Conversations 2024 in Nairobi, Kenya this Friday, February 16th. Join us for an evening of discussion around all things AI, with cool demos from innovators doing interesting stuff with AI. It promises to be an evening filled with networking opportunities and fun at our post-event mixer. If you are an AI expert, enthusiast, regulator, or innovator within Kenya’s tech ecosystem, this is an experience not to be missed. Hurry now and register by clicking on the link below, we cannot wait to welcome you. And more! It will be remembered as the year that reset the trajectory (hopefully) for the better. Register now! If you strip off the “tech” and “startup” façade from how venture investing is commonly understood, you will quickly see that humans often try to spread out the amount of risk we carry at any point in time, in every area of endeavour. From education to career and relationships, it is almost intuitive to “not put all your eggs in one basket”. Venture capital investing is exactly this same activity, but with financial maths, wads of money, and “tech” in the picture. The other thing that separates venture investing from regular investing is that, as a financial philosophy, it only works when risks are distributed based on enormous potential for oversized gains and a significant downside that is limited to zero. Understanding the risk-reward balance of venture investing is why this type of thinking is inherently challenging. All technological progress (including economic progress) has always been the child of venture investing in some form, whether what you’re considering is the launch of the rocket that put a man on the moon or the socio-economic reforms that helped China lift millions from extreme material poverty. It is the same philosophy that helped Steve Jobs rebuild a floundering Apple, and in our opinion, it is the same reason why partnering with OpenAI makes sense to Microsoft’s C-Suite and board. To bring the point closer to home, it is easy to legitimately point fingers at the many failures of venture capital and call for a more conservative approach to financing things like startups. But venture capital and venture investing are not necessarily the same thing. In fact, for the purposes of this essay, it is helpful to think of venture investing as investing in anything that has the potential to deliver outsize positive returns relative to the risk that the investment goes to zero. Think about human capital development, think about core services and infrastructure, and think about a corporate DNA that keeps pace with global business and technology changes so that it is relevant to customers and workers. Africa’s technology ecosystem, and indeed economy, may not grow to the admirable heights we dream of if everyone, from your local town government head to the suits in boardrooms, does not take investing in ventures (not just startups) seriously. This is not an argument for everyone to ditch their jobs and become financiers of startups. Rather, if we allow an overreaction to poorly thought-out venture capital investing to affect our understanding of the risk-reward balance of investing for significant positive outcomes across all aspects of the economy and social structure, then we will have created another issue. In essence, more of Africa’s mature companies need to take part in the business of venture investing—again, this is more than simply providing capital. Many examples surely showcase that this business can work very well for firms and people willing to put in the work. Safaricom, Kenya’s leading telco, has had multiple tries at it with varying levels of success. For instance, it launched the $1 million Spark Venture Fund more than a decade ago, which supported the likes of Sendy, a logistics company that has since closed shop. The company seems to have learned its lessons and modified its strategy to include more than just investing capital. There should be more of this from African telcos, African retail giants, and African governments. In fact, the big foreign international companies could significantly increase their impact if they convert a portion of their idle resources into venture investing assets. Who knows, it may do far more good than their current CSR initiatives. Kenn Abuya and Abraham Augustine Senior Reporters, TechCabal Thank you for reading this far. Feel free to email kenn[at]bigcabal.com, with your thoughts about this edition of NextWave. Or just click reply to share your thoughts and
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👨🏿🚀TechCabal Daily – Star leaked
In partnership with Share this newsletter: Lire en Français اقرأ هذا باللغة العربية Congratulations to Côte d’Ivoire As Nigeria takes a step back with second at the African Cup of Nations (AFCON), we’re also taking a look at ecosystems that have fallen outside the limelight in Nigeria’s bustling tech ecosystem. Nestled into the edge of Western Nigeria, Lagos is where some of the continent’s biggest startups kicked off. If there’s a tech event happening in Nigeria, it’s also most definitely going to hold in Lagos. It’s also the state most investors, who fly in for these events, focus on. But Nigeria has 35 other states, what’s happening there? What’s it like building a tech ecosystem outside of Nigeria’s tech capital? We’ve got answers in the debut of our Weekend Features. In today’s edition Africa waves goodbye to Herbert Wigwe Starlink clamps down on South African resellers Bayobab lands two subsea cables in Ghana and Nigeria Funding African civic tech How much was lost to ransomware attacks in 2023? The World Wide Web3 Opportunities Features Africa waves goodbye to Herbert Wigwe One point we hammered in our monthly recap is how one Nigerian commercial bank, Access Holdings, is giving startups a lesson in acquisitions. Last month, Access Holdings, the parent company of Access Bank, completed three acquisitions across two countries. Before that, the bank made waves in 2019 with the $239 million acquisition of another commercial bank, Diamond Bank. It also pushed an expansion project across the continent, absorbing banks and corporations across Mozambique, Zambia, Uganda, Botswana and several other countries. In the first half of 2023, the company also reported a 52% jump in profits. More recently, in January 2024, the bank crossed the ₦1 trillion market capitalisation mark on the Nigerian Stock Exchange for the first time. And at the helm of Access’ sprawling empire was Herbert Wigwe who served as CEO of the corporation since 2014. Herbert Wigwe Tragically, Wigwe lost his life on Saturday night in a helicopter crash in the US that killed six including his wife Doreen, and their first son Chizi. The crash also claimed the life of former group chairman of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) Abimbola Ogunbanjo as well as the lives of the two pilots on board. Africa celebrates Wigwe’s life: The deaths were confirmed by Access Bank in a post honouring his visionary leadership. Since then, Africa’s business and tech leaders have taken to social media to honour Wigwe’s legacy. “Herbert Wigwe was the best of the best. The finest of the finest. Ah. No. The most hardworking person I know. Such a survivor. Always restless. Always hungry. One step ahead. So strong. So, so strong. The most ambitious person I know. And he had so much more to give. He was only just getting started.” Ola Brown, Founder at HealthCap Africa. “I am saddened by the tragic death of Herbert Wigwe, CEO and co-Founder of Access Bank, his wife & son. He was a visionary and brilliant banker. May God comfort your aged parents, children, the Wigwe family and the staff and management of Access Bank. You will be greatly missed.” Akinwumi Adesina, President, African Development Bank (AfDB). “The passing of Dr. Herbert Wigwe, Group CEO of Access Holdings PLC, his wife and son, is a huge loss to our financial sector and country as a whole. Dr. Wigwe was a true pioneer and fine gentleman who blazed the trail in revolutionising our banking industry and more recently in education. Also saddening to hear was the loss of Mr. Abimbola Ogunbanjo, former chairman of the Nigeria Exchange Group PLC.” Bosun Tijani, Nigerian Minister for Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy. “Terribly saddened by the news of the terrible loss of Herbert Wigwe, Group CEO Access Bank @HerbertOWigwe , his wife and son as well as Bimbo Ogunbanjo in a helicopter crash. My deepest sympathies and condolences to the Wigwe family, the Ogunbanjo family, Access Bank Group employees and Management @myaccessbank and my younger Brother Herbert’s partner Aigboje Aig-Imoukhuede. May the souls of the departed rest in perfect peace.” Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Director-General at the World Trade Organisation. Access Corporation has also revealed that the board will soon announce an acting CEO for the Group who will carry on Wigwe’s legacy. Access payments with Moniepoint You don’t have to take our word for it. Give it a shot like he did Click here to experience fast and reliable personal banking with Moniepoint. Internet Starlink clamps down on South African resellers Over the past year, satellite internet service Starlink has launched in some of Africa’s biggest economies—except one. The Space X-owned service which kicked off in Nigeria has snaked its way across the continent, launching in Kenya, Rwanda, Zambia even eSwatini, all while avoiding South Africa. Starlink won’t give itself up: Starlink is now active—and licensed—in seven African countries with plans to be available in 19 more by the end of 2024, and 10 more by 2025. South Africa isn’t on this list. The reason? Well, Starlink won’t acquiesce to South Africa’s equity requirement: that 30% of its company—or any foreign company launching in the country—must be owned by South Africans. That hasn’t stopped South Africans from using Starlink though. At least 14,000 South Africans are using the service via resellers like IT Lec and StarSat. These resellers buy Starlink roaming packages available in licensed countries for South Africans, register the services in those countries and manage subscriptions for users. Starlink is pushing back: Now, Starlink is fighting some resellers. Over the past week, at least 400 StarSat customers have reported that their Starlink service has been blocked. Per MyBroadBand, Starlink says resellers are violating its terms of use, and its copyrights by using the Starlink logo for their marketing. The SpaceX-owned company has also asked resellers to cease all unauthorised resales immediately. Regulators also push back: Southern Africa resellers are also finding themselves fighting both the company, and the regulators. In November, South Africa’s communications regulator, ICASA, warned against resale of Starlink
Read MoreAccess Bank mourns Herbert Wigwe, to announce acting Group CEO soon
Access Bank has announced the death of Herbert Wigwe, the company’s founding Group CEO alongside his wife, son, and three other passengers, including the chairman of Nigerian Exchange Abimbola Ogunbanjo, in a plane crash. The company also said that the board will soon announce the appointment of an acting Group CEO who is expected to build on the “legacy of growth and operational excellence.” “The Access family has suffered a major loss with the passing of Dr. Wigwe who was a great friend and fine gentleman. He had a prodigious intellect, admirable personal qualities, and vast business experience which he brought to bear on the Access Family and for which we owe him a debt of gratitude,” said Abubakar Jimoh, chairman of Access Holdings in a statement. The helicopter carrying Wigwe and the other passengers was identified as a Eurocopter EC130 by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration. The aircraft was headed to Las Vegas when it crashed near a border city between Nevada and California on Friday night, as per reports. The 57-year-old CEO was a key figure in the transformation of Access Bank to a holding company and the largest bank in Nigeria by total assets. The bank is also one of the largest retail banks in sub-Saharan Africa with over 60 million customers in 20 countries. Apart from the banking sector, Herbert Wigwe was also invested in education with his latest project being a university named after him and located in Rivers State.
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A revamped Showmax begins its march to 50 million subscribers with a branding masterclass
Editor’s note: For the best viewing experience, click the half-moon icon ☾ at the top right corner of the page to switch to dark mode. Weeks after Amazon Prime beat a hasty retreat from Africa, Showmax, the streaming service majorly owned by MultiChoice, presented a spectacle that shows how much it is betting the house on African streaming. For four days in the first week of February, the Showmax team went to great lengths to show its guests—journalists whose stock in trade is skepticism—who were in Johannesburg for a grand launch, how much it believes in its ability to crack Subscription Video On Demand (SVOD) in Africa. The grand launch of the revamped Showmax For months, the company has talked up Showmax 2.0, its second iteration, the new technology that underpins the new app, the partnerships it believes will serve as a competitive advantage, and its unique understanding of the African market. A fun game would be taking a shot whenever a Showmax executive mentions their unique understanding of the African market. First review of the new Showmax: A big leap forward with content & UI But this is not a game. Instead, last week was the final stretch before it migrates all of the data from the old app on February 12. It was about celebrating the sheer amount of work that has gone into this moment: the beginning of what the company hopes will be a long march into dominating and making a solid business of African video streaming. L to R: Event compere, Andrea Zappia and Calvo Mawela Showmax, which started as an idea three years ago, wants to attract 50 million paying subscribers in five years—a fifth of Netflix’s 260 million subscribers in Q4 2023. However, all markets are not created equal, and 50 million African subscribers in the SVOD market is ambitious. A mix of a startup mentality and riding the coattails of an established parent business will be critical for success. The Showmax grand launch “We’re over here because we began as a startup, and we wanted that startup mentality. We wanted to begin without the guidance of our parent company,” said a member of the company’s marketing team, explaining why the Showmax office sits in the corner of the MultiChoice campus, away from the rest of the main building. Showmax’s office is quirky and has all the clichés of a fashionable startup office in the middle of a big launch: whiteboards in spaces designated as war rooms, employees hunched over big screens, drinking too much coffee and looking stressed, and a Lego board the design team uses to destress.“We had more than three meetings every day,” one person tells me, explaining the pace of work in the lead-up to the launch party. Everything had to be right. As launches go, Showmax pulled off a masterclass in branding, with its colourful X logo prominent. The stars of some of its original shows, like Wura, The Real Housewives of Abuja, Spinners, and Adulting, were on hand, and the team created experience booths for those shows. Despite the entertainment, the conversations were serious, and the theme was Showmax’s plan to become the king of African streaming. While most tech publications would call it a bet, Andrea Zappia, the former Sky executive recently named chairman of the Showmax, disagrees. “This is a logical investment,” he told an excited crowd of about 400 people at the MultiChoice dome, the venue of the launch, on Tuesday evening. Alongside Calvo Mawela, the group CEO of MultiChoice, the pair discussed some behind-the-scenes wheeling and dealing that made this iteration of Showmax possible. “It took a lot of convincing for these partners (Comcast, NBCU) to make their first investment in Africa,” said Mawela, referring to NBCU’s 30% equity investment in the streaming company. The conversations began in 2020 and were slowed down by the pandemic, but now everything is in place. Technology, check. Important partnerships, check. Extensive investment, check. Passion, check. Now the race is on for MultiChoice, a publicly listed company, to show its shareholders that it can pull off this bold bet. And if it’s feeling any pressure from Canal+ breathing down its neck, the company’s executives and employees didn’t show it. Just before the party started, Mawela told the crowd, “Showmax and streaming are not just a project, it’s a passion.” But passion doesn’t pay any bills. The company has set its own goals publicly, and now we must measure success or failure by its ability to capture 50 million paying subscribers by 2029. The journey starts now.
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What is it like to build a tech ecosystem in Nigeria outside the country’s tech capital?
Editor’s note: For the best viewing experience, click the half-moon icon ☾ at the top right of the page to switch to dark mode. Sanusi Ismaila moved from Lagos to Kaduna in 2014 to set up a technology hub that trained people to solve real-world problems. He believed it was essential to inspire and cultivate tech ecosystems outside of Lagos because local issues need to be solved by locals who understand the nuances. After a while, he ran into his first problem: no talent pipeline to sustain startups nationwide. So, he went one step backward on the value chain to produce the talent needed to build high-quality products and startups. In 2016, Ismaila launched CoLab, and it became Kaduna’s first tech hub and the second in northern Nigeria. Today, CoLab is a community for those building tech careers and dreamers looking to connect and learn from each other. CoLab Lagos is to the Nigerian tech ecosystem what Silicon Valley is to the North American ecosystem. Yet, unlike the United States, where other states like New York, Seattle and Chicago still have thriving ecosystems that complement Silicon Valley, tech ecosystems outside Lagos struggle to build their identities or grab significant attention from stakeholders. As a result, some of the best tech talents from these regions frequently feel the need to migrate to more viable regions to attract better opportunities. After a brief conversation with these men, he discovered they were CoLab members; the following month, he signed up to learn data analytics. Six years on, he now works at AltSchool and is the director of people and head of data science programs at CoLab while still living in Kaduna. What started as a small community of young people wearing hoodies and sitting around with used HP laptops has become one of northern Nigeria’s biggest tech talent pipelines. CoLab has over a thousand alumni, with some collaborating to build startups like Sudo Africa and others working in organisations like Paystack, Microsoft, and Google. The community became such a force that in May 2022, the Kaduna State Governor, Nasir ElRufai, provided them with seven hectares of land to set up a campus and train even more tech talents. Image via Benjamin Dada Excel Ajah, who built writersgig, an online platform for freelance writers, has struggled with finding tech talent, and he believes that this is a significant contributing factor to the slow growth of the tech ecosystems in the East. “Because ecosystems like Lagos are more advanced, it’s easier to find people who can do exactly what you want,” he shared. The tech ecosystem in Imo State is in its earliest stages and didn’t begin to take shape until 2020. According to Ajah, its inception can be traced to when he and a couple of people started hanging out in public facilities to work and discuss other tech ecosystems like Lagos. In no time, they attempted to replicate these communities and events they saw in Lagos and soon organised The Owerri Business Week and Social Media Fest, which attracted a lot of attention and have become annual events. SM Fest, for the Owerri tech ecosystem While still running writersgig, Ajah launched Silicon Africa, a tech innovation centre dubbed after its counterpart in San Francisco. With a new company came hiring needs, which was where he encountered his first challenge. Scarcity of talent. It was difficult for Ajah to find strong developers in the region to work for his company, so he began training them instead. “Some of the early developers I hired still work with me and are now senior developers who now train other early-stage developers in the centre,” he shared. “This has been interesting to watch because it has become a cycle, and those they train now train others.” For Chidi Duru, another founder who operates from Owerri, the problem of the ecosystem in Imo precedes a scarcity of talent. For him, it’s a lack of interest in learning tech skills driven by the popularity of internet fraud in the region, especially in the past years. Duru’s tech hub, CodeAnt, provides coding classes to young people with support from Google, but it is still difficult to convince young people to focus on learning tech skills. As a founder, building from Owerri limits him from a network of people who understand what he’s building. Recently, in Lagos, he walked around at a centre wearing a CodeAnt hoodie merch and had a couple walk up to him to discuss the classes and company. “This has never happened in all the years I’ve been wearing our merch in Owerri,” he shared while laughing. “I even contemplated moving to Lagos for some minutes.” While it’s a lot of work, Duru says that he’s committed to putting in the work to ensure that aspiring tech talents in Owerri have a space that’s dedicated to their growth and learning. So far, they’ve trained about a thousand young people with coding and digital marketing skills. The CodeAnt primary team who are working to develop a tech ecosystem in Owerri Beyond a talent pipeline, Lagos has a more structured ecosystem that encompasses the talent, the investors to fund these ideas, and the media to tell stories about said ideas. In newer ecosystems like Imo, for example, securing avenues to tell their stories on the centre stage can be difficult. Most tech media is focused on more vibrant ecosystems like Lagos, which makes getting their attention “a bit challenging,” in the words of Duru. During a fireside chat in January, Sim Shagaya, the founder of u-lesson and Miva, both Abuja-based ed techs, shared that one of the reasons why tech ecosystems outside Lagos have struggled is a lack of structured institutions in these regions. Before the rise of the tech industry in Lagos, it was already home to tertiary institutions like The University of Lagos, Lagos State University other private and open universities, providing it with a high mass of young people from these institutions to feed into the
Read MoreWelcome to TechCabal Weekend Features!
More than being a global pop star, The Weekend is the time we use to catch up on all the shows that our pesky jobs don’t allow us to watch during the weekday. It’s also for reading delightful articles that make you sigh joyfully while sipping coffee/orange juice/beer/wine. Because, let’s face it, you’re really not going to read that article you bookmarked on Monday about understanding the intricacies of the Russian-Ukraine war. So this weekend, we’re bringing you two articles we guarantee will spark joy. The first is about what it’s like to build a tech company outside of Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial capital. It might not be something you often think about, but like Nigerian music, it’s difficult to “blow” outside Lagos. We spoke to three people building in Kaduna and Imo, and the story is worth every minute of your weekend. Read the story here. Our second delightful story for your weekend is from our newsroom editor, who abandoned us visited Johannesburg last week for the grand launch of the new Showmax. Pros of reading this article: Helping me meet my KPIs pictures of the MultiChoice office and also, paragraphs like this: For four days in the first week of February, the Showmax team went to great lengths to show its guests—journalists whose stock in trade is skepticism—who were in Johannesburg for a grand launch, how much it believes in its ability to crack Subscription Video On Demand (SVOD) in Africa. Read the story here. Here’s what you can expect from future editions of TechCabal’s Weekend Features: Long-form content: These aren’t your bite-sized news stories; these Weekend Features will include well-researched, long-form stories that promise to keep you engaged for the weekend. Finding hidden gems: Learn more about the startups tackling the continent’s challenges in ways you never thought possible. Going beyond the hype: Dive deep into the intricacies and social impact of emerging technologies. Meeting the masterminds: Get exclusive insights from the incredible people driving the ecosystem forward, especially the underdogs. TC’s Weekend Features is more than just reading; it’s an experience. We promise to keep you busy and interested with visually compelling storytelling, weaving together data, personal narratives, and expert opinions to create stories that inform, inspire, and entertain. Join us every Saturday as we explore untold stories that fuel Africa’s tech revolution in visually engaging ways.
Read MoreWasoko merger fallout: employees claim startup hid deal for six months
Wasoko, a Kenyan e-commerce platform, did not share its merger plans with Egypt’s MaxAB with employees for over six months, fearing that leaks could scuttle the transaction, two former employees told TechCabal. The merger is expected to be completed by the end of March 2024. The B2B e-commerce startup, which was founded in 2013 and raised over $140 million from investors like 4DX Ventures and Avenir Growth Capital, first told employees about the merger in a video call attended by the MaxAB executives in early December 2023, the same month the deal was announced. The meeting, which was not recorded, surprised many employees, although some had figured out there were plans for a merger and eventual redundancies. On January 15, Wasoko laid off over 100 employees across engineering, product, and business intelligence departments in Kenya and India. Following the layoffs, nine employees sued Wasoko, claiming they were unfairly fired. They argued the company did not give them sufficient time to prepare for their exit and that while Wasoko said it would follow local labour laws during the layoffs, it was a way out of paying them sufficient severance. The severance package compensated employees based on how long they had worked with the company, how many leave days they had accrued, and the number of days left before their January 15th exit. The former employees told a court that the severance package favoured those who had been with Wasoko for an extended period. Wasoko and MaxAB say merger will create a clear e-commerce leader with tens of millions of runway The court has blocked Wasoko from firing the nine employees. Other employees said they had taken bank loans, believing their work with the e-commerce platform was secure. Wasoko said it would discuss the matter with its banker, Standard Chartered, and ease repayment for six months, said one former employee. It also promised to provide health insurance coverage until March 2024. Exclusive: Flutterwave gets court order to recover $24 million lost to unauthorized POS transactions “We initiated notice of intention to declare redundancies for a portion of our staff on December 5, 2023 as previously announced.” Wasoko said in a statement to TechCabal. “Impacted employees were provided with the legally mandated period of notice and are receiving the required severance packages as stipulated by applicable employment law.” However, the company declined to comment on specific claims since the matter is already in court. Following the lawsuit, Wasoko has prepared an exit document barring employees from suing the company after receiving their exit packages, one person told TechCabal. The case will be heard in court on February 13th.
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👨🏿🚀TechCabal Daily – Leatherback’s pushback
In partnership with Share this newsletter: Lire en Français اقرأ هذا باللغة العربية TGIF Tomorrow, TechCabal will be launching a new weekend series. For our audience who enjoy long-form feature articles, we promise to hook you up. Every Saturday, we will publish one story to keep you engaged during the weekend across a variety of topics. If you want to get tomorrow’s edition, sign up to TC Scoops and we’ll send you an alert as soon as it’s published. In today’s edition Flutterwave moves to recover lost $24 million Leatherback CEO sues EFCC after “defamation” incident Kenya has a new AI bill Ethiopia will ban non-electric cars Funding tracker The World Wide Web3 Opportunities Cybercrime Flutterwave to recover $24 million lost to unauthorised POS transactions Last month, we wrote about financial institutions coming together to fight fraud. Our exclusive today will tell you why they have good reason to. African fintech giant Flutterwave is seeking to retrieve $24 million illegally transferred in October 2023 through a combination of a “technical glitch” and potentially fraudulent activity by POS merchants. Following a High Court ruling on February 1, the fintech company will reach out to over 6,000 account holders across 35 banks and financial institutions involved in the unauthorised transactions. The incident: On October 10 2023, a technical issue caused unauthorised transfers from a Flutterwave client to over 6,000 accounts across 35 banks and fintechs. Flutterwave quickly alerted the institutions, temporarily suspended the affected accounts to prevent further losses, and offered the institutions indemnity for reversing the transfers. Now, a recent High Court ruling will allow Flutterwave to contact account holders via email, SMS, and WhatsApp messages, with assistance from a recovery agency to recover the funds, according to court documents KYC in focus: Amidst increasing fraud attempts in Nigeria’s financial sector, the Central Bank of Nigeria has mandated stricter KYC measures. These require customers’ Bank Verification Number (BVN) or National Identification Number (NIN) for account opening by March 2024, alongside plans to introduce new security features on Point of Sale (PoS) terminals. The success of Flutterwave’s fund recovery efforts hinges on accurate customer information held by banks and fintechs, highlighting the importance of robust KYC protocols. 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. Fintech Leatherback CEO sues EFCC for defamation After three months of turmoil, Ibrahim Ibitade, CEO of Leatherback, a cross-border payments startup that operates in seven countries, has successfully cleared his name following an intense episode with Nigeria’s anti-graft agency, the EFCC. Ibitade deemed the EFCC’s actions “bullying” and is now seeking accountability for the agency’s lack of due diligence. Here’s what happened: In September 2023, rumours were circulating that Leatherback lost money to SDQ Facilitators—an unregulated Nigerian currency trading company. Leatherback denied the rumours, but an EFCC investigation into SDQ Financials was launched. The investigation revealed that SDQ used Leatherback’s naira and USD wallets, but Leatherback claims they were unaware of any fraudulent activity. Subsequently, in November 2023, the EFCC declared Ibitade wanted for allegedly conspiring to obtain money under false pretence and posted a now-deleted photo of him on their Instagram page. CEO fights back: In November, Ibitade denied that he was hiding from the EFCC and has now stated that he has been cleared of any wrongdoing. The agency deleted their Instagram post of Ibitade after two petitions from Leatherback, and now, the payments company is suing the EFCC for defamation and wants them held accountable for their actions. Leatherback says it will continue its trajectory towards success, as the company claims it processed $500 million in monthly transactions by June 2023 and was nearing the $1 billion mark before the EFCC episode. Secure payment gateway for your business Fincra’s payment gateway enables you to easily collect Naira payments as a business; you can collect payments in minutes through bank transfers, cards, virtual accounts and mobile money. Create a free account and start collecting NGN payments with Fincra. Regulation Kenya to penalise unregistered AI firms with $6,250 fine Kenya, a nation at the forefront of African tech advancement, has proposed an AI and robotics law that includes fines of up to $6,250 for unlicensed businesses. The Kenya Robotics and Artificial Intelligence Society Bill 2023 introduced the fine to regulate and support the growing sector. The bill also outlines the establishment of the Robotics Society of Kenya (RSK), a proposed regulatory body empowered to issue licences and levy the $6,250 fine on unlicensed businesses. Failure to comply could even land offenders in jail for two years. This body will also advise the government on emerging trends in AI and robotics. Innovation booster or tax grab? The proposal has sparked discussions among AI enthusiasts and advocates, who view the law as a “severe threat to innovation and growth” and believe that it is merely another avenue for the government to create unnecessary bureaucracy and generate revenue. This isn’t the first time Kenya has faced such criticism. In 2022, a similar proposal to regulate ICT professionals was shot down by the then-president, Uhuru Kenyatta, after it faced immense pushback for creating excessive hurdles and stifling freelance work in a sector already struggling with a talent shortage. AI in Africa: The AI sector is growing across Africa. Of the 2,400 AI companies on the continent, as of 2022, 40% were established in the previous five years. If Africa captures even 10% of the global AI market, analysts predict a staggering $1.5 trillion boost to its GDP by 2030. For other African countries, Mauritius was the first country in Africa to publish a national AI strategy in 2020. In 2021, Egypt launched its national AI strategy to deepen the use of AI technologies and transform the economy. In 2023, the Nigerian government invited global AI researchers of Nigerian descent to collaborate on the national AI strategy. Mobility Ethiopia to ban importation of non-electric cars Ethiopia is making headlines
Read MoreBreaking: NCC withdraws disconnection notice on Glo after N2bn interest payment to MTN
The Nigerian Communications Commission has lifted a disconnection notice placed on Globacom after it reached an interest payment agreement with MTN Nigeria. Both telcos ended a 15-year-long dispute over interconnection fees after MTN agreed to accept N2 billion in interest payments instead of the original sum of N3 billion, TechCabal exclusively reported this week. Globacom had initially paid N1.6 billion as the principal debt but had disputed the interest accrued on the debt, a source close to the matter told TechCabal. This prompted the NCC to set a timeline of 21 days for both parties to agree on the interest amount and when it would be paid. The NCC intervened to prevent any possible disruptions to the over 61 million subscribers on the Globacom network. “The Commission reiterates that strict adherence to the terms and conditions of licenses, particularly those delineated in interconnection agreements, is imperative for all Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) and other licensees within the telecommunications industry,” said the NCC statement. Henceforth, mobile network operators must submit records and regular updates regarding interconnectivity to the NCC. The commission also said it would adopt a transparent approach towards industry indebtedness.
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