What to expect from Google Pixel Watch 5
Table of contents Has Google announced the Pixel Watch 5? When will the Pixel Watch 5 release? How much will the Pixel Watch 5 cost? What are the expected specs of the Pixel Watch 5? Pixel Watch 5 vs Pixel Watch 4 What we still don’t know Google’s Pixel Watch 5 is close. Regulatory filings, an appearance inside Google’s own Health app, and a brief tease in Google’s own event trailer all point to a watch that’s almost ready to launch. Google hasn’t announced the device itself yet, so this guide separates what Google has confirmed from what leakers and reporters are saying, and gets you ready for the Made by Google event on August 12. Has Google announced the Pixel Watch 5? Google has confirmed the Made by Google event for August 12, 2026, in New York City. The keynote starts at 6 PM ET (11 PM WAT), and Trevor Noah is hosting, with guests including Stephen Curry, Alex Cooper, Shubman Gill, Ayami Nakajo, Peggy Gou, and PinkPantheress. Google’s own teaser for the event showed a quick glimpse of the Pixel Watch 5, the first time Google has acknowledged the device by name. A few other signs point the same way. Four model numbers for the watch cleared US FCC certification in June, and the name “Google Pixel Watch 5” briefly showed up as a setup option inside Google’s own Health app. None of this confirms the specs or the price, but it confirms the watch exists and is close to launch. When will the Pixel Watch 5 release? Google will announce the Pixel Watch 5 on August 12. Leaks from Dealabs, a French outlet with a strong record on pre-order pricing, point to pre-orders opening on August 13 and the watch going on sale on August 20, the same day as the Pixel 11 phones. That timeline would move much faster than last year. The Pixel Watch 4 was announced on August 20, 2025, but didn’t reach shelves until October 9, 2025, a gap of about 50 days. If the August 20 date holds this year, buyers would only wait about 8 days between the announcement and the on-sale date. Treat August 20 as the date to watch. It comes from a leaker with a strong pre-order track record, and several outlets have repeated it. Some earlier reports guessed an October ship date based on last year’s pattern, but that guess came before the newer leak surfaced. How much will the Pixel Watch 5 cost? Leaked pricing from Dealabs points to the first price increase in Pixel Watch history. Here’s what the leaks say for the US, UK, and EU: Pixel Watch 5, 41mm, Bluetooth/Wi-Fi: $399 / £369 / €419 Pixel Watch 5, 45mm, Bluetooth/Wi-Fi: $429 / £399 / €449 Pixel Watch 5, 41mm, LTE: $499 / £469 / €519 Pixel Watch 5, 45mm, LTE: $529 / £499 / €549 That’s a jump from the Pixel Watch 4’s launch prices of $349, $399, $449, and $499 across the same four configurations. In the US, the 41mm models go up by $50, and the 45mm models go up by $30. In the UK and EU, only the 41mm models appear to rise, and the 45mm prices reportedly stay the same as last year. Google has given a reason for the increase. Speaking to 9to5Google, Google’s VP of Devices and Services, Shakil Barkat, said memory prices have jumped in ways the company hasn’t seen before. He pointed to data showing the price of 1GB of LPDDR5X RAM went from $2.80 in 2025 to $12 in 2026, and said the entire Pixel family will see price adjustments because of it. At $399, the entry-level Pixel Watch 5 matches the Apple Watch Series 11’s starting price and costs more than the Samsung Galaxy Watch 9, which starts at $379.99. The Galaxy Watch 9 also runs on Samsung’s newer Snapdragon Wear Elite chip, so Google’s watch costs more while using older hardware. What are the expected specs of the Pixel Watch 5? Leaks point to a watch that keeps almost everything the same as the Pixel Watch 4 and puts its upgrades into storage, memory, and software. Two leaked spec sheets, one from Dealabs and one from MyMobiles, give the clearest picture so far. 1. Processor The chip is the biggest open question. Dealabs describes it as a “Snapdragon W5 Gen 2 Accelerated,” a version of the chip that hasn’t been announced before. The MyMobiles spec sheet lists a standard Snapdragon W5 Gen 2 with a Cortex-M55 coprocessor instead, and a Google Play Console listing from earlier in the summer shows the same CPU and GPU as the Pixel Watch 4. Until Google confirms it, treat the chip as a Snapdragon W5 Gen 2, possibly with some tuning, rather than a new generation of silicon. 2. Memory and storage Storage looks set to double from 32GB to 64GB. RAM may rise from 2GB to 3GB, based on the Play Console listing, though the full spec sheets from Dealabs and MyMobiles don’t list a RAM figure at all. If the increase holds, it would be the first RAM upgrade since the original Pixel Watch launched. 3. Display Leaks point to the same Actua 360 LTPO AMOLED display as the Pixel Watch 4, at 320 ppi with peak brightness up to 3,000 nits and a refresh rate that adjusts between 1Hz and 60Hz. Both the 41mm and 45mm sizes return, with Corning Gorilla Glass 5 on top. 4. Battery and charging The 41mm model is expected to carry a 332mAh battery and the 45mm model a 465mAh battery, both slightly larger than the Pixel Watch 4’s cells. Quoted battery life stays the same at up to 30 hours on the 41mm and 40 hours on the 45mm with the always-on display active, or 48 and 72 hours in battery saver mode. Charging speeds are expected to match last year’s watch, and Google is expected to skip a charging brick in the box again. 5.
Read MoreQuick Fire 🔥 with Mohammed Bashir Yunusa
Quick Fire is TechCabal’s weekly column featuring executives, founders, and operators discussing the decisions, industry shifts, and contrarian ideas driving Africa’s technology and business landscape. This week: Mohammed Bashir Yunusa on non-interest commerce, why trust matters more than technology at the start of any financial innovation, and why the next decade of banking will not be won by branch count. Mohammed Bashir Yunusa is a banking executive with over 15 years of experience driving growth, transformation, and value creation across the financial services industry. His expertise spans business strategy, digital banking, commerce, innovative finance, investment and deal structuring, corporate finance, and non-interest banking. As Divisional Head, Digital Banking & Commerce at The Alternative Bank, Yunusa provides strategic leadership for the Bank’s digital banking, commerce, product management, and ecosystem partnerships. He focuses on shaping growth strategies, developing customer-centric solutions, and creating sustainable value through technology, strategic partnerships, and forward-looking business models. Throughout his career, he has led transformative initiatives across business strategy, product development, digital banking, commerce, and innovative finance. His experience also encompasses investment and deal structuring, where he has advised on strategic transactions, financing models, and partnerships across multiple sectors of the economy. His approach combines commercial insight with disciplined financial structuring to deliver sustainable outcomes for institutions and businesses. His leadership has contributed to the development of pioneering financial products, digital platforms, and business models, including Nigeria’s first credit-based e-commerce platform. By combining technology, innovative finance, and commercial strategy, he has consistently unlocked new markets, enhanced customer experiences, and delivered sustainable growth. Yunusa holds a Global Executive MBA from IESE Business School, a Postgraduate Diploma in Strategy and Innovation from Saïd Business School, University of Oxford, a Master of Science in Strategic Planning from Heriot Watt University, and a Bachelor of Science (Hons.) in Business Administration (Finance) from Ahmadu Bello University, where he also graduated with distinction in Accounting. He believes finance is at its most powerful when it expands opportunity, enables enterprise, and creates shared prosperity. His work is guided by a commitment to building institutions that combine commercial excellence with innovation to deliver lasting economic and societal impact. Explain your job to a five-year-old. I help people save, spend, borrow, and grow their money in smarter ways. My team builds the tools that make banking simple, fast, and useful, so people can focus on living their lives while money quietly works for them. Non-interest banking removes the tool most digital lenders build credit products around: interest. How do you build a credit-based commerce platform without it? You stop thinking about lending and start thinking about trade. In non-interest banking, every transaction must be backed by a genuine commercial activity that forces you to build around assets, partnerships, and real economic value, not risk-priced through interest. Our job isn’t to replicate conventional banking. It’s to build better commercial models where customers gain access to goods and services, merchants increase sales, and the bank earns from facilitating genuine trade. Done well, everyone wins. You helped build Nigeria’s first credit-based e-commerce platform. What almost killed it before it worked? The technology wasn’t the difficult part. Behaviour was. We assumed customers wanted credit. What they actually wanted was confidence: that delivery would happen, that repayment would be simple, and that the product would genuinely improve their lives. The lesson: innovation succeeds when it solves a trust problem before it solves a technology problem. Inside a bank, where do the digital banking team and the commerce team actually disagree? Digital teams optimise experiences. Commerce teams optimise economics. Digital wants fewer clicks; commerce wants higher lifetime value. Digital celebrates user growth; commerce asks whether those users are profitable. The best organisations make customer experience and commercial sustainability improve together, not one at the other’s expense. In bank-fintech-merchant partnerships, who holds the leverage, and has that shifted in the last few years? Leverage belongs to whoever owns the customer relationship. A few years ago, fintechs had the advantage because they moved faster. Today, banks have become significantly more digital, merchants more sophisticated, and customers expect integrated experiences. The future belongs to partnerships where everyone contributes something unique—not to whoever tries to own everything. What’s a deal or partnership you walked away from that looked good on paper, both in your career and in your role overseeing a division at The Alternative Bank? I came across a transaction recently that looked incredibly attractive on paper. It promised strong returns and could have worked well for the first few deals. The more I thought about it, though, the more I realised it wasn’t the kind of business I want to build. It relied too heavily on today’s market conditions, today’s financing model, and today’s technology. As those evolve, so does its value proposition. So I walked away. I’ve become less interested in opportunities that make money today and more interested in building businesses that will still matter decades from now. Businesses that adapt, compound, and create value long after we’re gone. Short-term wins are exciting. Enduring institutions are far more rewarding. Your background is in deal structuring and corporate finance. What’s the real tension between building at product speed and structuring it at the speed finance—and money—is supposed to move? Innovation rewards speed; finance rewards discipline, and the mistake is believing you have to choose one. Good organisations build governance into the product development process, so risk management becomes an accelerator rather than a brake. Moving fast without discipline creates expensive mistakes. Moving perfectly but too slowly creates missed opportunities. What’s the biggest risk in Nigerian digital banking right now that isn’t being talked about enough? Everyone is competing for users. Very few are building sustainable economics. Customer acquisition has become relatively easy. Building profitable, engaged, long-term relationships is much harder. The institutions that survive will be the ones that understand lifetime value, not just download numbers. What’s a decision you made that was commercially right but took years to be proven right? Investing heavily in ecosystems instead of individual products. Products can be
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Kenya’s new crypto rules give exchanges right to appeal regulator decisions
Kenya has given licenced crypto exchanges and other virtual asset companies a formal legal right to challenge regulatory decisions, one of the most significant additions to the country’s finalised cryptocurrency regulations. Under the finalised Virtual Asset Service Providers (VASP) Regulations, exchanges, wallet providers, token issuance platforms, stablecoin issuers, and other virtual asset firms can appeal licence refusals, suspensions, revocations, and other regulatory sanctions imposed by the relevant authorities. “A person aggrieved by any decision of the relevant regulatory authority under these Regulations may appeal against that decision in accordance with section 43 of the Act,” the National Treasury said in the policy. The appeals provision is particularly significant because the same regulations substantially expand the government’s enforcement powers. Regulators may reject licence applications, suspend or revoke licences, impose administrative sanctions, intervene in the management of a provider and appoint statutory managers to take control of customer assets under specified circumstances. The regulations also establish a legal framework for freezing and seizing virtual assets linked to suspected financial crime. Subject to court approval, investigators may obtain access to hardware wallets, seed phrases, and other devices necessary to secure digital assets under investigation. The appeals mechanism allows exchanges, wallet providers, token issuance platforms, and stablecoin issuers to challenge regulatory actions that could materially affect their operations in Kenya. At the same time, the regulations require enforcement authorities to protect customers who are not connected to the alleged wrongdoing, ensuring that freezing or seizure orders target specific accounts or virtual assets rather than all customer assets held by a platform. “A freezing or seizure order issued under this Part shall… target specific consumer accounts or specific virtual assets held in custody by the licensee; make provision for the licencee to seek clarification or variation of the order where compliance would affect assets of uninvolved consumers,” the policy read. The provision marks an important change from the draft regulations published in March, which did not contain an explicit statutory appeals mechanism for affected virtual asset service providers. The final gazetted regulations therefore introduce a clearer procedural safeguard even as Kenya strengthens oversight of the sector. The changes modestly rebalance a framework that remains heavily weighted toward enforcement. Authorities retain broad powers to inspect providers, require records, freeze assets and intervene in a firm’s operations where customer assets are considered at risk. For international exchanges evaluating the Kenyan market, the appeals mechanism provides an additional layer of regulatory certainty. Although regulators retain the authority to suspend or revoke licences, affected firms now have a clearly defined legal process through which they may challenge those decisions under the Virtual Asset Service Providers Act, 2025. Taken together, the regulations signal Kenya’s attempt to build a more mature regulatory framework for digital assets—combining stronger oversight of crypto businesses with clearer procedural protections for licenced firms subject to enforcement action. True scale demands moving beyond surface-level integrations to robust execution. We’ve filtered the noise out of Moonshot 2026, optimising the conference strictly for high-calibre connections between startup founders, global financial operators, enterprise leaders, and individuals rewiring Africa’s technical frameworks. Get 20% off Early Bird tickets for a limited time.
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As African newsrooms shrink, powerful companies face less scrutiny
This article draws from my conversation with Ivana Heijnen in Episode 7 of the Voices and Visions podcast, which explores the people and ideas shaping Africa’s innovation economy. Across much of Africa, companies are becoming larger, richer, and more influential. The newsrooms expected to scrutinise them are moving in the opposite direction. I found myself returning to this contradiction during the seventh episode of Voices and Visions, a podcast hosted by Ivana Heijnen about the people shaping Africa’s tech and business ecosystems. I have always believed that journalism begins with caring about people, systems, and whether they work as they should. A reporter’s responsibility is not merely to describe events. It is to examine who is exploiting whom, which institutions are failing, and who benefits when they do. “There’s that surveillance role of a journalist,” I told Heijnen. “You scrutinise who is stealing from whom, what is going on well, what is not working as it is supposed to, and give people solutions to some of these things.” That role is becoming harder to perform. African newsrooms are operating under severe financial pressure. Advertising revenue has shifted to global tech platforms such as Facebook, Google, and X. Print circulation has declined, while audiences increasingly expect news to be free. Media organisations have responded by imposing hiring freezes, laying off staff, and shrinking editorial budgets. Reporters are expected to produce more stories across more platforms with fewer resources. Investigative journalism is particularly vulnerable. It is expensive, slow, and legally risky. A reporter may spend weeks pursuing a story that generates no immediate revenue and may never be published. By contrast, a sponsored event or corporate announcement can generate income and be turned into multiple pieces of multimedia content within hours. While this is now being presented as a media business problem, it is also a big accountability crisis. “Media has a huge role,” I said during the conversation. “Surveillance. We need to scrutinise everything that is in the public. We need to hold everyone to account, and that is telling the story as it is.” But watchdog journalism cannot survive on responsibility alone. It requires reporters, editors, lawyers, travel budgets, data, and institutions willing to withstand commercial and political pressure. As those resources disappear, the people and companies requiring the greatest scrutiny gain more room to shape the stories told about them. Powerful companies, weaker newsrooms Large companies have resources that most African publications currently do not. They retain communications advisers, lawyers, lobbyists, and public relations agencies. They cultivate relationships with editors, sponsor industry events, and buy advertising across multiple platforms. None of those activities is inherently improper. Companies have a legitimate interest in explaining what they do. The problem arises when their capacity to influence the public narrative exceeds the media’s capacity to interrogate it. Some of the companies journalists cover are also among the biggest sources of advertising revenue. Their executives may have close relationships with media owners. In some countries, the people who possess political or commercial power also directly own the outlets expected to scrutinise them. “Some of these people who have this power also own the media outlets,” I told Heijnen. “They just want reporters to rejig whatever they want to churn out.” A financially secure newsroom can resist some of that pressure. A struggling one must calculate what it can afford to lose. This imbalance matters because large corporations are not passive victims of weak systems. They can possess enormous power to influence regulation. A major bank, telco, or multinational can lobby policymakers, hire influential advisers, and gain access to decision-makers in ways that an ordinary citizen cannot. “If they want a regulation or a policy to be changed, they can lobby, they can push for it,” I said. “But they choose not to because they also benefit from that flawed system. And who loses in all this? The ordinary person.” Without independent reporting, the public sees only part of that relationship. Companies speak enthusiastically about innovation, inclusion, and the jobs they create. Far less is said about market dominance, labour practices, political connections, or the regulations they helped shape. Press releases become the story The effects are especially visible in Africa’s tech ecosystem. Startup coverage is heavily influenced by fundraising announcements, founder profiles, and carefully constructed claims about impact. The companies receiving the most attention are often those with the strongest communications machinery, not necessarily the strongest businesses. “Capital follows narrative,” I told Heijnen. Before capital becomes rational, it can follow emotion and attention. A compelling founder story attracts coverage. Coverage creates visibility. Visibility suggests momentum. That momentum attracts investors, partnerships, and still more coverage. Many highly funded startups understand this loop. They retain effective PR firms and build relationships with journalists and editors across the continent. They appear repeatedly in the media, becoming familiar to investors and policymakers. “Whether their business models are good, or they are solving a problem that is there, is neither here nor there,” I said. “They’ve mastered what can capture attention.” Journalists are meant to interrupt that loop with difficult questions. How many jobs did the company create? How much revenue does it generate? Are its customers better off? Did the product lower costs? What happened to the millions it raised three years ago? Are its claims independently verifiable? Yet these questions require time and expertise. It is much easier to rewrite an announcement saying that a startup has raised $5 million than to spend months investigating what happened after its previous round. “Fundraising should no longer be news,” I said. “A good idea should attract investment. The story should be the impact.” The amount raised is not meaningless. Funding can reveal where investors see opportunity and which sectors are attracting capital. But money entering a company should mark the beginning of the scrutiny, not the successful conclusion of its story. If journalism stops at the announcement, the media becomes part of the startup’s fundraising infrastructure. Funding accountability The answer is not to pretend journalism can exist
Read MoreGoogle Pixel 11 Pro Fold: Release date, price, and specs
Table of contents When is the Google Pixel 11 Pro Fold coming out? Google Pixel 11 Pro Fold detailed specs How much will the Google Pixel 11 Pro Fold cost? What colours does the Google Pixel 11 Pro Fold come in? Where can you buy the Google Pixel 11 Pro Fold? Google will announce the Pixel 11 Pro Fold at its Made by Google event on August 12, 2026, in New York. The foldable shares the stage with the Pixel 11, Pixel 11 Pro, Pixel 11 Pro XL, and Pixel Watch 5, but you’ll have to wait longer to buy it. Last year’s Pixel 10 Pro Fold was announced in August and only reached shelves in October, and every credible report points to the same pattern this year. Leaks have already filled in most of the picture. Expect a $1,899 starting price, a new Tensor G6 chip, a MediaTek modem replacing years of Samsung modems, and a slimmer body. Google has confirmed the event date and little else, so treat everything below as leak-based reporting until August 12. When is the Google Pixel 11 Pro Fold coming out? Google’s press invite confirms the Made by Google event for August 12, 2026, at 6 PM ET in New York City, as reported by 9to5Google and Android Central. That is a week earlier than last year’s event and much later in the day than usual. The announcement date and the release date are two different things for this phone. The Fold is expected to go on sale around October 2026, based on reporting from Android Central and PhoneArena. Google has followed this pattern before. The Pixel 10 Pro Fold was announced on August 20, 2025, and shipped on October 9, a gap of about seven weeks. The complexity of building the hinge and the foldable screen is the most commonly cited reason for the delay. A leak from French deal tracker Dealabs, reported by 9to5Google and Notebookcheck, points to an August 20 on-sale date with pre-orders opening on announcement day. That date applies to the regular Pixel 11, the Pixel 11 Pro, and the Pixel 11 Pro XL. It does not cover the Fold, so ignore any coverage that presents August 20 as the foldable’s release date. Google Pixel 11 Pro Fold detailed specs The full spec sheet below comes from leaked retail listings, FCC filings, and reports from named outlets. Google confirms the official numbers on August 12. 1. Outer display 6.4-inch OLED cover screen with a 120Hz refresh rate, according to Android Authority citing Android Headlines 1080 x 2342 resolution with peak brightness around 2,450 nits, per a leaked spec sheet reported by GSMArena One leaked Amazon listing said 6.5 inches, but most credible sources say 6.4 inches, which matches the Pixel 10 Pro Fold. Treat 6.4 inches as the safer figure. 2. Inner display 8-inch foldable OLED with a 120Hz refresh rate, reported by Android Authority and GSMArena 2076 x 2160 resolution with peak brightness around 2,050 nits, per the leaked spec sheet Some early listings claimed 144Hz, but every credible named source reports 120Hz, so treat 120Hz as correct. The crease also looks set to stay about the same, with PhoneArena reporting little sign of improvement this year. 3. Processor and RAM The Fold runs on the Tensor G6, Google’s first chip built on TSMC’s 2nm process, according to GSMArena and Android Authority. If accurate, it would be the first major smartphone chip on a 2nm node. The leaked spec sheet describes one ARM C1-Ultra core at 4.11GHz, additional C1-Pro cores, a PowerVR GPU, and Google’s Titan M3 security chip. RAM lands at 16GB across every storage tier, per Android Authority’s detailed read of Google’s accidentally published Amazon listings. Some earlier listings mentioned 12GB, but Droid-Life reports that figure as an error from international listings. The RAM cut to 12GB is a genuine change this year, but it applies to the base Pixel 11 Pro and Pro XL, and it skips the Fold. 4. Storage 256GB, 512GB, and 1TB options, reported by Android Authority and Droid-Life The 128GB tier is gone across the whole Pixel 11 lineup, making 256GB the new base The 1TB version is reportedly limited to the darkest colour, per GSMArena 5. Cameras The camera system largely carries over from the Pixel 10 Pro Fold, based on Android Headlines’ detailed spec sheet as reported by Android Authority: 48MP main camera 10.5MP ultrawide with macro support 10.8MP periscope telephoto with 5x optical zoom and 30x Super Zoom 10MP selfie cameras on both the cover screen and the inner screen One possible hardware change stands out. Telegram tipster Mystic Leaks, as reported by 9to5Google, says the Fold gets a new main sensor codenamed “chemosh,” thought to be a 50MP sensor shared with the base Pixel 11. You may see other coverage claiming a full overhaul with a 48MP ultrawide and a 48MP periscope. That claim confuses the Pixel 11 Pro and Pro XL cameras with the Fold’s, and no major outlet backs it for this phone. On the software side, PhoneArena reports rumours of 100x AI-assisted zoom and 4K 30fps Cinematic Blur. The fingerprint reader stays side-mounted in the power button. 6. Battery and charging The battery appears to be shrinking. Android Authority’s Amazon listing leak points to 4,750mAh, smaller than the Pixel 10 Pro Fold’s 5,015mAh pack, though the outlet cautions the figure could be placeholder data. Other leaks put it between roughly 4,650mAh and 4,800mAh depending on how it is measured. The exact number varies, but every source agrees the pack gets smaller this year, which is a step backwards worth knowing about before you buy. Charging is expected to stay at around 30W wired and Qi2 wireless with Pixelsnap magnets, in line with last year, per Android Authority and PhoneArena. A charging speed upgrade has yet to appear in any leak. 7. Durability PhoneArena expects the Fold to keep its IP68 rating for dust and water resistance. The Pixel 10 Pro Fold was
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Millions lack credit histories. African banks are changing how they lend
Africa’s banking system was built around one assumption: the best borrowers earn regular salaries. But on a continent where most people earn their living in the informal economy, that assumption leaves millions of creditworthy consumers outside the financial system. Banks are not abandoning the payslip. They are widening the pool of information they use to assess borrowers, drawing on mobile money transactions, telecom activity, point-of-sale (POS) payments and other digital financial footprints to evaluate people who have long been excluded from formal credit. That wider credit net reflects the reality that Africa’s economies are powered by informal businesses, gig workers, traders and entrepreneurs whose incomes rarely arrive as monthly salaries. Traditional underwriting was designed for borrowers with formal employment contracts, bank statements and established credit histories. It struggles to capture how millions of Africans actually earn, spend and manage money. For lenders, that has created a costly blind spot. Africa faces a $300 billion financing gap for consumers and small businesses. Rather than replacing traditional credit assessment, banks are supplementing it with new data sources that provide a fuller picture of a customer’s financial behaviour. The result is an evolution in underwriting that recognises creditworthiness is not limited to formally employed workers. “We know there is vibrant economic activity across the continent, but that doesn’t translate into what lenders can underwrite,” Dalumuzi Mhlanga, chief executive officer (CEO) of Notto, an African licensed and regulated alternative credit bureau, told TechCabal on Wednesday. “The disconnect lies between how people actually earn incomes, spend and save in the informal sector and how banks process that as part of their underwriting.” Dalumuzi Mhlanga, CEO of Notto, says alternative data can help lenders assess creditworthiness beyond traditional credit histories. Image source: Notto Alternative credit scoring aims to close that gap. According to Mhlanga, instead of relying solely on repayment histories and bank records, these models analyse behavioural patterns such as regular deposits into mobile money wallets or bank accounts, recurring bill payments and spending patterns. The idea is that consistent financial behaviour can indicate a person’s willingness and ability to repay a loan, even if they have never held a credit card or bank loan. Notto says it has analysed more than one billion transaction records, built credit scores for more than eight million consumers and generated credit assessments for over five million mobile money users across South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe. The company believes the approach has delivered tangible results. It stated that before its models were introduced, only around 1% to 2% of the five million consumers it assessed had access to formal credit. Within about a year of operating, lending expanded almost tenfold while non-performing loans remained below 4%. “We are not going to introduce risk,” Mhlanga said. “We have been able to identify consumers and small businesses that otherwise wouldn’t have qualified, extend credit to them, but still deliver very low non-performing loans.” Banks say the industry’s thinking is evolving in the same direction. “Traditionally, banking has relied on salary as proof of a customer’s ability to repay,” said Nako Bolote, Access Bank’s Group Head of Cross-Border Payments and Remittances, Africa. “The problem is that formal employment represents only a small portion of the population. Banks are now looking for ways to serve the informal sector, where we know money is flowing.” He told TechCabal in an interview on Wednesday that lenders are working with mobile network operators, whose data provides insights into customers’ financial activity that conventional banking records cannot capture. “Telecom data doesn’t necessarily show salary income, but it does provide visibility into customers’ financial activity and usage patterns,” said Bolote. “Through those partnerships, we are able to better understand customers’ cash flows, even when they’re informal, and extend credit accordingly.” The same thinking is being applied to small businesses and gig workers. Banks are analysing POS transaction histories to understand business cash flow, while earnings data from digital platforms can help demonstrate the consistency of freelancers’ incomes. The objective is not to replace traditional affordability assessments but to complement them with evidence that reflects how people participate in modern economies. For Bolote, the significance extends beyond technology. “The people being brought into the formal financial system through these new approaches to credit assessment are exactly the underserved communities we have been trying to reach,” he said. “Formal employment isn’t the only legitimate way people earn a living.” The payslip will remain part of the lending equation. But as banks widen their view of creditworthiness, millions of Africans whose financial lives have existed outside formal banking may finally come into focus. True scale demands moving beyond surface-level integrations to robust execution. We’ve filtered the noise out of Moonshot 2026, optimising the conference strictly for high-calibre connections between startup founders, global financial operators, enterprise leaders, and individuals rewiring Africa’s technical frameworks. Get 20% off Early Bird tickets for a limited time.
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👨🏿🚀TechCabal Daily – A unicorn Moove
In partnership with Lire en Français اقرأ هذا باللغة العربية Good morning. African startups and growth-stage companies are increasingly looking beyond their home markets. But few conversations focus on what that expansion really costs. Beyond entering new markets lies a different challenge: fragmented payment systems, foreign exchange (FX) volatility, settlement delays, and infrastructure that wasn’t built for businesses to operate across borders. So what separates companies that scale globally from those that stall at the border? Join us for the next edition of Moonshot Conversations with Idorenyin Obong, chief executive officer and co-founder of Grey; Chijoke Dozie, co-founder & director at Carbon; Ruth Iselema, founder of Changera; and Adebiyi Aromolaran, VP of Operations at MENAT Global. Moderated by Muktar Oladunmade, Senior Reporter and Desk Lead at TechCabal, the conversation will unpack the infrastructure decisions, operational lessons, and financial strategies behind building businesses that are global by design. The conversation is happening on August 7 at 11:00 a.m. WAT. Register here. Let’s dive in. Become smarter about tech and commerce in Francophone Africa, and the policies shaping them. Read our newsletter here first or subscribe below. Subscribe Moove becomes a unicorn Cloud9 acquires Chpter MTN gets the keys to IHS’ house SIM swap fraud in Kenya World Wide Web 3 Opportunities companies Moove reaches unicorn status with $250 million raise Image Source: PalmPay If you asked any African VC which startup was most likely to reach unicorn status before the end of 2026, most would have picked Moove. And, no, it’s not because they are clairvoyant. Rather, it was an open secret that the startup was nearing unicorn status. The only thing that might have caused a surprise was the eventual $2.1 billion valuation. Moove built its reputation first by helping Uber drivers buy cars in Lagos, Nigeria, and now by preparing for a future where nobody is driving them at all, which may explain why investors like Mubadala and Toyota’s growth fund led its $250 million round. Explain like I’m new here: When Moove launched in 2020, it saw that ride-hailing drivers couldn’t afford to buy a car. So, it started a drive-to-own model. Moove bought the vehicles, while drivers paid them off through their earnings on ride-hailing platforms like Uber, and eventually they owned the cars after paying in full. But somewhere along the way, Moove realised its future lay beyond vehicle financing. It did something about that: In 2024, the company partnered with Alphabet-owned Waymo to manage fleets of robotaxis, which are fully autonomous vehicles that use AI sensors and cameras to transport passengers without a human behind the wheel. To support that expansion, Moove raised $1.2 billion in debt financing in 2025. It also acquired Brazilian mobility startup Kovi in 2025, giving it a stronger operational footprint in Latin America. What’s next for Moove? Moove says it will use the money to expand its autonomous vehicle business, build dedicated service hubs for self-driving cars, and grow across the United States, Europe, and Asia. It also plans to more than triple the size of its autonomous vehicle team by the end of the year. The next phase is all about infrastructure. Moove plans to build “nests” where autonomous vehicles can be cleaned, charged, inspected, and serviced before returning to the road, as pit stops for robotaxis. It’s a bold bet that reflects where the mobility industry is headed. The autonomous vehicle market in the Middle East and Africa is projected to grow to $18.35 billion by 2034 as AI and electric vehicles (EVs) advance, and Moove’s partnership with companies like Waymo positions it to help build that future. Getting paid in cedis just got easier for African businesses operating in Ghana. Fincra now issues dedicated GHS virtual accounts to enable businesses to collect payments. See how Fincra GHS virtual accounts work. companies Cloud9 acquires Chpter, the startup its founders used to run Image Source: Canal+ Cloud9 has acquired Chpter, the WhatsApp and Instagram commerce startup its founders ran before launching their own bank, in an all-stock deal it won’t put a number on. Why it matters: It’s Cloud9’s second acquisition in three months, after buying ticketing platform M-Tickets in May. The bank is building distribution through deals, not disclosures, and paying for both with stock instead of cash. Driving the news: Chpter’s roughly 4,500 businesses are moving to Cloud9’s Business Banking app as the standalone Chpter platform shuts down. Some staff are joining too, though former Chpter executives Mark Kiarie and Kevin Kuria, who led the company’s day-to-day operations after co-founders Tesh Mbaabu and Mesongo Sibuti departed, are not among them. Between the lines: Chpter raised $1.2 million in pre-seed funding in September 2024 to expand into Nigeria, Ghana, and Egypt. That expansion never really happened, and the company went quiet once its founders left in 2025 to start Cloud9. They’re now buying back the business they built. What they’re saying: Cloud9 chief executive officer Tesh Mbaabu says the deal accelerates the bank’s path to profitability, though he won’t commit to a timeline. “Our focus remains disciplined growth and sound unit economics, rather than making short-term profitability promises,” he said. Zoom out: Two stock-funded acquisitions in three months suggest Cloud9 is prioritising footprint over cash burn, before it’s even a year old. Download PalmPay. Bank smarter. With PalmPay, you can bank with confidence. Enjoy seamless everyday banking with security features designed to help protect your money. Send money, pay bills, and manage your finances all in one app. Learn more. Telecoms MTN secures shareholder approval to acquire remaining shares in IHS Towers Image Source: Giphy Imagine spending years arguing with your housemates about who gets to hold the remote, only to decide the best solution is to just buy the whole house and move them out. That is essentially what MTN Group, Africa’s largest telecom operator, has done with IHS Towers, the tower company it is in the process of acquiring. The telecom giant hassecured shareholder approval to acquire the remaining shares in IHS, clearing the way
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The surveillance system that helped Nigeria curb piracy wants to fight banditry
For years, Nigerian naval ships went to sea with a basic problem: they could patrol, but they did not always know where to look. A vessel could leave a port, disappear beyond the horizon, and become little more than a guess on a naval commander’s map. Patrol boats and helicopters were available, but without a clear picture of what was happening across Nigeria’s vast waters, the Navy often conducted what officials called “blind patrols.” Falcon Eye was designed to change that. The maritime surveillance system, developed by Israeli defence company RTCom Defense, began deployment along Nigeria’s coastline in 2015. By combining coastal radar, cameras, satellite feeds, automatic identification systems and an over-the-horizon radar capable of detecting vessels hundreds of kilometres offshore, it gave the Nigerian Navy something it had lacked: a continuous picture of its waters. More than a decade after deployment began, Falcon Eye’s architects want to take the same concept inland. Ido Shalev, Chief Operating Officer, who has worked on Falcon Eye for more than a decade, says the next frontier is not the open ocean but the maze of creeks and waterways in the Niger Delta—and potentially the land itself, where Nigeria is fighting a different kind of security problem: banditry, kidnapping and other forms of organised crime. “For the past eight years,” Shalev said in an interview with TechCabal in Lagos on Monday, he had been advocating for expanding Falcon Eye into Nigeria’s “backwaters.” For the past five years, he has also pushed for what he describes as land domain awareness—the ability to build a unified, real-time picture of activity, threats and forces across the ground environment, giving security decision-makers the information needed to understand developments, respond to threats and protect national sovereignty. From blind patrols to a picture of the sea Falcon Eye over-the-horizon radar. Image source: RTCOM Defense Falcon Eye was built around a simple proposition: naval forces are more effective when intelligence tells them where to go. The system’s sensors stretch along Nigeria’s coastline, with command centres in Lagos, Yenagoa and Calabar feeding information into a main control centre at Naval Headquarters in Abuja. Its over-the-horizon radar can detect vessels as far as 200 nautical miles offshore, or about 370.4 kilometres, while electro-optical cameras and other sensors help operators identify targets. That changes the Navy’s job. Instead of sending ships out to search large areas of ocean, Falcon Eye can identify unusual movements and direct naval assets toward them. Shalev described the difference as a shift from “blind patrols” to mission-oriented operations. One of the clearest examples came on May 14–15, 2020, when pirates hijacked a Chinese vessel, the Hailufeng II, off Côte d’Ivoire and sailed it toward Nigeria. The pirates had destroyed the vessel’s tracking equipment, but Falcon Eye’s over-the-horizon radar detected it before it entered Nigerian waters. The Navy intercepted the vessel and arrested 10 pirates. Nigeria subsequently recorded a sharp decline in piracy, culminating in its removal from the International Maritime Bureau’s list of piracy-prone waters in March 2022. According to Shalev, insurance premiums on vessels operating in Nigerian waters fell by about 80% after the country was removed from the high-risk list, saving an estimated $700 million to $800 million annually. The expensive security anchorage in Lagos, where ships had previously paid about $2,000 a day to wait safely, was also no longer needed. RTCom estimates that Falcon Eye has helped save Nigeria about $4 billion since 2015, taking into account reduced insurance costs, oil-theft prevention and the disruption of smuggling and other maritime crimes. That figure is the company’s estimate, rather than an independently verified government calculation. The sea is not the Niger Delta The system’s success at sea, however, highlights one of Falcon Eye’s key limitations. It was designed primarily to monitor Nigeria’s Exclusive Economic Zone—the offshore area where the country has rights to explore, exploit and manage natural resources—and other open waters. The Niger Delta presents a very different surveillance challenge, with its dense network of creeks, mangroves and inland waterways. Dense mangrove forests, narrow waterways and countless creeks obstruct lines of sight and create thousands of potential hiding places. A radar that can see across a large stretch of open ocean cannot simply be moved inland and expected to provide the same coverage. “We have to monitor many, many more sites that are more short range,” Shalev said. That means expanding Falcon Eye into the backwaters would require a denser network of sensors, positioned around waterways, chokepoints and other strategic locations. The challenge is particularly significant because many of Nigeria’s persistent security and economic problems are concentrated in these difficult-to-monitor areas. Oil theft and illegal refining, for example, often take place deep inside the Niger Delta rather than in the open sea. A similar problem exists with the proposed expansion into land surveillance. From pirates to bandits Banditry presents a fundamentally different surveillance challenge. A ship is a large, moving object operating within a relatively predictable environment. A group of bandits can disappear into a forest, move between communities, abandon vehicles, or operate among civilians. Falcon Eye’s maritime model depends heavily on detecting movement across a defined domain. Applying the same philosophy to land would require a considerably more complex network of sensors and intelligence sources. Shalev nevertheless believes Nigeria needs such a system. He argues that the answer to insecurity is not simply buying more military hardware. Nigeria already has soldiers, vehicles, aircraft and weapons. The problem is knowing where to deploy them. “Security needs to be not by buying more cars or buying more tanks,” he said. “You have to get intelligence, you have to get real-time domain awareness to know where to send those assets.” It is a lesson Falcon Eye was designed to demonstrate at sea. The Navy had ships before the system arrived. It will have ships after it. What changed, Shalev argues, was the intelligence guiding those ships. The same principle, in theory, could apply to the army and other security agencies: instead of sending units into large
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Here’s what a ₦1 million crypto trade could cost under Nigeria’s new tax rules
A ₦1 million ($733.92) Bitcoin transaction can attract multiple taxes amounting to ₦64,250 ($47.15) before accounting for exchange commission, blockchain network fees or any investment gains or losses, with the government’s take increasing as the asset appreciates before it is sold. That is because Nigeria’s new virtual asset tax framework no longer taxes only crypto profits. It taxes almost every stage of a virtual asset’s lifecycle. The Nigeria Revenue Service’s (NRS) new guidelines introduce a 1.5% stamp duty on virtual asset transactions, but that is only the beginning. Crypto users could also pay a 1% withholding tax when disposing of most cryptocurrencies, income tax on realised gains, and Value Added Tax (VAT) on exchange service fees. Each tax applies to a different taxable event. Together, they make buying, selling, earning, and spending digital assets materially more expensive. The guidelines mark the government’s most comprehensive attempt yet to bring crypto into Nigeria’s tax net. Rather than imposing a single crypto tax, they create a layered tax framework where different taxes arise from different stages of the same transaction. Nigeria received an estimated $92.1 billion in crypto value between July 2024 and June 2025, making it one of the world’s largest crypto markets. After doubling revenue from the Electronic Money Transfer Levy (EMTL) by tightening compliance across fintechs, the government is now extending the same levy — now renamed stamp duty — to crypto transactions as it searches for new sources of tax revenue. The government’s medium-term revenue projections show just how important that expansion has become. Revenue from stamp duty is projected to reach ₦456.07 billion ($334.72 million) in 2026, rise to ₦579.82 billion ($425.54 million) in 2027, and hit ₦752.45 billion ($552.24 million) by 2028. A ₦1 million Bitcoin purchase starts with an immediate tax Suppose a user wants to buy ₦1 million ($733.92) worth of Bitcoin. Previously, aside from exchange commissions, the buyer received almost ₦1 million ($733.92) worth of Bitcoin. Under the new framework, the buyer still pays ₦1 million ($733.92), but receives only 98.5% of the Bitcoin purchased. The remaining 1.5% is withheld as stamp duty and remitted to the government. The total tax burden becomes clear once the entire transaction cycle is considered. Assume a user buys ₦1 million ($733.92) worth of Bitcoin at ₦1 million ($733.92) per BTC. The purchase attracts a 1.5% stamp duty of 0.015 BTC (₦15,000/$11.01), leaving the buyer with 0.985 BTC (₦985,000/$722.91). If Bitcoin later doubles in value to ₦2 million ($1,467.84) per BTC and the investor decides to sell their 0.985 BTC at ₦1.97 million ($1,445.82), the taxes increase as well. The buyer in that second transaction pays a 1.5% stamp duty on the Bitcoin received, equivalent to 0.014775 BTC, or about ₦29,550 ($21.69) at the prevailing market price. The new buyer gets 0.970225 BTC. The exchange also withholds 1% of the value of the Bitcoin being disposed of, about ₦19,700 ($14.46), from the seller as withholding tax. The transaction generates ₦64,250 ($47.15) in tax liabilities across both sides of the trade. Because both taxes are calculated using the value of the asset at the time of sale, the government’s take rises as Bitcoin’s price appreciates. The estimate excludes exchange trading fees, blockchain network fees and value-added tax on exchange service fees. If the investment generates a taxable gain, income tax would apply separately. A user who buys Bitcoin worth $2,000 (₦2.72 million) and later sells it for $4,000 (₦5.45 million) realises a gain of $2,000 (₦2.72 million). Under the guidelines, the first ₦800,000 of annual gains is exempt from tax, while the remaining ₦1.93 million would be taxed at 15%, producing an income tax bill of about ₦288,765. Depending on the taxpayer’s applicable income tax band under the guidelines, the income tax can rise to 25%. Crypto Tax Receipt: Where does the money go? Nigeria’s 2026 framework taxes your trade at entry, exit, and on profit. Type a scenario below to see the exact 6-tier extraction. You Invest (₦) You Sell For (₦) Small Trader Active Trader Whale After all taxes, you keep ₦0 Net ProceedsTax Drain (₦0) Stamp Duty (Entry)1.5% of investment -₦0 Stamp Duty + WHT (Exit)1.5% SD + 1% WHT withheld -₦0 Progressive Income TaxCalculated across 6 tiers -₦0 Profit Tier (Rate)TaxableTax 1. First ₦800k (0%)₦0₦0 2. Next ₦2.2m (15%)₦0₦0 3. Next ₦9m (18%)₦0₦0 4. Next ₦13m (21%)₦0₦0 5. Next ₦25m (23%)₦0₦0 6. Above ₦50m (25%)₦0₦0 WHT Advance Credit Applied +₦0 Generating insight… Rather than taxing gains created solely by naira depreciation, the NRS will calculate appreciation in US dollars before converting the real gain into naira for tax purposes. This provision ensures that investors are not taxed on currency depreciation, preventing a situation where a user owes taxes simply because the naira weakened even if the asset value remained flat. The new guidelines do not create a single virtual asset tax. They create multiple taxes that interact. “VA (Virtual Assets) transactions shall be subject to the applicable taxes imposed under the NTA. A single transaction may give rise to more than one tax liability such as income tax, VAT or stamp duty, where different taxable events arise from the same transaction,” the NRS stated. In practice, a straightforward virtual asset investment will now involve: This is not Nigeria’s first attempt to tax virtual assets. The Finance Act 2023 introduced a 10% tax on gains from disposing of digital assets, but enforcement remained weak. Nigeria is not alone in taxing digital assets, but its approach differs from many major crypto markets. In the United States, cryptocurrencies are generally treated as property, with investors paying capital gains tax only when they sell or dispose of their holdings at a profit. The United Kingdom similarly taxes gains after the sale of assets. Rather than imposing taxes at multiple points in a transaction, many jurisdictions focus primarily on taxing realised gains or income. Stablecoins become a more expensive digital dollar Stablecoins are digital assets whose value is pegged to relatively stable assets such as fiat currencies. They are
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Omowonuola Akintola wants Africa to build its geospatial future
An unmapped village. A community overlooked for development. A disaster response slowed by missing data. Those are the kinds of problems Omowonuola Akintola has spent her career trying to solve. Through geospatial data, she has helped governments and humanitarian organisations better understand the places they serve—from identifying underserved communities for rural electrification projects to supporting disaster response. . “If we can help more communities become more visible, maybe there will be a lot more people interested in developing those communities,” she says. It is a belief that has shaped every step of her career. Unlike many people who can trace their careers to a childhood dream, Omowonuola Akintola simply followed the opportunities in front of her. Growing up in Osogbo, the Osun State capital in Western Nigeria, reading was her favourite pastime growing up. For a while, she imagined herself studying Economics simply because her older brother wanted to. “I would not say I had interest because I understood why it was necessary for the world,” she says. “I just had interest.” Her father, an urban planner, had other ideas. He encouraged his children to pursue courses related to his profession, believing they would offer meaningful careers. Akintola first studied Surveying and Geoinformatics at The Polytechnic, Ede, between 2011 and 2013. After earning a National Diploma in Surveying and Geoinformatics from The Polytechnic, Ede, she applied to study the same discipline at Obafemi Awolowo University. The programme was not yet available. When OAU introduced it the following year, she gained admission through Direct Entry. “I think it was just a chance because it was the year I got into OAU that they actually started the course,” she says. “It was just a new thing of trying to see how technology can be included into the land surveying course.” As she settled into the programme, Akintola discovered that what interested her wasn’t measuring land. It was using technology to understand it. “I didn’t want to do land survey. It felt boring to me. I wasn’t really interested in that,” she says. “I just felt like it would make sense to sort of focus more on the technological part of it.” As her studies progressed, she immersed herself in programming languages, desktop software and geospatial tools, while taking online courses offered by organisations in the geospatial sector to sharpen the technical skills hoping they would open opportunities beyond Nigeria. . “I was more focused on trying to understand the technical parts,” she says. “It felt more comfortable to me and there are more opportunities in that part of the field across the globe.” Seeing data shape decisions After graduating in 2020, Akintola got her first opportunity to put the technical skills she had spent years building into practice. She joined OEA Consult Limited in Lagos as a Graduate Assistant, supporting hydrology projects with data analysis. “It was nice to leave school and immediately have some real-life experience,” she says. “Seeing how the things I’d been learning in school could really be used in real projects was really interesting.” Later that year, as the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted work and travel, she returned to Osogbo to be with her family. A friend soon introduced her to a remote role at a German energy consulting firm supporting the Nigeria Energy Support Programme (NESP). Over the next two years, she applied geospatial analysis to rural electrification and agricultural projects across Nigeria and Ethiopia. One of the projects focused on communities beyond Nigeria’s national grid. Before developers could decide where to extend the grid or deploy solar mini-grids, they first needed to understand the communities they hoped to serve. Akintola’s job was to turn satellite imagery into datasets that helped estimate the infrastructure and investment each community would require. “Everything we do in geospatial is location-based,” she says. “Before you want to do any work in a place, you need to understand what is in that place.” Beyond Nigeria, she also worked on projects in Ethiopia, analysing crop types, groundwater availability and land size to estimate the energy needed to power irrigation systems. But one assignment stayed with her long after it ended. Years after electricity had been introduced to some rural communities, the team returned to assess whether access to power had actually improved people’s lives. “We were looking at satellite imagery to see if there had been some changes within those communities that we could use to evaluate how much the electrification had supported them,” she recalls. The assignment reinforced what had first drawn her to the technological side of surveying. The project confirmed that the work she enjoyed most wasn’t producing maps; it was producing evidence that shaped decisions. That, she realised, was where she wanted to make an impact. When the data wasn’t ours By 2022, Akintola wanted to apply her geospatial skills beyond infrastructure projects. She was drawn to humanitarian work, where mapping could help communities before and after disasters. “There are a lot of places where resources are scarce and being able to see how data can help people who are trying to solve problems for those places is something to support,” she says. “So, I felt like maybe it would be interesting to go into the development, data-for-good sector.” That year, she joined the Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team (HOT), an international non-governmental organisation that creates open geospatial data for humanitarian and disaster response. As a geospatial analyst, she worked with satellite imagery to build maps used by governments, aid organisations and emergency responders. Her team combined satellite imagery with local knowledge to create and update maps before and after disasters. Community members helped validate the maps, adding context that could not be seen from space. “We get to work with communities who live in the area and they provide context,” she says. “If you create a map and they feel like, ‘Maybe this map is wrong because I’m there, I know that,’ they use their local knowledge to make the map more useful and more accurate.” Her work took on
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