Left behind: The millions of Nigerians whose use of technology is an afterthought
Nigeria has an estimated 35 million persons with disabilities (PWDs), roughly 15% of the population according to the National Commission for Persons With Disability (NCPWD). This represents a market larger than many African countries’ entire populations, yet their digital needs remain invisible to the tech sector. Professionals, students, entrepreneurs, and civil servants with disabilities are systematically excluded from platforms that ought to improve their lives. Whether government portals or private platforms, complaints abound about inaccessible designs, screen-reader incompatibility, and services that ignore users with visual, auditory, cognitive, or mobility impairments. “If we want to talk about digital accessibility in Nigeria, we would need more than a 24-hour podcast to scratch the surface,” said Saheed Okerayi, a blind tech enthusiast. According to him, most platforms have bits of accessibility for persons with disabilities whilst others completely neglect it, with fundamental issues like unlabelled buttons and missing alt text (alternative text) remaining widespread. Root causes In his assessment of Nigeria’s accessibility landscape, Olufemi Bayode, a digital accessibility expert who has spent years navigating Nigeria’s digital exclusion crisis, gave a stark remark: “If I’m to rate accessibility, be it digitally or otherwise, if I’m not too strict, I would give it 4%.” Bayode said that the exclusion is comprehensive and systematic, affecting every major platform category. The root cause, according to him, is simple: “When it comes to accessibility in this country, nobody cares. Be it individual developers or governments, people are just not concerned.” Bayode breaks down the most pervasive violations into several categories: Missing alt text and unlabelled buttons: “So many images and unlabelled buttons exist on websites and apps. There’s one fintech app where you don’t know what’s there when entering your password. Your screen reader can’t recognise if it’s an image or button.” Inadequate markups and semantics: “Developers don’t follow the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) promoting basic markups that make web content readable for screen readers, such as heading styles, paragraph tags, navigation tags.” Absence of keyboard navigation: “Nigerian websites don’t provide keyboard shortcuts like LinkedIn or Facebook. You have to keep scrolling to find message links or buttons.” Improper form labelling: “Many developers use placeholders instead of accessible labelling. Screen readers don’t read these aloud, so users don’t know what input is required.” Lack of user-defined experience: Unlike global websites offering text size or colour contrast adjustments, “I’ve never seen that on a Nigerian website,” Bayode said. These technical shortcomings create nightmares for users across Nigeria’s digital ecosystem. 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This exclusion represents a massive missed business opportunity. Globally, the disability market represents over $13 trillion in annual disposable income, yet Nigerian businesses potentially miss out on this market simply because tech developers and designers do not build with PWDs in mind. “If a website doesn’t build with persons with disabilities in mind, they’re losing customers double the size of some countries. Imagine collecting ₦1,000 from each PWD; we’re talking billions,” Bayode said. In the financial sector, for instance, accessibility is fragmented and inconsistent across platforms and devices. Users report vastly different experiences even with the same institution. And challenges span both large traditional banks and
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Roam’s Nairobi factory shows what’s hard about building electric bikes in Africa
About 10 kilometres from Nairobi’s central business district, inside the city’s industrial zone along Mombasa Road, Roam Park sits behind a modest gate. The 10,000-square-metre facility is the site of Roam’s unfolding electric motorcycle assembly facility. Around 20 to 30 Kenyan technicians and engineers are spread across different stations inside the facility, including warehousing, fabrication, welding, electronics, and testing. One locked room houses the battery diagnostics lab, and visitors aren’t allowed in. “That tech is internal,” says Habib Lukaya, Roam’s regional sales manager. The floor runs quietly but steadily, with whole bikes taking shape as the pieces move from station to station, built mostly by hand. Roam Electric’s new Nairobi facility. Image Source: TechCabal The plant is 36% complete, but assembles 12 to 15 electric bikes daily. Once fully up, it could produce up to 50,000 bikes a year, a serious claim by Lukaya. The Nairobi-based startup, known for its two-wheelers, is shifting from importing fully built units to putting together bikes locally, including some component integration. At the centre of that push are the Roam Air and its newer version, the Roam Air V2. “We’ve tried to improve what riders care about most, including speed and battery life, and load,” said Lukaya as he introduced the new electric motorcycles to some members of the press. Roam Air V2 now comes with two batteries, charges fully in 45 minutes, and can carry up to 240 kilograms. It has a range of 100 to 120 kilometres and a lighter frame. Each battery weighs about 20 kilos, lasts up to five years, and supports 800 to 1,200 full charge cycles. Riders own their batteries, which include trackers to monitor performance. While rivals like Ampersand and ARC Ride rely on battery swapping, Roam is sticking with a charging model. “We want riders to have full ownership of the battery,” said Lukaya. Roam uses open architecture, which allows other battery models to be charged at its facilities. The company is building out its charging network in Kenya and has partnered with Total Energies and supermarket retailer Quickmart to set up charging stations. Riders can use an app to find charging spots. Image Source: TechCabal How the Roam plant works The facility has distinct sections for warehousing, assembly, body work, fabrication, engineering, after-sales support, and a battery lab. Lukaya said bikes are built from components supplied by different international partners, as no single supplier provides more than one part. Roam imports batteries and motors from China. It takes about 30 minutes to assemble one bike on the main line. Once quality checks are completed, the bikes are ready for dispatch to customers. The facility also has a battery testing zone, and while visitors weren’t allowed to enter, Lukaya noted that this area is reserved for performance and charging tests, including Roam’s proprietary fast-charging technology, which remains confidential. Roam also runs a battery buyback programme, collecting used or degraded batteries at the end of their useful life. Typically, these batteries fall below 80% state-of-health, meaning they no longer hold charge as expected. The company says the battery recycling effort will scale at the end of 2025, once enough units have been in the field for at least three years. Image Source: TechCabal A look at the numbers The Roam Air costs $2,290 (about KES 297,000). With dual batteries, the cost rises slightly, up to around $2,500 depending on the version. Battery units account for 40 to 60% of the total bike cost. “The price is still the same for Roam Air V2 is the same as V1, with most parts still imported from China and India, but we are looking to localise more parts as time passes to ensure the price becomes affordable for the boda boda rider. Also, the next battery generation we are working on will be a bit cheaper,” a Roam representative told TechCabal. Charging one battery to full costs about KES 150 ($1). Most riders top up with KES 80 ($0.6) worth of power per day. Given that the average rider covers about 150 kilometres daily and earns KES 4,000–5,000, charging costs are a small but steady expense. Roam doesn’t offer direct credit sales, but partners with four major asset-financing firms: Watu Credit, M-KOPA, 4G Capital, and Mogo. For riders unable to pay upfront, each firm offers slightly different terms for financing the double-battery version of the Roam Air. Financing agreements can run for 12, 18, or 24 months. Customers also have the option to purchase a single-battery bike or just the battery alone, depending on what they can afford or already own. But even the most affordable options are still out of reach for many riders. A KES 25,000–35,000 ($194-232) deposit and daily fees north of KES 1,000 ($8) can be too much for those who already operate on thin margins. It’s not entirely clear how Roam expects this to scale among its core market of boda boda riders, most of whom live hand-to-mouth. 4G Capital is the most affordable financing option, while M-KOPA is the most expensive over the full term. The difference between the two extremes can be as much as KES 138,000 (around $1,060). Roam doesn’t control its financing partners’ pricing models, but it relies heavily on these partnerships to move units in a price-sensitive market. Where things stand Roam is trying to walk a thin line by building local capacity without fully domesticating its supply chain. The plant is still dependent on foreign components, especially for high-cost parts like batteries and motors. But local fabrication and bodywork are growing, and the engineering team is based on-site. Roam says that as the plant scales, the cost of production per unit should drop. But that depends on volume and whether local suppliers can enter the chain. Roam expects to complete the Nairobi facility by the end of 2025. When fully operational, the plant will produce tens of thousands of electric bikes yearly, most for the local market. The Roam Air V2 rollout will continue in stages, targeting riders
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How Releaf Earth is using biochar to repair soils for Nigerian farmers
Releaf Earth, a Nigerian climate-agritech startup, has launched the country’s first operational industrial biochar production facility in Iwuru, Cross River State, capable of removing carbon from the environment. Using palm kernel shells processed by its proprietary machine, Kraken, the plant converts the agricultural waste into biochar, a charcoal-like substance made from agricultural waste that helps soil hold nutrients to enhance crop growth. It also sequesters carbon, giving Nigeria a market opportunity in the global carbon removal economy. Carbon dioxide (CO₂) removal is crucial in combating global warming because it addresses the excess CO₂ already present in the atmosphere, which continues to trap heat and drive climate change. However, conservation and sustainable use of biomass have become a primary global strategy for reducing atmospheric carbon. Releaf’s biochar production emerged from its origins in food processing, where palm kernel shells are mostly treated as waste despite their economic value. The shells, due to their high carbon composition, are now being transformed into a valuable biochar, creating wins for farmers, the climate, and the economy. According to the company, its Iwuru facility will remove 40 kilotonnes of CO₂ from the environment by 2030, with plans for an additional 60 kilotonnes of CO₂ removal at other facilities. The company said the Kraken machine de-shells the palm nuts. While the kernels are used to produce ingredients such as vegetable oil, the leftover shells are fed into a pyrolyser. This thermal conversion system heats the biomass in the absence of oxygen, converting it into biochar. This process locks carbon in a stable form for centuries when the biochar is buried underground, preventing it from re-entering the atmosphere as CO₂. The process returns the removed atmospheric carbon to the land, supporting smallholder farmers by enhancing soil quality for improved crop yields and income, and creating new income streams through the commercialisation of carbon credits. “This innovative approach combines permanent carbon sequestration with regenerative agriculture, delivering tangible benefits to both the planet and the smallholder farmers at the heart of Africa’s food systems,” the company said. “In addition to its climate and agricultural benefits, the biochar production process generates its own renewable energy. This means Releaf Earth’s biochar units can operate with minimal reliance on external power sources, making them ideal for deployment in off-grid rural areas.” To tap into the market for both agricultural inputs and climate finance, Ikenna Nzewi, CEO of Releaf Earth, expressed that the company has partnered with Thrive Agric, an agribusiness that works with over 500,000 farmers across Nigeria, and has already begun distributing and applying biochar among smallholder farmers, while also storing and tracking it daily as part of a growing initiative. “Biochar serves as both a physical product that enhances soil productivity and as a carbon removal mechanism that generates high-value carbon credits, which are digital assets,” he said. “ So, we’ve already started sequestering carbon for thousands of years, which is really exciting.” To bring transparency to the emerging value chain, Nzewi told TechCabal that the company has built geospatial software tools to visualise its entire supply chain, from sourcing palm kernel shells to storing biochar. These tools provide real-time traceability for carbon credit buyers, such as Microsoft and other major tech firms, who can now see where the carbon is stored, complete with images and GPS data, making their carbon removal operations fully auditable. While transparency is necessary to attract global buyers of carbon credits, he said the company is using Riverse, a carbon credit verification platform, to provide real-time tracking and verification of its removed carbon. “They essentially review our factory, the raw material that we are using, and basically do an analysis for every ton of palm kernel shell that we put in our machine to make biochar, how many tons of carbon does that remove?” He revealed that while the company is a biochar industry pioneer in the country, it is targeting two distinct revenue streams, the sale of biochar, which is potentially priced between $400 to $600 per ton, and carbon removal credits, which fetch $150 to $200 per ton of CO₂ equivalent removed. According to industry data by Sylvera, biochar projects accounted for over 90% of all issued carbon credits from removal projects. However, Africa remains underrepresented in the carbon credit market, despite its abundance of biomass that could help it remove large amounts of carbon through biochar. Nwezi stated that while Africa produces more than a billion tons of biomass annually, biochar gives the continent the unique opportunity to lead the global climate goals, which requires that “carbon removal must scale 14,000-fold to reach 10 billion tons annually in the next 25 years. [And] the need to feed its growing population means this output is bound to increase.” Mark your calendars! Moonshot by TechCabal is back in Lagos on October 15–16! Join Africa’s top founders, creatives & tech leaders for 2 days of keynotes, mixers & future-forward ideas. Early bird tickets now 20% off—don’t snooze! moonshot.techcabal.com.
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How do banks and fintechs determine your credit worthiness?
By March 2025, Mubarak Umar had spent a year and a half working as a supplier agent for Sun King, a solar company in Ibadan, western Nigeria, earning about ₦200,000 ($126) monthly, paid directly into his GTBank account. Earlier in the year, he conceived the idea to open an electronics store and believed his consistent income and banking history would qualify him for a sizable loan from his bank. But when he applied, he found he could borrow no more than ₦120,000, far below the ₦2 million he wanted. He turned to PalmPay and Opay for a quick loan, the fintech apps he often borrowed from, but was also offered modest amounts of ₦23,000 and ₦8,000, respectively. “It surprised me that [the] bank I have been using for over ten years couldn’t offer me such an amount, not even half of it,” Umar said. “The mobile apps too have never lent me more than ₦35,000, although I use them for daily major transactions. It is like we are the only ones that trust them; they don’t trust us.” Every day, many Nigerians like Umar seek loans from banks or tap their smartphones to apply for quick loans from digital lenders. Unbeknownst to the loan seekers, the decision on how much they can borrow isn’t always entirely made by humans. Lenders are increasingly employing tech systems that use customers’ data to calculate their credit score and determine how much they can afford to borrow. The technology that decides a customer’s borrowing power depends on whether they borrow from a traditional bank or a loan app. While the former rely on systems that assess structured-income verification and credit history for loan limits, the latter explore digital footprint and mobile phone data with algorithms that scan through a customer’s smartphone analysing app usage and accessing contact lists. Traditional banks in Nigeria mainly give loans to corporate clients, salary earners who have at least one year of salary history, or are employed by companies affiliated with the bank, according to a bank staff. This practice often excludes micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs), as well as informal sector workers, who may not meet these criteria. TechCabal’s analysis of the 2023 annual reports of Nigeria’s leading banks—FirstBank, UBA, GTBank, Access Bank, and Zenith Bank—shows a strong preference for corporate lending over retail or individual lending. In 2023, FirstBank allocated 94% of its ₦6.6 trillion loan portfolio to corporate borrowers, giving just 6% to individuals and small businesses. UBA followed a similar pattern, giving 70% of its ₦5.5 trillion loan book to corporates. Access Bank’s 2023 audited financials show that it committed 88% of its ₦8 trillion loans to corporate clients, with only 12% going to retail borrowers. GTBank’s loan portfolio was 69.4% corporate and 24.1% retail. Abdulhakeem Abdulmajeed, a product manager at The Alternative Bank, said traditional banks remain cautious in lending to the broader population due to the inherent risks in credit recovery. “Banks are deposit collectors, not investment funds, so they must be extremely careful with where they put these funds to ensure depositors can access their money at any time,” he said. He added that banks avoid high-risk individuals and sectors likely to default on loan repayment to protect their liquidity and maintain regulatory standards. Unlike fintechs that cushion loan defaults with high interest rates, “banks must keep default rates below 5%; that makes them more selective with who gets access to their credit,” Abdulmajeed said. For eligible customers, banks use rule-based credit scoring systems that evaluate customers’ turnover, and use the Central Bank of Nigeria’s (CBN) credit check software to scrutinise the customer’s account for past credit with their BVN. “The customer must have an account with the bank, and we look at their account turnover of the amounts coming in and going out from their account each month. We also do a credit check to see if the customer has a history of default,” said Obayemi Gbenga, a loan desk officer at Keystone Bank. The average of a customer’s turnover and credit history rating determine the loan limit the customer could borrow. The lower the credit score is, the higher the risk of the customer defaulting on the repayment, and vice versa. According to CreditRegistry, a credit bureau licensed by the CBN, credit scores range from 300 to 900, with scores above 700 considered good and those below 500 regarded as poor. Gbenga stated that a customer’s monthly turnover is expected to be at least twice the amount he intends to borrow, as this indicates their repayment capacity. He explained that if the turnover with the bank falls short, the loan desk uses a system to check the customer’s accounts in other banks and fintech platforms to assess their overall financial activity. “Everybody has only one BVN; inputting the customer’s BVN on the [credit check] software will bring all past credit history across all banks, including digital lending apps,” Gbenga said. “But for a business or company, the system uses the Corporate Affairs Commission’s registration number to access the company’s borrowing history, while using the BVN for the personal credit history of the owner of the business or company.” Digital lenders rely on tech-driven data to offer loans Unlike traditional banks that largely restrict loans to customers with salary income and formal credit histories, fintechs like PalmPay, OPay, FairMoney, and other digital lenders use behaviour-based algorithms and smartphone data to assess creditworthiness. The lender uses algorithmic credit scoring systems powered by machine learning, which collect customer’s data—SMS alerts, contacts, apps usage, device information, and location—accessed with the customer’s permission, which they consent to while agreeing to the app terms during signup. Some lenders also use apps that require customers’ BVN or request access to bank statements through APIs to provide more formal financial insights. The data determines the credit limit, sets the interest rate, and defines repayment schedules. Despite digital lending offering collateral-free loans, zero paperwork, and approval within minutes, it often comes with very high interest rates. These
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MTN Uganda to spin off mobile money unit into a standalone fintech
MTN Uganda has announced plans to spin off its mobile money business into a standalone fintech company, ending its status as a subsidiary of the telecoms group in a strategic shift aimed at unlocking more value from the fast-growing payments business. The proposed restructuring will transfer MTN Mobile Money Uganda to a new entity owned by MTN Group Fintech Holdings B.V. and a trust acting on behalf of the minority shareholders of MTN. MTN Uganda said the transaction is still subject to regulatory and MTN shareholders’ approvals. Shareholders are expected to vote on the transaction at an extraordinary general meeting on July 2. “The proposed transaction will, if approved, will result in MTN MoMo ceasing to be a subsidiary of MTN,” MTN Uganda said in a notice on Tuesday. “The mobile money and financial technology business currently run by MTN MoMo will be operated by a new company following a company amalgamation.” MTN Uganda’s restructuring will not affect its listing on the Uganda Securities Exchange, where it remains one of the bourse’s most actively traded stocks since its 2021 IPO. The transaction is part of MTN Group’s strategy to separate its high-growth financial services business from its telecom operations. The Johannesburg-listed company is betting on fintech as a long-term growth driver, with mobile money already outpacing traditional telecoms revenues in key markets like Uganda. While it’s unclear whether the new company would seek outside capital or partnerships, the reorganisation will allow the two businesses to pursue their growth in the East African market independently. Mobile money services have become a critical part of the telecom business in Africa, particularly as smartphone penetration and digital payments uptake continue to grow. MTN’s move mirrors Airtel Africa’s plan to list its mobile money unit, Airtel Money, in the first half of 2026 as it seeks to capitalise on the growing demand for digital payment services across the continent. MTN’s MoMo enjoys a larger footprint across West and Central Africa with an estimated 14 million active subscribers in Uganda. In Q1 2025, its mobile money services grew 18.4% to $70.8 million (Ush 255.6 billion). Mark your calendars! Moonshot by TechCabal is back in Lagos on October 15–16! Join Africa’s top founders, creatives & tech leaders for 2 days of keynotes, mixers & future-forward ideas. Early bird tickets now 20% off—don’t snooze! moonshot.techcabal.com.
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👨🏿🚀TechCabal Daily – Silverbacks 5x cashout
In partnership with Lire en Français اقرأ هذا باللغة العربية Happy mid-week! If you’re often missing TC Daily in your inbox, check your Promotions folder and move any edition of TC Daily from “Promotions” to your “Main” or “Primary” folder and TC Daily will always come to you. Let’s get into it. Silverbacks Holdings earns 5x return on partial exit from OmniRetail South Africa’s largest Starlink kit distributor, IcasaSePush, shuts down Telkom records 10% surge in mobile service revenue Kenya’s Mobius Motors to resume assembling cars in December World Wide Web 3 Opportunities Venture Capital Silverbacks Holdings earns 5x return on partial exit from OmniRetail What is cashout again? A 5X return!/Image Source: Nollywood Memes Silverbacks Holdings is doing more than just putting money into Africa; they’re reaping massive returns. Their latest triumph? A partial exit from OmniRetail, a Nigerian B2B e-commerce startup, where they landed a 5x return on their initial investment. The exit follows OmniRetail’s recent $20 million Series A raise. Luck or pattern? This recent partial exit marks Silverbacks’ ninth profitable exit, consistently proving that Africa is a goldmine for investments. Its partial exit from OmniRetail comes one month after securing a 29x return from its LemFi exit, after the startup closed its $53 million Series B round in January 2025. Silverbacks’ African portfolio consistently outperforms other regions, yielding an average 10.7x multiple on invested capital (MOIC) and an 81.5% internal rate of return (IRR) in Nigeria over two years and eight months. In Egypt, the company averaged a 9.7x MOIC and a 339% IRR over 1 year and 7 months. For the curious (and confused): Multiple on invested capital (MOIC) is a measure of how many times an investment has been returned, while internal rate of return (IRR) is the annual return on investment a company has earned, factoring in the exact timing of every cash-in and cash-out. This partial exit from OmniRetail is a calculated move by Silverbacks Holdings. By selling a portion of its stake, Silverbacks de-risks its investment while retaining exposure to OmniRetail’s continued growth. This strategy allows Silverbacks Holdings to generate immediate liquidity for its fund and then use this capital to invest in new, promising ventures across Africa, like its co-investment in the South African basketball team, Cape Town Tigers, with the OmniRetail founder. What startup will Silverbacks fund next? Africa is watching. Fincra – The Easiest Way to Move Money in and out of Africa. Empower your business to effortlessly collect payments and make payouts across Africa with Fincra. Their payment solutions equip fintechs, marketplaces, global merchants, & more with unmatched speed and security. Create your account in 3 minutes. Get the best African tech newsletters in your inbox Country Afghanistan Albania Algeria American Samoa Andorra Angola Anguilla Antarctica Antigua and Barbuda Argentina Armenia Aruba Australia Austria Azerbaijan Bahamas Bahrain Bangladesh Barbados Belarus Belgium Belize Benin Bermuda Bhutan Bolivia Bosnia and Herzegovina Botswana Bouvet Island Brazil British Antarctic Territory British Indian Ocean Territory British Virgin Islands Brunei Bulgaria Burkina Faso Burundi Cambodia Cameroon Canada Canton and Enderbury Islands Cape Verde Cayman Islands Central African Republic Chad Chile China Christmas Island Cocos [Keeling] Islands Colombia Comoros Congo – Brazzaville Congo – Kinshasa Cook Islands Costa Rica Croatia Cuba Cyprus Czech Republic Côte d’Ivoire Denmark Djibouti Dominica Dominican Republic Dronning Maud Land East Germany Ecuador Egypt El Salvador Equatorial Guinea Eritrea Estonia Ethiopia Falkland Islands Faroe Islands Fiji Finland France French Guiana French Polynesia French Southern Territories French Southern and Antarctic Territories Gabon Gambia Georgia Germany Ghana Gibraltar Greece Greenland Grenada Guadeloupe Guam Guatemala Guernsey Guinea Guinea-Bissau Guyana Haiti Heard Island and McDonald Islands Honduras Hong Kong SAR China Hungary Iceland India Indonesia Iran Iraq Ireland Isle of Man Israel Italy Jamaica Japan Jersey Johnston Island Jordan Kazakhstan Kenya Kiribati Kuwait Kyrgyzstan Laos Latvia Lebanon Lesotho Liberia Libya Liechtenstein Lithuania Luxembourg Macau SAR China Macedonia Madagascar Malawi Malaysia Maldives Mali Malta Marshall Islands Martinique Mauritania Mauritius Mayotte Metropolitan France Mexico Micronesia Midway Islands Moldova Monaco Mongolia Montenegro Montserrat Morocco Mozambique Myanmar [Burma] Namibia Nauru Nepal Netherlands Netherlands Antilles Neutral Zone New Caledonia New Zealand Nicaragua Niger Nigeria Niue Norfolk Island North Korea North Vietnam Northern Mariana Islands Norway Oman Pacific Islands Trust Territory Pakistan Palau Palestinian Territories Panama Panama Canal Zone Papua New Guinea Paraguay People’s Democratic Republic of Yemen Peru Philippines Pitcairn Islands Poland Portugal Puerto Rico Qatar Romania Russia Rwanda Réunion Saint Barthélemy Saint Helena Saint Kitts and Nevis Saint Lucia Saint Martin Saint Pierre and Miquelon Saint Vincent and the Grenadines Samoa San Marino Saudi Arabia Senegal Serbia Serbia and Montenegro Seychelles Sierra Leone Singapore Slovakia Slovenia Solomon Islands Somalia South Africa South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands South Korea Spain Sri Lanka Sudan Suriname Svalbard and Jan Mayen Swaziland Sweden Switzerland Syria São Tomé and Príncipe Taiwan Tajikistan Tanzania Thailand Timor-Leste Togo Tokelau Tonga Trinidad and Tobago Tunisia Turkey Turkmenistan Turks and Caicos Islands Tuvalu U.S. Minor Outlying Islands U.S. Miscellaneous Pacific Islands U.S. Virgin Islands Uganda Ukraine Union of Soviet Socialist Republics United Arab Emirates United Kingdom United States Unknown or Invalid Region Uruguay Uzbekistan Vanuatu Vatican City Venezuela Vietnam Wake Island Wallis and Futuna Western Sahara Yemen Zambia Zimbabwe Åland Islands ?> Gender Male Female Others TC Daily Events TC Scoop <!– Next Wave –> <!– Entering Tech –> Subscribe Internet South Africa’s largest Starlink kit distributor, IcasaSePush, shuts down Image Source: Tenor South Africa’s biggest Starlink kit distributor, IcasaSePush, has shut down, citing growing backlash and pressure from regulators. The company, which helped rural and remote communities get online, says it is stepping back to avoid disrupting efforts to bring Starlink into the country legally. Its closure comes just as Starlink finally pulled the plug on roaming in South Africa. No more backdoor access, no more clever workarounds. Until an official launch happens, Starlink is off the table. While IcasaSePush claims that it is not directly affiliated with Starlink or SpaceX, for months, it has imported and sold hardware of the satellite internet
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Why telcos will now deduct USSD charges from your airtime
Starting later this June, a new guideline proposed by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) will charge mobile airtime balances instead of customers’ bank accounts for Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD) sessions. This change marks the latest development in a years-long standoff between telecom operators and banks over who should bear the cost of USSD transactions—a dispute that has left over ₦160 billion ($106.67 million) in unpaid fees hanging in the balance. The new billing model, first hinted at in a June 3, 2025, customer notice issued by Sterling Bank and United Bank for Africa (UBA), states that each USSD session will cost ₦6.98 per 120 seconds. Telecom operators will deduct this amount directly from the subscriber’s airtime, but only after the user consents and the bank confirms it is ready to deliver the requested service. The NCC has yet to release a full public statement on the policy, but sources familiar with the ongoing discussions confirm that final implementation details are being worked out between banks and telcos, and implementation is likely to kick off before the end of June. While the commission declined to comment on this story, an NCC official said the commission was preparing a detailed position on the new rules. A long-running dispute, finally addressed The new model is intended to break the cycle of payment disputes that have plagued USSD services since their inception. Initially, telecom operators provided USSD infrastructure to banks, who in turn billed customers and were expected to settle service charges with the telcos. However, there was no clearly defined revenue-sharing model, and as user adoption soared, so too did the debt owed by banks to telcos. In 2019, MTN Nigeria attempted to shift the cost to subscribers directly by introducing an end-user billing model. The move was quickly halted by the NCC and the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), which argued that USSD was a “sunk cost” and not meant to be charged to end users. The NCC later adopted a corporate billing model in 2020, instructing banks to bear the service costs while collecting transaction fees from customers separately. Despite efforts to standardise USSD billing, disputes between banks and telecom operators persisted. In 2021, a flat fee of ₦6.98 per USSD session was introduced, with banks expected to collect this fee from customers and remit it to telecoms. However, compliance remained weak. Over time, unpaid fees accumulated significantly, and before regulatory intervention, telecom operators claimed that banks owed them around ₦250 billion for USSD services. In response, the CBN and the NCC directed banks to settle ₦212.5 billion, representing 85% of the total debt, by the end of 2024. The debt had steadily grown over several years due to delayed payments and unresolved billing models. By early 2025, MTN reported it had recovered ₦32 billion but still had ₦42 billion outstanding. What changes with direct airtime billing? The NCC’s directive effectively returns to end-user billing, but with safeguards in place. Instead of silently passing fees through bank channels, users will now be required to authorise each transaction. Once consent is given, the ₦6.98 fee will be deducted from their airtime balance, giving telecoms full control over fee collection. For telecom operators, the shift to direct airtime billing represents a long-overdue resolution, offering multiple operational advantages. It eliminates the need to pursue banks for settlements, reducing bad debt as payments are collected instantly at the point of transaction. Additionally, it gives telcos full oversight of USSD billing and revenue tracking, while also streamlining operations by removing the legal and administrative burden of dealing with unpaid debts from banks. What does it mean for customers? For subscribers, the most immediate impact of the new USSD billing model is the requirement to have sufficient airtime before initiating any transaction. This marks a shift from the previous system, where charges were deducted directly from bank accounts, and it may prove inconvenient for users who are not in the habit of topping up mobile credit. For those accustomed to seamless banking without the need to manage airtime balances, this could disrupt routine financial transactions. However, the model introduces certain benefits that could enhance the overall user experience. One key improvement is the introduction of a consent prompt before any charge is applied. This ensures that users are fully aware of and agree to the charges, fostering greater transparency and trust in how USSD services are billed. The standardised pricing—₦6.98 per 120 seconds per session—provides predictability. With clear and consistent costs, users can better plan for and manage their mobile banking expenses, which may, in turn, encourage more frequent use, especially in areas with limited access to internet-based banking options. USSD remains a vital channel for financial access in Nigeria, particularly in rural and underserved areas where mobile apps and internet connectivity are less prevalent. By simplifying the cost structure and improving reliability, the new model may enhance confidence in USSD banking and preserve its utility as a financial inclusion tool. While the NCC’s new rules resolve one of the telecom sector’s longest-running disputes, some questions remain. Will subscribers push back against airtime billing? How will banks adapt to a diminished role in the USSD transaction chain? And can this model be sustained in a market already grappling with rising costs and inflation? In the short term, telcos like MTN and Airtel stand to benefit from improved revenue collection and a stronger grip on service delivery. In the long term, however, the policy’s success will depend on user experience, public education, and the ability of stakeholders to maintain service affordability. Mark your calendars! Moonshot by TechCabal is back in Lagos on October 15–16! Join Africa’s top founders, creatives & tech leaders for 2 days of keynotes, mixers & future-forward ideas. Early bird tickets now 20% off—don’t snooze! moonshot.techcabal.com.
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The Backend: Why your refunds take forever and how Recital is fixing it
For most Nigerians, the moment a bank transfer goes awry—money deducted, but no value received—the ordeal begins: emails to customer service, hours on hold, and the gnawing uncertainty of when, or if, the funds will be returned. The real culprit isn’t always the bank’s unwillingness to help, but the labyrinth of fragmented financial data they must wade through to resolve the problem. Behind the scenes, a bank employee scrambles through spreadsheets and scans through logs and dashboards from payment processors like Paystack and Flutterwave to trace your money. Recital, a Lagos-based startup, aims to streamline and automate the reconciliation process, reducing the time, cost, and errors involved in resolving failed bank transfers for businesses and customers alike. “People think digital payments are instant, but for businesses, making sense of where the money actually is can be ten times more complicated,” says Bobola Ojo-Ami, co-founder of Recital. “Every payment a business receives is just the start of a long, messy reconciliation process.” Ojo-Ami’s frustration is personal. Recently, an attempt to top up data on his Airtel router went sideways: “₦30,000 gone, no data, and three emails later, I’m still waiting,” he says. “For Airtel, finding my payment means digging through different systems, matching receipts, and hoping nothing slipped through the cracks.” The problem, he explains, is universal. Most African businesses collect payments from a dizzying array of sources—bank transfers, cards, mobile money, payment processors like Paystack and Flutterwave, each with its data format and reporting quirks. The result is a daily grind of downloading statements, wrangling spreadsheets, and manually matching transactions. “Financial systems don’t speak the same language,” said Recital’s co-founder, Cleopatra Douglas. “Teams are forced to become detectives, piecing together what should be a simple story.” Douglas, an ex-Flutterwave engineer, and Ojo-Ami, a financial strategist, are building Recital to centralise financial data across banks, payment processors, and accounting systems. They want to automate the back office so that operational headaches like reconciliation, chargebacks, and cash management become invisible to the end user. “We’re not just solving a finance problem,” Douglas says. “It’s an operations problem that cuts across finance, customer delivery, and even engineering.” Get the best African tech newsletters in your inbox Country Afghanistan Albania Algeria American Samoa Andorra Angola Anguilla Antarctica Antigua and Barbuda Argentina Armenia Aruba Australia Austria Azerbaijan Bahamas Bahrain Bangladesh Barbados Belarus Belgium Belize Benin Bermuda Bhutan Bolivia Bosnia and Herzegovina Botswana Bouvet Island Brazil British Antarctic Territory British Indian Ocean Territory British Virgin Islands Brunei Bulgaria Burkina Faso Burundi Cambodia Cameroon Canada Canton and Enderbury Islands Cape Verde Cayman Islands Central African Republic Chad Chile China Christmas Island Cocos [Keeling] Islands Colombia Comoros Congo – Brazzaville Congo – Kinshasa Cook Islands Costa Rica Croatia Cuba Cyprus Czech Republic Côte d’Ivoire Denmark Djibouti Dominica Dominican Republic Dronning Maud Land East Germany Ecuador Egypt El Salvador Equatorial Guinea Eritrea Estonia Ethiopia Falkland Islands Faroe Islands Fiji Finland France French Guiana French Polynesia French Southern Territories French Southern and Antarctic Territories Gabon Gambia Georgia Germany Ghana Gibraltar Greece Greenland Grenada Guadeloupe Guam Guatemala Guernsey Guinea Guinea-Bissau Guyana Haiti Heard Island and McDonald Islands Honduras Hong Kong SAR China Hungary Iceland India Indonesia Iran Iraq Ireland Isle of Man Israel Italy Jamaica Japan Jersey Johnston Island Jordan Kazakhstan Kenya Kiribati Kuwait Kyrgyzstan Laos Latvia Lebanon Lesotho Liberia Libya Liechtenstein Lithuania Luxembourg Macau SAR China Macedonia Madagascar Malawi Malaysia Maldives Mali Malta Marshall Islands Martinique Mauritania Mauritius Mayotte Metropolitan France Mexico Micronesia Midway Islands Moldova Monaco Mongolia Montenegro Montserrat Morocco Mozambique Myanmar [Burma] Namibia Nauru Nepal Netherlands Netherlands Antilles Neutral Zone New Caledonia New Zealand Nicaragua Niger Nigeria Niue Norfolk Island North Korea North Vietnam Northern Mariana Islands Norway Oman Pacific Islands Trust Territory Pakistan Palau Palestinian Territories Panama Panama Canal Zone Papua New Guinea Paraguay People’s Democratic Republic of Yemen Peru Philippines Pitcairn Islands Poland Portugal Puerto Rico Qatar Romania Russia Rwanda Réunion Saint Barthélemy Saint Helena Saint Kitts and Nevis Saint Lucia Saint Martin Saint Pierre and Miquelon Saint Vincent and the Grenadines Samoa San Marino Saudi Arabia Senegal Serbia Serbia and Montenegro Seychelles Sierra Leone Singapore Slovakia Slovenia Solomon Islands Somalia South Africa South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands South Korea Spain Sri Lanka Sudan Suriname Svalbard and Jan Mayen Swaziland Sweden Switzerland Syria São Tomé and Príncipe Taiwan Tajikistan Tanzania Thailand Timor-Leste Togo Tokelau Tonga Trinidad and Tobago Tunisia Turkey Turkmenistan Turks and Caicos Islands Tuvalu U.S. Minor Outlying Islands U.S. Miscellaneous Pacific Islands U.S. Virgin Islands Uganda Ukraine Union of Soviet Socialist Republics United Arab Emirates United Kingdom United States Unknown or Invalid Region Uruguay Uzbekistan Vanuatu Vatican City Venezuela Vietnam Wake Island Wallis and Futuna Western Sahara Yemen Zambia Zimbabwe Åland Islands ?> Gender Male Female Others TC Daily Events TC Scoop <!– Next Wave –> <!– Entering Tech –> Subscribe How does Recital work? Recital’s answer is a cloud-based platform that ingests financial data from any source, normalises it, and creates a unified view of every transaction. “We built a flow where you can bring in your payment or financial data from anywhere—banks, PSPs, accounting software—and it all becomes one object in our system,” Douglas explains. At the heart of Recital is its automated reconciliation engine. For a typical business, reconciling payments means comparing internal records with statements from multiple banks and payment providers, often across several currencies. Recital’s system automates this three-way reconciliation, instantly flagging mismatches and missing funds. “We’re able to check reconciliation against up to three sources at once,” Douglas says. “What used to take hours or days now happens in minutes, with a 93% reduction in operational time.” The platform’s AI doesn’t just match transactions; it learns from the messy, real-world data unique to African markets, parsing cryptic references and inconsistent formats that global competitors often miss. Another pain point Recital tackles is chargebacks: the forced refunds that occur when customers dispute transactions with their bank. “Responding to a chargeback is like assembling a legal case,” Douglas says. “You need to pull together evidence from chats,
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South Africa’s Telkom mobile service revenue grew by 10% driven by strong subscriber base
Telkom, South Africa’s third-largest mobile operator, reported a 10.2% increase in mobile service revenue, a major driver of its 3.3% group revenue increase for the financial year ended on March 31 2025. The telecom says this growth was fueled by strong subscriber expansion, with 13.4%, nearly three million new mobile users joining its network, bringing its total customer base to 23.2 million. The surge was driven largely by prepaid customers, who grew by 15.4%. “The mobile business continues to be the star of the consumer business,” said Telkom Group CEO Serame Taukobong. “This was driven by strong subscriber growth coinciding with maintaining ARPU (average revenue per user) at R60 (over $3), said Taukobong. The financial results show that a push to enhance mobile data services also led to a 19.5% increase in mobile data subscribers, totalling 15.2 million, as demand for affordable, high-speed connectivity surged nationwide. Telkom optimised its pricing models, attracting more users in non-metro regions, where demand for affordable connectivity is growing. Telkom’s wholesale arm, Openserve is playing a pivotal role in cross-border infrastructure integration. Through partnerships with global players like Google, Openserve is expanding terrestrial and undersea cable routes that reach deeper into Southern Africa. A new international point of presence linking South Africa to Angola and Brazil is underway, part of a larger effort to diversify and secure African connectivity pathways against disruptions. Fibre-related data revenue grew by 10%, with fibre-based services which has been growing over the years and now constituting 82% of Openserve’s total revenue. Telkom’s fibre connectivity footprint grew by 13.3%, passing nearly 1.4 million homes—a model that could be replicated in emerging urban centres across the continent through strategic partnerships. Telcom says it is investing heavily in 4G/5G infrastructure and edge data capabilities to power next-generation “Everything-as-a-Service” (XaaS) models—customisable digital solutions for African enterprises and governments. Mark your calendars! Moonshot by TechCabal is back in Lagos on October 15–16! Join Africa’s top founders, creatives & tech leaders for 2 days of keynotes, mixers & future-forward ideas. Early bird tickets now 20% off—don’t snooze! moonshot.techcabal.com.
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Inside Itana, Nigeria’s first digital free zone
Itana, Nigeria’s—and Africa’s—first fully digital free zone, located in Alaro City within Lagos State’s Lekki Free Zone corridor, is reimagining the concept of special economic zones by shifting the focus from manufacturing to services, technology, and innovation. At its core, Itana is a response to the urgent need to modernise how Nigeria and Africa enable business growth in a global digital economy. Traditional free zones across the continent have long revolved around industrial production and export-oriented manufacturing. But, as Adetayo Oduwole, Director of Business and Compliance at Itana, explains, that model left out an increasingly dominant part of the economy: services. “We’ve left the service sector underexplored for too long,” he said in an interview with TechCabal. “With the way the world is going, powered by technology, Africa must tap into trade in services or risk falling further behind.” That realisation drove Itana’s founding vision: to create a digital-first jurisdiction where companies can remotely incorporate, scale, and serve global markets without being bound by Nigeria’s historically rigid regulatory infrastructure. Inspired by models like Delaware in the U.S. and Dubai’s Internet City, Itana functions as a special administrative enclave tailored for digital businesses. It leverages Nigeria’s existing 30-year-old free zone regulations to avoid the bureaucratic delays of reinventing legislation. The zone allows startups to register with a $2,000 incorporation fee and a yearly $1,150 renewal, including access to an official address for mailing, document processing, and collaborative activities. “We’ve streamlined everything,” Oduwole says. “From incorporation to regulation, the process is digital and global from day one. You can set up from Nairobi, London, or Yaba.” But beyond paperwork, Itana is also anchored in place. Its first district, a 72,000-square-meter mixed-use area in Alaro City, is already under construction with backing from the Africa Finance Corporation (AFC), which committed $100 million to phase one. The zone offers 24/7 power from gas-fired plants, piped gas, dual fiber-optic internet, clean water, and efficient city management. Oduwole calls it a “live-work-play” environment, with startup campuses, co-living spaces, outdoor work areas, and even biking trails to foster community and productivity. Crucially, Itana isn’t just infrastructure but also policy innovation. It’s also the first free zone in Nigeria to prioritise regulatory support for the digital economy. The project partners with Future Africa, an early-stage venture capital firm founded by Iyinoluwa Aboyeji, co-founder of Flutterwave, to fund and accelerate early-stage startups. The resulting ecosystem brings founders, regulators, policy advocates, and potential customers under one roof. This multi-stakeholder approach is especially important for Nigeria’s growing tech sector, which often struggles with inconsistent regulation, complex taxation, and a lack of infrastructure. With more than 60% of Africa-bound venture capital flowing to Nigeria while only a fraction of startups scale beyond local boundaries, Itana is positioning itself as a bridge between local talent and global opportunity. From brain drain to talent export One of the most forward-looking aspects of Itana is its alignment with the African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA). By enabling Nigerian-registered service providers to deliver products across Africa without relocating their operations, Itana taps into a huge opportunity: a unified market of over a billion people. “Scaling across Africa is hard,” Oduwole says. “Different countries, different rules. We’ve built a framework that lets you offer services across the continent while remaining rooted in Nigeria.” Talent is central to this plan. Through partnerships with Nigeria’s Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment and the National Talent Export Programme (NATEP), Itana is helping to match trained Nigerian professionals with global employers. The goal: create 100,000 jobs in the next five years and establish Nigeria as a leader in cross-border service delivery, including business process outsourcing (BPO), software development, and digital design. “This isn’t about brain drain,” Oduwole said. “It’s about talent export—keeping Nigerians here while connecting them to global markets.” The platform also addresses some of the structural issues plaguing Africa’s labour markets: job fraud, poor job matching, and inadequate training. By working with multiple education and training providers, Itana is not only placing talent, but it’s helping develop it. “We’re focused on making sure that when companies come into Itana, there’s a ready pipeline of skilled, credible talent,” says Oduwole. “And we want to do that with integrity.” While it is still early days, Itana is starting to see some results. Despite broader narratives of companies exiting Nigeria, Oduwole says Itana has seen strong interest from both local and foreign firms, including African startups looking to expand, foreign investors exploring new markets, and Nigerian companies seeking easier ways to scale. “You’d be surprised how many foreign companies are coming to us asking if they can find talent, if they can scale here,” he says. “It’s a total shift in mindset.” What sets Itana apart is not just its infrastructure or regulatory model, but its ecosystem-building philosophy. Rather than replicate itself across Nigeria, Itana’s goal is to build a working prototype—an African Delaware—that others can learn from. “We don’t need Delawares all over Nigeria,” Oduwole says. “We need one good model, tested and optimised, that others can build on in their own way.” With Africa’s youth population projected to double by 2050 and global demand for digital services skyrocketing, Itana’s timing is critical. As the world races to digitise, Nigeria now has an opportunity to lead, not by copying others, but by designing something that works for its unique context. “Itana is not just a zone. It’s a signal,” Oduwole said. “That Nigeria is open for digital business, and this time, we’re not playing catch-up. We’re setting the pace.” Mark your calendars! Moonshot by TechCabal is back in Lagos on October 15–16! Join Africa’s top founders, creatives & tech leaders for 2 days of keynotes, mixers & future-forward ideas. Early bird tickets now 20% off—don’t snooze! moonshot.techcabal.com.
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