iOS 26 Unveiled at WWDC 2025: Key highlights and announcements
Table of contents Major announcements iOS 26 macOS 26 “Tahoe” iPadOS 26 watchOS 26 tvOS 26 visionOS 26 Developer tools and frameworks Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference 2025 (WWDC25) ran from June 9 to 13 at Apple Park in Cupertino, with CEO Tim Cook kicking off the keynote. This year, the spotlight was on software. Apple introduced significant updates to its operating systems and new tools for developers, without announcing any new hardware. The biggest reveal was Liquid Glass, a fresh design style rolling out across iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, Apple TV, and Vision Pro. Apple also shifted to year-based version names; you’ll now see iOS 26, macOS 26, and so on, making it easier to know you’re on the latest version. Another key theme? Apple Intelligence, a suite of AI-powered features built right into your devices, with a strong focus on privacy. Major announcements 1. Liquid glass: A new look across devices Apple is giving its entire family of devices a makeover with Liquid Glass. The new interface features glossy icons, soft rounded corners, and translucent backgrounds that reflect your surroundings. It’s the first time Apple has rolled out a single design style across all its platforms, and the most significant visual refresh since iOS 7. 2. Year-based version names Image source: Marques Brownlee on X (formerly Twitter) Goodbye to version numbers like iOS 17 or macOS Ventura. From now on, Apple will align all its operating systems by year. The current updates are called iOS 26, macOS 26, watchOS 26, iPadOS 26, tvOS 26, and visionOS 26, and they’ll remain the main versions through 2026. This makes it easier for you to know if your devices are up to date. 3. Apple intelligence: Smarter features built in Apple introduced Apple Intelligence, its new name for the AI features now woven into your devices. These include: Live translation: Translate calls and messages in real time, with all processing done right on your device to keep your conversations private. Visual intelligence: Recognise what’s on your screen and interact with it. For example, you can tap on an image and ask questions using ChatGPT. Creative tools: Play with Genmoji (custom emoji you can generate with text prompts) and Image Playground to create images inside your favourite Apple apps. Apple emphasised that these AI features run directly on your device, with no cloud required, so your data remains yours. Developers can also use a new Foundation Models API to bring these AI capabilities into their apps. 4. Developer tools & SDKs Developers got a big boost this year with the release of Xcode 26. It now includes built-in coding help powered by AI (with ChatGPT support baked in). This can help developers write, test, and document their apps faster. Apple also introduced: The Foundation Models framework to let apps tap into Apple’s on-device AI. Metal 4, a new graphics engine that pushes gaming performance on Apple Silicon Macs to new heights. An Icon Composer tool that makes it easy to create app icons that match the new Liquid Glass style. 5. No new hardware, but more innovative use of existing devices Unlike some past WWDC keynotes, this year’s event didn’t include new hardware launches. Apple’s newest Macs with M4 chips were mentioned but had already been introduced at earlier events. Instead, the focus was on making better use of existing hardware. Metal 4 unlocks console-level gaming on Macs, while VisionOS (the operating system for Vision Pro) now supports third-party VR controllers, showing Apple’s growing interest in giving you more ways to use your devices, especially in gaming and spatial experiences. Below, we dive into each platform update and announcement in detail: iOS 26: What’s new on your iPhone Apple’s iOS 26 brings a fresh new look and more innovative features to your iPhone. It’s the most significant design update in years, along with powerful built-in AI tools that help you get more done, right from your phone. Here’s what you’ll notice: 1. A new look with liquid glass Image source: Apple on YouTube iOS 26 introduces Liquid Glass, a sleek and modern design. You’ll see translucent backgrounds, glossy icons, and more depth throughout the system. The Lock Screen and Home Screen are now more dynamic; your clock can move across wallpapers, and 3D wallpapers respond when you tilt your phone. App icons and widgets can appear in a new “clear” style or show soft colours. Even Safari’s tab bar will subtly fade to keep your screen focused on what matters most. 2. Apple intelligence: Smarter features built in iOS 26 adds powerful AI features that run directly on your device, keeping your data private. Live translation: Translate text or speech in real time during phone calls, FaceTime, and messages. Everything happens on your iPhone, so your conversations stay private. Visual intelligence: Your iPhone can now understand what’s on your screen. Long-press an image or webpage to search for more info, shop for products, or even ask ChatGPT questions about what you see. iOS can also recognise dates in messages and suggest adding them to your calendar. Genmoji & image playground: You can now create fun custom emojis (called Genmoji) or generate images from text prompts using the new Image Playground. It’s built into Apple’s apps and ready to use. Smarter shortcuts: The Shortcuts app now offers intelligent actions, letting you build advanced automations or creative tasks. Your iPhone will also suggest helpful shortcut actions as you go. 3. Upgrades to phone and messages apps Phone app improvements: The Phone app now combines Favourites, Recents, and Voicemail in one easy view. Call Screening answers unknown calls for you, asks the caller to identify themselves, and shows you a transcript, so you can decide whether to answer. Hold Assist will even monitor when you’re on hold and notify you when someone picks up. Image source: Apple on YouTube Messages updates: Messages now separates texts from unknown senders in a different folder. You can set custom backgrounds for your chats and create polls in
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Silverbacks partially exits from OmniRetail with a 5x return in ninth profitable exit
Silverbacks Holdings, an African-focused private investment firm, has sold a portion of its stake in OmniRetail, a Nigerian B2B e-commerce startup, securing a 5x return on its initial investment. This comes one month after securing a 29x return from its Lemfi exit. The exit follows OmniRetail’s recent $20 million Series A raise, which saw participation from 64-year-old manufacturing titan, Flour Mills of Nigeria, alongside other backers. This partial exit marks Silverbacks’ ninth profitable exit. Founded in 2019, OmniRetail links 150,000 retailers with 5,800 distributors and fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) manufacturers through its e-commerce platform. Twice dubbed Africa’s fastest-growing business, it saw revenue surge 71,818% from $280,000 in 2020 to over $120 million in 2023, processed more than ₦1.3 trillion ($810 million) in deals in 2024, and hit profitability. Why Flour Mills, Nigeria’s 64-year-old food giant, joined OmniRetail’s $20 million round “Silverbacks has been a truly resourceful early investor and a consistent contributor to the growth of OmniRetail’s network,” Deepankar Rustagi, OmniRetail’s CEO, said in a statement. “I’m excited to see them continue the journey with us as I also have the pleasure to support their sports venture.” Rustagi recently invested in Silverbacks’ portfolio company, the Cape Town Tigers, a basketball team that reached the 2024 BAL/NBA Africa semi-finals. “This 9th exit is another validation of our long-term strategy and reaffirms the exceptional calibre of entrepreneurs we support,” said Ibrahim Sagna, Executive Chairman of Silverbacks Holdings. The move reflects a broader trend of investors finding liquidity through secondary sales in Africa’s maturing startup ecosystem. Since Silverbacks began investing in Africa, its Nigerian portfolio has returned an average 10.7x multiple on invested capital (MOIC)—a measure of how many times an investment has been returned— and an 81.5% internal rate of return (IRR), the annualised return an investment has earned factoring in the exact timing of every cash-in and cash-out, in two years and eight months. In Egypt, exits have been even more lucrative, averaging a 9.7x MOIC and a 339% IRR over 1 year and 7 months. Lemfi’s $53 million Series B delivers 29x return for Silverbacks Holdings Silverbacks’ investments in Africa have outperformed those elsewhere. Africa has returned nearly four times the capital Silverbacks has invested on the continent, led by strong fintech performance with a 13.7x MOIC and a 91.9% IRR over an average 3.7-year holding period. In comparison, the firm’s non-African exits posted a more modest 1.3x MOIC. “These consistent, strong exits with attractive IRRs demonstrate that investing in Africa is not only viable but also a smart move for generating superior returns,” the firm said. Silverback’s African portfolio cuts across African fintech, media, sports, and fashion with investments in Moove, Wave, Flutterwave, Shuttlers, African Warriors Fighting Championship (AWFC), and the Cape Town Tigers Basketball Club. 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 – It’s enough!
In partnership with Lire en Français اقرأ هذا باللغة العربية Good morning. Put a finger down if Apple’s new liquid glass feature reminds you of Windows Vista. I am not sure I like it and I hope that secret stays between us. Anyways I’ll be downloading the new iOS26 and let you know how it goes. In other news, six African startup founders asked African VCs about sector bias, creative-economy investment, post-funding missteps, missed deals, and when blended capital might tackle non-tech African problems. Check out Muktar’s article to see how these investors answered. Let’s delve into today’s dispatch! – Faith Africa to launch indigenous credit rating agency in September Nigerian telecom operators plan to start deducting airtime balances for USSD fees Tigran Gambaryan has stepped down from Binance Netflix partners with CANAL+ in 24 francophone countries World Wide Web 3 Opportunities Economy Africa to launch indigenous credit rating agency in September Africa to launch its credit rating agency/Image Source: The Africa Daily Post In September 2025, Africa will launch a credit rating agency—the African Credit Rating Agency (AfCRA). It’s a big move, as AfCRA is positioning itself to become the go-to credit assessor for countries and corporations across the continent. But why does this even matter? Well, have you ever thought about how investors decide whether a corporation or a country is “credit-worthy” before giving them a loan? Imagine you’re sitting on a lot of free cash and you decide to loan some of it out for interest. Naturally, before handing over that money, you’d want to do your homework. You’d check the borrower’s background, review their credit, and weigh the risk. In the corporate and sovereign world, due diligence works the same way. When a country wants to issue a bond or secure a loan from an international bank or monetary body, it gets assessed based on its debt profile, growth rate, and default history. For decades, investors have relied on the ‘Big Three’ global credit rating agencies—S&P Global, Fitch, and Moody’s. This is why we celebrate when African countries get an upgrade. It signals lower credit risk and opens the door to more financing. But there’s been growing criticism of these global rating agencies for missing local context. Many argue they lack on-the-ground insight into African economies and the effects of politics. While the AfCRA will bring the needed local context to those sovereign assessments, it could also lead to a catch-22: if it issues ratings lower than the global agencies, African governments may be unhappy; if it issues higher ratings, investors may call it biased. The real struggle is keeping the AfCRA independent and unbiased, ensuring that governments cannot interfere in the assessment process. For now, we have to wait and see what the rollout and reception looks like in the coming months. The AfCRA will issue its first sovereign rating by early 2026. 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. 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Six founders ask investors questions about venture capital and investing
For many founders in emerging markets, venture capital can feel like a black box. Investor expectations are often opaque, and founders rarely get the chance to question the gatekeepers of capital. More often than not, founders are in the hot seat answering questions about their business, while investors decide whether their company is worth backing. In this week’s Ask an Investor, I switched the roles and gave six founders the opportunity to ask investment professionals questions about venture capital and investing. The founders asked questions about their investment thesis, support for founders, exit strategy, and just about anything related to investing. In this edition, founders from fintechs like Sycamore and Allawee, social media startup Storipod, legal tech startup Regfyl, e-commerce startup Selar, and lending startup Reown asked investors from Endeavor, Consonance, Catalytic, Kuramo, Launch Africa, BRB, and Alitheia Capital questions. The questions spanned startups they missed out on that went on to do well, what the future of investing on the continent looks like, why venture capitalists keep backing the same sectors in Africa, and several others. It is important to note that these answers reflect the personal opinions of the analysts and not their firms. The interviews have been edited for length and clarity. Babatunde Akin-Moses (Sycamore’s founder): Do you foresee a time when a new investment (perhaps a blend of venture capital and private equity) would emerge to address pressing African problems that are not technology-based? Chukwuemeka Agba (private equity analyst at Kuramo Capital): I think that any business that really solves pressing African problems (for example, power) should be scalable. Scalability is a significant component of sustainability. With respect to investment sentiment around the non-typical tech-based solutions, I believe we are increasingly seeing blended financing activities on the continent with participation from development finance institutions, impact investors and returns-focused venture capital and private equity players. I believe we will continue to see growth in these types of investments across the continent. I do not expect this to be a common source of funding for startups, but I definitely hope we see more of these collaborations between impact and returns in the future. James Nelson (Storipod’s founder): When many investors describe themselves as ‘sector agnostic,’ the default still seems to be fintech, mobility, and logistics. But what platforms are truly exploring or backing the creative economy in Nigeria? Jeffrey Akemu (platforms and operations at Launch Africa): Yes, even among sector-agnostic funds, true engagement with the creative industry remains limited. The creative economy in Nigeria is vibrant, with music, film, design, animation, and digital content generating not only cultural capital but significant commercial value. Still, it struggles to attract venture capital at the same scale as fintech or mobility. This is partly due to investors’ lack of familiarity with the business models that drive creative ventures, which often rely on royalties, IP monetisation, long-tail distribution, and artistic influence, which are elements that don’t always fit traditional tech VC metrics. Ikenna Enenwali (Allawee’s founder): Have you ever passed on a startup you wish you hadn’t, and what did they get right in the end? Fisayo Durojaiye (investment director at WAEV Capital): I really do not have an example of a startup I passed on only to become a runaway success eventually. All of them were successful for a time and they have all crashed afterwards. Temidayo Oniosun (serial angel investor): I wish I had a story like that. But no, I don’t think there’s any startup I’ve passed on and later regretted. There’s never been a case like that. What I’ve seen happen a lot is: I pass on a startup, and then a few months down the line, things become more obvious—why I actually passed on them. The issues I raised as red flags usually end up coming to light. So for me, it’s more like being vindicated. I don’t think I’ve ever passed on a company and then later thought, “Oh, I made a mistake.” That hasn’t happened. There was this startup. They said they had a deal with Paystack to launch Paystack’s POS business and that Paystack wanted to use them as a partner to roll it out. The founder sat in my house pitching me hard, putting pressure on me to invest. But as I investigated, I realised he had exaggerated a lot of the claims, especially the supposed agreement with Paystack. He made it sound way bigger than it was, probably as a tactic to raise money. I flagged those and told him straight up, “I’m passing on your startup, and this is why.” The next month, I saw he had taken a job at another company. So I’ve had quite a few of those experiences, where startups are either on the wrong track or pushing a narrative that doesn’t hold up, and I walk away. And then months—or a year or two—later, it plays out just like I expected. Audu Ayodeji (Reown’s founder): What triggers a follow-up conversation or a pass after the first call with a founder? Favour Eniola Ubaka (portfolio manager at Catalytic Capital): A terrible pitch deck that does not contain very important details like the numbers, team, or fundraise amount will lead to a pass on. There would be a pass on if the founder is unable to answer investors’ questions with confidence. On the other hand, there would be a follow-up conversation if the founder’s pitch is in sync with the investment thesis and all necessary details are addressed during the call or on the pitch deck. The founder’s confidence can also lead to a follow-up. There are also instances where the investor’s instinct is drawn to the founder. In cases where investments cannot be made, the investor could provide business advisory, mentorship, or introductions to relevant stakeholders that can support. Douglas Kendyson (Selar’s founder): In this current climate, what would convince you to invest in a startup with no traction? Sumayyah Adefolu (investment and operations analyst at Consonance Capital): In today’s climate, three key factors would convince
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Rams, chickens, and the price of survival
This year in Nigeria, a ram for Eid costs upwards of or close to ₦400,000—more than the national minimum wage of 4-5 months. By Christmas, chickens may become equally emblematic of scarcity. These are not festive exaggerations; they are market signals—microeconomic symptoms of a deeper macroeconomic disease. The price of survival is rising, while the machinery of value creation remains dangerously idle. Across Africa, and Nigeria in particular, we are witnessing an economic paradox: rising financial inclusion amidst declining productivity; expanded access to money, yet diminished access to value. It is tempting to diagnose this as inflation. But inflation is a fever—there is an infection beneath it. And the name of that affliction is deindustrialisation by digitisation. The consumption trap In Nigeria, over 70% of household income is spent on food, transport, and other basic needs. This is not prosperity. It is survival. The marginal propensity to consume is high not because Nigerians are consuming more, but because they can afford less. Wages stagnate, prices surge, and every naira earned is immediately spent to ward off hunger, illness, or insecurity. In such an economy, savings are rare, capital formation is shallow, and the multiplier effects of commerce are weak. What little money is generated circulates rapidly—but does not accumulate. It moves, but it does not multiply. Fintechs were supposed to change this. They promised inclusion. What they delivered was velocity. The fintech paradox: Movement without multiplication Over the past decade, more than $5 billion has been invested in African fintech startups. We were promised transformation. What we received was transaction. Mobile money, digital wallets, and agency banking have made it easier than ever to move naira, cedis, and shillings across geographies. But these tools, elegant as they may be, have become lubricants for a fundamentally extractive economy. They facilitate consumption but do not enable production. A fintech app may help a yam farmer in Kaduna receive digital payments. But that same app will also enable him to purchase imported pesticides, pay for generator fuel, and order foreign rice he can’t afford to eat. This is not financial empowerment. It is a high-speed treadmill of poverty. Money, unlike a machine or a tool, is not inherently productive. It is a medium, and not a means. Without factories, farms, or forges, fintechs are simply better pipes for an empty well. The false gods of inclusion Most African fintechs are not banks. They do not lend at scale, build infrastructure, or fund innovation in manufacturing or agriculture. Instead, they are payment gateways, identity services, and switching engines—designed more to extract transaction fees than to enable transformation. Their incentives are shaped by capital—global capital. And global capital is risk-averse. It seeks fast returns, not long-term development. Thus, most fintechs pivot toward merchant payments, diaspora remittances, or KYC compliance. These are low-risk, high-frequency activities that enrich platforms but rarely build national capacity. We were told inclusion would democratise finance. But in truth, inclusion has often meant being included in consumption and not in wealth creation. Industrialisation ≠ Imitation The answer is not to mimic 20th-century models of industrialisation. Africa cannot replicate the import substitution strategies of post-war Latin America or the export-led growth of East Asia. The global context has changed: climate constraints, demographic pressures, fragmented supply chains, and capital flight have made yesterday’s blueprints obsolete. Nor will digital optimism suffice. Digitisation without production merely creates smoother pathways for dependency. If Africa is to industrialise, it must do so on its terms. This means productive innovation rooted in local realities: modular micro-factories, agro-processing hubs, distributed logistics, and mobile-enabled cooperatives. These are not romantic visions. They are pragmatic necessities. Leapfrogging must be redefined. It does not mean skipping industrialisation. It means reinventing it and anchoring not in steel mills alone, but in smart, distributed infrastructure that amplifies the informal economy rather than bypasses it. Fintech as infrastructure — not interface There is still a future for fintech—but only if it evolves. Imagine fintech as a backbone for distributed manufacturing: underwriting toolmakers, financing cold-chain cooperatives, offering working capital to carpenters, weavers, and blacksmiths. Picture a financial OS that ties digital identity to productive capacity; that tracks inventory, not just invoices; that enables ownership, not just access. This is fintech as productive infrastructure, a scaffolding for the real economy, not just a slick interface for digital consumption. The government that isn’t there The Nigerian state, meanwhile, has mastered a new form of governance: minimalism by default, not design. It neither delivers services nor provides safety nets. It taxes without transparency, borrows without discipline, and regulates without consistency. Infrastructure decays while policies oscillate. The state has outsourced governance to the governed. And yet, Nigerians persist. There is ingenuity in the chaos. But ingenuity needs scaffolding. What could emerge, if nurtured, is a new kind of bottom-up economic federalism where informal networks, cooperatives, and municipalities operate semi-autonomously but within a framework of shared infrastructure, data, and trust. The question is whether this latent architecture will be supported or smothered by both the state and the market. Making the weird work Nigeria’s economy is weird. Informality is the norm. Trust is hyperlocal. Growth is improvisational. But weird does not mean weak. It means something different. And perhaps it is in embracing this difference and not erasing it that we may find a path to real, lasting industrialisation. Let us stop worshipping apps. Let us start investing in capacity. Let us build systems that not only digitise transactions but also dignify production. Rams are expensive. Chickens will be too. And QR codes won’t change that. But solar-powered irrigation might. Cold storage in Sokoto might. Modular tractor forges in Funtua might. If we must live in a weird system, can we at least make it productively weird? Abubakar Sadiq Amao is a technical analyst and fintech founder with expertise in economics, blockchain, and product development. He enjoys building financial tools at the intersection of retail and commerce. He is currently leading Chappi while pursuing an MBA. Mark your calendars! Moonshot by TechCabal
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Kenya’s student loan agency seeks power to freeze 316,000 defaulters’ bank accounts
Kenya’s Higher Education Loans Board (HELB) has proposed changes to the law that would grant it the authority to freeze bank accounts held by over 316,000 former university students who have defaulted on state-issued loans. The board is stepping up efforts to recover a $270.3 million (KES 35 billion) debt burden. On Friday, HELB Chief Executive Geoffrey Monari asked the Parliamentary Committee on Public Investments for amendments to the Higher Education Loans Board Act that would empower the agency to track and freeze the bank accounts of former students who have defaulted on their loans. Monari warned that rising defaults threaten the fund’s sustainability, particularly as enrolment in Kenyan universities grows. The proposal signals a shift in the state’s approach to student debt enforcement. HELB is now seeking measures similar to those used by tax authorities. “My request is for legislation that allows us to freeze accounts of former students doing business but not repaying their loans, similar to how the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) freezes business accounts,” Monari said. “This would encourage defaulters with steady incomes to comply. We can provide a detailed proposal outlining the laws we need to recover these funds.” Monari said that while 464,000 beneficiaries have been repaying their loans for over 10 years, HELB currently collects $510,638 (KES 66 million) monthly, pushing it to rely on the National Treasury allocations. In contrast, 316,000 former students have yet to begin repayment. “If we can get even a portion of these defaulters to start servicing their loans, it would significantly boost cash flow and enhance our capacity to support current university students,” he said. Monari told parliament members that HELB operates an inspectorate department that ensures employers deduct and remit loan repayments on behalf of their staff. Under current regulations, employers who fail to comply face a monthly penalty of $23.17 (KES 3,000) per student for every month in default. Monari said the HELB is facing enforcement challenges for graduates living abroad. However, he said the agency is working with Kenyan embassies and the State Department of Immigration to strengthen cross-border tracking of defaulters. For self-employed graduates, HELB relies on credit blacklisting to encourage compliance. Defaulters are reported to the Credit Reference Bureau, restricting their access to loans and other financial services. However, Monari conceded that the agency has limited access to beneficiaries working in the gig economy, where income is irregular and often unreported. 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 – Twiga Foods hits pause
In partnership with Lire en Français اقرأ هذا باللغة العربية Happy Eid Holiday! If you’re Nigerian, hope you’re enjoying the long weekend—soak it in. Because any moment now, a tech bro is going to log on and ask if we really need this many public holidays. But enjoy the peace while it lasts. We’ve got one more day off on Thursday, and you already know someone on the timeline is going to make it their entire personality. Twiga Foods pauses its Nairobi operations Sierra Leone to launch solar-powered 5G network Mr Price, South African fashion retailer, now sells smartphones World Wide Web 3 Job Openings E-commerce Twiga Foods has paused its Nairobi operations for two months Image Source: Google Twiga Foods, a Kenyan e-commerce company, once promised to fix the country’s broken food supply chain by owning all of it—from farm to market. That vision helped it raise over $180 million. But on June 5, it hit pause on operations in Nairobi. Why? Officially, Twiga says the two-month break is to relocate its distribution hub from Tatu City to somewhere closer to the capital. The company is considering possible new locations Baba Dogo, Mombasa Road, and Syokimau, for its new distribution hub. Yet, behind that move is a deeper reset. The company is walking away from the heavy infrastructure it once saw as its edge. It took Twiga too long to admit its capital-heavy model wasn’t working. It tried to be a farmer, a warehouse operator, and a delivery company all at once—and bled money doing it. Now it’s trying a different approach. It has cut hundreds of jobs, bought up three local distributors, and is shifting to a leaner model that uses tech and third-party partners to do the hard work. The Nairobi pause is the latest step in that shift. Twiga hopes that centralising its operations and moving to a lighter footprint will help it lower costs, speed up deliveries, and keep retailers stocked. But none of this guarantees a turnaround. Copia Global once had a similar story—and it shut down in 2024 after running out of cash. Twiga says it’s still committed to serving small retailers and believes it can make the numbers work. The next two months could tell us if that belief holds up. 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 Telecoms Sierra Leone to launch solar-powered 5G network Image Source: Airtel Sierra Leone is flipping the switch on its first 5G network. Zoodlabs, a local telco, has teamed up with CrossBoundary Energy, an energy service provider, to power the country’s first 5G towers. The initial towers, which will be powered by solar energy, are set to be launched in Freetown and will be funded by CrossBoundary Energy. With the new 5G network Sierra Leone is well on its way to improved internet connectivity—think faster network, no network lag. The country is also set to see advancements such as smart cities, remote healthcare, and the application of Internet of Things (IoT). Why is this a big deal? By combining technology with clean energy, Sierra Leone isn’t just catching
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Next Wave: ESPOPs and the future of employee ownership
Cet article est aussi disponible en français <!– In partnership with –> <!–TopBanner Join us for TechCabal Battlefield, Moonshot’s startup competition where you can showcase your startup idea to a global audience and an esteemed panel of judges and stand a chance to win up to 2.5 million naira in funding for your business! Click to register for TC Battlefield First published 08 June, 2025 Image | Alter Finance Earlier this week, I reported that Moniepoint employees sold part of their shares for $870,000. After a similar Arnergy story, the online reaction was swift. Readers loved it, urging more founders to do the same. These moments are inspiring, but still rare in African tech. More often than not, employee shares aren’t worth the paper they’re printed on. However, this is less an indictment of startups and more a reflection of how young Africa’s tech ecosystem still is. With time and more success stories, employee rewards like this will likely become more common. To prepare our readers for that (hopefully immediate) future, today’s edition of Next Wave will explore everything you need to know about employee stock option plans (ESOPs)—and how they can work for your company. What are ESOPs, and how do they work? When a young founder starts assembling her dream team, she often faces a tough choice: go it alone or persuade talented people to join her for a modest salary and a stake in the company. With limited capital and high market salaries, equity becomes a powerful tool to attract top talent. ESOPs let employees own a part of the company they work for. Instead of just earning a salary, staff receive shares or the option to buy shares in the future. In the tech world, where startups often can not pay high salaries at the beginning, ESOPs are a popular way to attract great talent and build a strong sense of teamwork and ownership. Next Wave continues after this ad. Moonshot is back, and this year, it’s about moving from resilience to results. With the theme Building Momentum, the 2025 edition explores how Africa’s digital economy can shift gears into scale, structure, and long-term growth. Expect more honest reflections, sharper insights, closed-door roundtables, and conversations that don’t end when the panels do. Watch the 2024 highlights. Early bird discount now available Reserve your spot here! Founders set aside a percentage of the company’s equity, often around 10–15% in early stages, as an option pool from which grants are made to employees. Each grant either awards employees shares directly or allows them to buy shares at a fixed price, typically set at the fair market value on the grant date. In the U.S., startups use a 409A valuation to determine this value, ensuring compliance with tax rules. The bet is that the company’s share price will rise over time, allowing employees to buy low and sell high when an exit, like an acquisition or secondaries, occurs. Because private company shares are illiquid, startup ESOPs include vesting schedules to reward long-term commitment. The most common structure is four years with a one-year cliff: employees earn 25% of their options after the first year, with the rest vesting gradually, typically monthly, over the next three. Those who leave before the cliff forfeit all options; those who stay keep what’s vested. Many companies include a post-termination exercise window—often 90 days—during which departing employees must exercise vested options or lose them. Startups may also offer additional grants to high performers (Arnergy, for instance, used this approach) or long-serving staff who’ve fully vested their initial options, keeping top talent engaged and incentivised. In privately held startups, employees usually can’t cash out their stock until a liquidity event because there’s no public market for the shares. Until then, stock options remain a deferred reward. This makes ESOPs especially tricky in emerging markets where exits are rare. Employees must often bet on the company’s future success while earning below-market salaries. Still, startups use ESOPs to attract talent they couldn’t otherwise afford, trading ownership for loyalty and long-term commitment. Some success stories Silicon Valley provided most examples of ESOP-driven wealth creation in the past, but today, the practice is spreading globally. Emerging market startups are increasingly adopting ESOPs to attract talent and share the upside of growth. In India, a startup boom over the past decade has brought a broader embrace of ESOPs, with some of the largest unicorns delivering landmark liquidity events for employees. One of the most impressive liquidity events was when Flipkart, an e-commerce startup acquired by Walmart, set the standard for employee stock option payouts in emerging markets. When the American giant acquired a majority stake in Flipkart in 2018 at a $20 billion valuation, Flipkart initiated an $800 million ESOP buyback for current and former employees. Over 6.2 million employee-held shares were repurchased at ~$126 per share. The deal minted hundreds of dollar millionaires and rewarded thousands of others with significant windfalls. Next Wave continues after this ad. Nigeria’s digital payment space is evolving fast. Are you keeping up? Our latest report highlights key shifts, challenges, and opportunities across the country’s payments ecosystem. Donwload the report now. Not long after, in 2021, Grab rose from a ride-hailing startup to Southeast Asia’s super app and went public on NASDAQ through an SPAC merger. That listing allowed hundreds of employees to convert their equity to liquid stock, and many early staff members became paper millionaires overnight. The IPO windfall created a new challenge: retaining employees who now had significant wealth. Grab responded with staggered lock-up periods and urged long-term holding, though some post-listing attrition was inevitable. In 2020, Nigerian fintech startup Paystack was acquired by Stripe for a reported $200 million – one of Africa’s largest tech acquisitions to date. Paystack had an ESOP pool, and although details are private, it’s well-known that early employees benefited from the buyout. How to set up an ESOP Establishing an ESOP is both a strategic and legal undertaking, and it’s one of the most powerful
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“I saw the crypto ban on social media, like everybody else”: Day 1–1000 of Busha
In Day 1–1000, we follow founders through the raw, unfiltered journey of company-building: the early scrambles, the quiet breakthroughs, the painful pivots, and the milestones that shape what a business becomes. This goes live on Saturdays by 2 PM WAT. In late 2017, as Bitcoin surged to $20,000 and global crypto fever peaked, Moyo Sodipo faced a frustration that would become the seed for Busha, a platform where Nigerians can buy and sell cryptocurrencies in Naira. “There was no easy way to buy or sell cryptocurrency here. I had to get someone in the US to help me buy Bitcoin, then send it over. You always had to depend on someone,” he recalls. By 2018, Sodipo and his co-founders—a tight-knit five-member group with roots in Jumia’s early days—began building. Their mission was simple: make crypto transactions accessible, instant, and trustworthy for everyday Nigerians. After a private beta, Busha launched to the public in 2019, entirely bootstrapped. Day 1-100: Building in the dark and the first validation Back then, Nigeria’s crypto regulatory climate was a blank slate. There were no clear frameworks, but also no explicit ban. Yet, Busha’s approach was anything but reactive. “As far back as 2018, we reached out to the SEC (Securities Exchange Commission) and said, ‘Hey, this is what we’re trying to build. We know there’s no active regulatory framework, but we want you to be able to regulate us,’” Sodipo says. This proactive compliance-first stance was strategic. “We’ve always done KYC, always done transaction monitoring. We built in such a way that anytime regulators came, we’d be ready. We didn’t need to scramble to get our house in order.” 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 The first version of Busha was released in early 2018. It took about eight months to develop a product ready for private beta. Michael Adeyeri, one of Busha’s co-founder and lead engineer, wrote the first lines of code. As with most startups, Busha’s co-founders wore every hat. “I was at the forefront of support and operations; Michael handled engineering and product; Samuel did finance; Oye led marketing; Femi covered operations. Our roles intertwined, but everyone was all-in,” Sodipo explains. Their relationship was beyond professional. Sodipo says all five of them had known each other for more than a decade, “almost brothers”, and this contributed in navigating the early days of the business with little personality conflicts. Busha’s first major validation came during the 2020 COVID-19 lockdown. “During the global financial crash, when everything tanked, people were still interested in crypto, still buying the dip. Seeing African customers ‘buy the dip’ at that point showed us we’d built something essential,” Sodipo recalls. “COVID was a blessing in disguise for us. People were at home, exploring new ways to earn and transact. Crypto became that opportunity.” Day 730: “Crypto Black Friday” Then, on February 5, 2021, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) announced that banks were banned from facilitating crypto transactions. “We call it Crypto Black Friday. It was chaos. I saw the circular online, just like everyone else. My phone blew up—customers panicking, partners shutting us off. Everyone was trying to withdraw funds at once, and our payment processors were shutting us down. It was the toughest day of my life,” Sodipo recounts. But it also began to yield some benefit. Major players in the sector congregated in a WhatsApp group and
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Digital Nomads: Roddiyyat Taiwo’s AI doctor wants to be a pan African triage tool
In Africa, the healthcare system is in tatters. Emergency response is slow, inaccessible, and inconsistent, and seeing a doctor is often a last resort, when the illness becomes unbearable. This is the world Roddiyyat Taiwo wants to change using an AI doctor. Taiwo is the co-founder of OpenHealth, a young Nigerian healthtech startup trying to make preventive healthcare accessible to young Africans. It’s a digital triage and AI-powered symptom-checking tool, built by a team of five teenagers who believe technology can bridge the healthcare gap for the continent’s underserved populations. Taiwo joins the call from her home in Abuja, Nigeria where she currently works as a business analyst for Cedar Crest, one of the city’s largest hospital chains. “Due to the nature of my work, I sit on so much data,” she said. “So I’m seeing in real-time how people access healthcare and where we are failing.” Taiwo’s dream is to digitise preventive healthcare by building what she calls an “AI doctor.” OpenHealth will accurately diagnose early symptoms after collecting data and interacting with the user. Afterward, the AI doctor recommends a next step which can include a visit to a human doctor, booking a lab test, or consulting with other appropriate care providers. Right now, OpenHealth currently lacks the existing partnerships with care providers to make this a full end-to-end product. The product stops at simply being a health concierge. 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 Breakaway wins The solution is not new; telemedicine startups are getting funded across Africa, and Taiwo, who sees the problem she’s solving as continent-wide, is acutely aware of this competition. Yet, she says her team has built something that is valuable to big healthcare providers, hospital chains, and individual users. With AbdulQuduus Ajibade, her co-founder, helming the technical side, OpenHealth can provide its technology as a subscription service, integrating with established healthtech platforms that don’t want to build an AI-enabled telemedicine service from scratch. The users’ health data is another useful asset as OpenHealth can benefit from revenue partnerships with healthcare firms on users it recommends after triage. The startup has previously partnered with Nigerian healthcare company, mDaaS Global, to integrate its application programming interface (API) into Beacon Health, a telemedicine service operated by mDaaS, in a three-month paid pilot. Barely two years old since ideation—one year since the product first went to market—OpenHealth has already shown promise in multiple ways. The startup has just over 1,000 people on its minimum viable product (MVP) waitlist, and operates on revenue generated from pilot tests alongside a modest $1,000 grant. But what’s most remarkable is how the team has made a name for itself through consistent participation in startup competitions. Alongside Ajibade, Taiwo has taken OpenHealth from a prototype to a growing product by tapping into incubators, pitch grants, and hackathons, where they’ve sold their OpenHealth dream in at least six competitions. “We got into Entrepreneurs of Tomorrow based on a recommendation. And even though I couldn’t travel to the US because my visa was denied, we still ended up being one of the top four finalists,” she says. “It was painful, but still a win.” Today, OpenHealth’s cap table is already taking shape. Taiwo and Ajibade retain major ownership of the business. Ten percent is allocated to early employees—each receiving 1.5% stock vested over five years—while another 10% goes to members of its advisory
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