Nigeria – Page 3 – Africa Tech Digest

Motorcycles Enter Ride-Hailing App Industry in Nigeria

7Jun

By Africa Tech DigestNo Comments

Ridehailing, West Africa

Motorcycles Enter Ride-Hailing App Industry in Nigeria

When a customer scrolls through the options on a ride-hailing app in Lagos, Africa’s largest city, cars are no longer the only things that show up. Over the past 18 months, motorcycle-hailing startups have become players in the city’s tech ecosystem, all competing for traction and market share in a city beset with some of the continent’s worst transportation challenges. By itself, the idea of an on-demand, flexible transport service to get around Lagos’ hours-long traffic jams and congestion is an appealing proposition for millions of Lagosians. It’s also cheaper compared with established car-hailing services like Uber and Taxify. To be clear, commercial transport motorcycles, known locally as okadas have long existed in Lagos, like in many other African cities where they h...

Nigeria attains steady increase in internet subscriptions

17Apr

By Africa Tech DigestNo Comments

West Africa

Nigeria attains steady increase in internet subscriptions

NIGERIA has recorded an 11 percent increase in internet subscriptions over the past year to 113, 9 million users. The figure indicates a density of 61 percent in a population estimated at 185 million, placing Nigeria well above the African average of around 16 percent, according to McKinsey, the management consulting firm. Statistics released by the Nigeria Communications Commission (NCC) indicates there were 2,24 million new internet subscriptions recorded, compared with 3,18 million the previous month. MTN accounted for the biggest share (40 percent) of total subscriptions. Since June last year, MTN has recorded month-on-month (m/m) increases in its internet subscriptions. For January, it recorded an increase of 4,6 percent or 2 million new subsc...

Techabal Releases New Report on Health Tech in Nigeria

9Apr

By Africa Tech DigestNo Comments

West Africa

Techabal Releases New Report on Health Tech in Nigeria

TechCabal is pleased to introduce its first paid report, The State of Health Tech in Nigeria. This deeply researched report examines general health indicators and challenges in Nigeria, and then dives into the health tech industry, profiling the innovative startups working to find technology solutions to Nigeria’s health-related problems. The report profiles 75 active and 15 inactive health tech startups across 12 subsectors. It further examines the challenges these startups face, the opportunities in the space and makes actionable recommendations for entrepreneurs, investors and regulators to consider. This report was prepared using both primary and secondary data. We started with publicly available information about the healthcare system and health tech industry in Nigeria. We ...

African tech startups raised $1.163B in equity in 2018

9Apr

By Africa Tech DigestNo Comments

Start-ups

African tech startups raised $1.163B in equity in 2018

African tech startups raised $1.163B in 2018 according to Partech Africa’s 2018 annual report on the financing on the continent confirming the attractiveness of African entrepreneurs and their ability to transform the continent into a global powerhouse. The report covers equity deals in tech and digital spaces, and funding rounds higher than US$200K and lower than US$100 Million. Deals covered are includes African startups only i.e. companies with their primary market in Africa itself. In 2018, 146 African startups raised a total of US$1.163 Billion in equity through 164 rounds, this is a +108% growth YoY, compared to +33% in 2016 and +53% in 2017. This represents x4.2 growth multiple over the last 36 months. “It’s quite simply astonishing. When we started our journey to create th...

Nigerian motorcycle taxi app Gokada to open driver training school

14Mar

By Africa Tech DigestNo Comments

Apps, West Africa

Nigerian motorcycle taxi app Gokada to open driver training school

Lagos-based on-demand motorcycle taxi app Gokada has celebrated its first birthday with the launch of its new office in Ilupeju, which will house a state-of-the-art driver training school to train and verify up to 500 riders at a time. Gokada customers can order a motorbike ride through the company’s website, or by using its geo-location -based smartphone app. In 12 months of operation, the startup has secured close to 1,000 bikes and completes around 5,000 rides across Lagos’ Mainland each day. It has now launched its new office, which will house its driver training school. The school, which is due to open in April, will assist with the smoother, more efficient training of more Gokada drivers. “Gokada was built on a super simple premise; moving Lagos citizens around the traffic...

Microsoft to open office in Lagos dedicated to developing mixed reality and artificial intelligence

11Mar

By Africa Tech DigestNo Comments

AI, West Africa

Microsoft to open office in Lagos dedicated to developing mixed reality and artificial intelligence

Alex Kipman, a Microsoft Technical Fellow and the co-creator of HoloLens, announced on Twitter Microsoft is opening an engineering office in Lagos, Nigeria. The Cognition Africa engineering team is looking for a software engineer to assist with the building of Mixed Reality Cloud Services that bring those technologies to a wider range of devices. For more information, click here. https://twitter.com/akipman/status/1104062105844559878

Nigeria’s AMPZ.TV, Ghana’s OZÉ & Kenya’s WayaWaya named regional winners in MEST Africa’s $50,000 pitch competition

11Mar

By Africa Tech DigestNo Comments

East Africa, Start-ups

Nigeria’s AMPZ.TV, Ghana’s OZÉ & Kenya’s WayaWaya named regional winners in MEST Africa’s $50,000 pitch competition

Five promising start-ups from across Africa have been chosen as regional winners in MEST Africa’s annual Pan-African pitch competition, moving one step closer to winning $50,000 in equity investment, a place in the MEST Africa incubator of their choice and global mentorship to help their company scale. Winners will pitch on a global stage in the finals at the 4th MEST Africa Summit, to be held in Nairobi, Kenya, June 10-12. Out of nearly 1000 applicants from across the continent, 10 finalists were chosen to pitch at the regional finals in Accra, Lagos, Nairobi, Cape Town and Abidjan, held February 27-28th. Winners from each region include: Nigeria –AMPZ.TV, the ‘LinkedIn for Sports’ that is developing the next generation of Etos, Drogbas and Aubameyangs through tec...

20Jan

By Africa Tech DigestNo Comments

Nigeria, West Africa

Nigeria ends 2018 with 172m subscribers, 31.5% broadband penetration

Nigeria’s telecommunications sector ended the year 2018 with 172 million subscribers, with teledensity rising to 123.4 per cent from 105 per cent in January 2018. Telephone density or teledensity is the number of telephone connections for every hundred individuals living within an area. It varies widely across the nations and also between urban and rural areas within a country. Subscribers’ statistics released yesterday by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) showed that service providers including MTN, Globacom, Airtel, 9Mobile, among others got 25.5 million new subscribers in the course of the year. In the same vein, broadband penetration in Nigeria rose from 30.9 per cent in November to 31.5 per cent as at December 31. Broadband is wide bandwidth data transmission, whic...

Rwanda emerging as a key tech and investment hub in Africa

15Jan

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East Africa

Rwanda emerging as a key tech and investment hub in Africa

As South Africa, Kenya and Nigeria dominate the African tech ecosystem, Rwanda is slowly, yet assuredly, emerging as a key tech and investment hub with its ease of doing business. Partech Ventures’ 2017 report revealed that South Africa, Kenya and Nigeria accounted for 76 percent of total funding in 2017 and was the top three tech startup ecosystems to have highest number of startups funded per country. Whilst the trio continue to dominate, Rwanda, despite its small population, is positioning itself as a profitable commercial hub through its ease of doing business [Rwanda ranks 29th globally in World Bank’s annual ‘Doing Business Report’], and by implementing a lenient visa policy. Much of the partnership work has been undertaken by the Rwanda Development Board, whose mission is to stimula...

Nigeria’s tech startups have become a political talking point to sway young voters

14Jan

By Africa Tech DigestNo Comments

Start-ups, West Africa

Nigeria’s tech startups have become a political talking point to sway young voters

Nigeria’s tech ecosystem has come in for praise over the past decade given the rise of startups solving problems and serving addressable market needs using technology. Investment—running into hundreds of millions of dollars—has flowed in and several startup and tech hubs have launched, ensuring a pipeline of innovative ideas. But tech startups are increasingly becoming political fodder too. With Nigeria’s general elections barely a month away, candidates looking to sway young voters—a majority of the electorate—are name-dropping tech companies in a bid to appear friendly to the ecosystem. In a recent debate for governorship candidates in Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial nerve center, leading candidates made sure to tout their support to the local ecosystem—Africa’s mos...