The government of Mauritius has issued a statement stressing its commitment to make Mauritius the region’s FinTech Center. In this vein, the Government has approved the establishment of a Technical Committee, chaired by the Ministry of Financial Services and Good Governance, to address all issues raised by industry stakeholders in the conduct of FinTech activities in Mauritius.
The Technical Committee is issuing a “Call for Views” to see how the industry, regulators, and policymakers can work together to ensure the continued progress of the FinTech sector’s growth in Mauritius. The aim of the exercise is to understand how Mauritius needs to adapt in order to reap the benefits of FinTech, as well as to recognise and expose the obstacles that FinTech startups face in order to ensure ease of doing business. Furthermore, the “Call for Views” would aid in the identification of FinTech talent, expertise, and work opportunities. Finally, the exercise will enable participants to comprehend the perspectives of both entrepreneurs and investors.
In order to contribute to the growth of the FinTech sector in Mauritius, the Ministry of Financial Services and Good Governance is requesting that interested parties send their views via email or post to the following address by Thursday, April 15, 2021 at the latest:-
Attn: The Permanent Secretary
Ministry of Financial Services and Good Governance
Level 9, SICOM Tower
Wallstreet, Ebene
Charles Rapulu Udoh
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based lawyer who has advised startups across Africa on issues such as startup funding (Venture Capital, Debt financing, private equity, angel investing etc), taxation, strategies, etc. He also has special focus on the protection of business or brands’ intellectual property rights ( such as trademark, patent or design) across Africa and other foreign jurisdictions. He is well versed on issues of ESG (sustainability), media and entertainment law, corporate finance and governance. He is also an award-winning writer
Now is an important time for the print industry. It’s a time of change and where new and emerging technologies are influencing its future. The print industry is unique and has developed over many years, transitioning from analogue to digital technologies, but there’s still so much more to come. For it to continue to grow and transform, we need fresh ideas and out-of-the-box thinking. And one way that we can support this growth is to attract the next generation.
Next Generation of Print
Print to you and me is a range of innovative applications that we interact with in our daily lives. However, print to someone who doesn’t know the print’s full capabilities or creative potential could be seen as just a book or a poster you put up on your wall. Those outside of our industry don’t realise all that ‘print’ encompasses – everything from a calendar to instruction manuals, or wallpaper to window graphics. In fact, everything you read that is not on a screen (besides a handwritten letter) is printed. But if this is the perception of print, then how do we attract new and young talent to fuel future innovation?
We know that print is rapidly advancing due to new technologies such as automation, augmented reality and robotics, and it’s these additions that present the opportunities for new talent.
In order to attract the future workforce, we need to re-look at the term ‘print’. What does it actually mean? For me, the word limits the scope of what print really is – it’s purely the output of what we do. And it’s impossible to encapsulate what our industry can do with just one word.
The magic of the industry is the end-to-end journey behind it including software, hardware, finishing etc. It should be positioned as a creative technology industry and this is what we need to bring to the fore to attract the next generation.
Young people today are digitally savvy, having grown up with smart technology at their fingertips. Some of them see print as old-fashioned and not ‘sexy’ like digital. So, we need to combine new technologies that they’re au fait with – and perhaps that they wouldn’t necessarily relate to print – in order to appeal to them. We need to speak their language and show them the strong role that print has to play alongside these digital and virtual platforms, and how they can be part of its exciting future in bringing the two more closely together.
Attracting the future print workforce
With a perception outside of the industry that print is dying, why would someone starting their career want to work in, what appears to be, a doomed industry? What they don’t know is that there are so many opportunities for growth – it is not a dying industry, but one that is constantly evolving. And it has huge creative and technology innovation potential.
One of the things I noticed when beginning my career in print, is that it offers such a scope for variety, bridging the gap between popular career routes such as technology and marketing. My background is in mechatronics engineering and I’ve been able to transfer these skills and apply them to new digital print technologies such as robotics and automation. Today’s digital printing devices integrate significant levels of automation to control virtually every aspect of production, thus changing the skill sets now required to operate these machines.
As a product manager in cut-sheet toner, I need to understand the technology behind the performance – but I also need to understand how to explain this technology in terms of benefits to the customer – the print service provider – and the customer’s customer – the print buyer. And this is where the skills I have developed through achieving a Master of Business Administration (MBA) degree have helped in my conversations with customers to explain how to sell and market the technology and the role that print plays in helping them to grow their business.
There are so many different career avenues within the print industry where skills can be deployed – creativity and design, data analytics, technology, engineering, business development, customer loyalty, marketing strategies – whatever their skills, they could find a match within print.
We need to explore more engaging ways to relate print to younger generations’ hobbies and interests. Take someone who is interested in sport, for instance. They probably don’t know about all of the huge opportunities for print at just one sports stadium – from tickets, to flyers to graphics. If they have a passion for fashion, they could get involved with fabric printing or textile design.
Or perhaps one young individual is considering a career as a data analyst. They could be the brains behind a revolutionary software solution that integrates brand customer relationship management systems with print.
Love to travel? With a calendar of global print and packaging exhibitions and customers located around the world, there’s plenty of opportunity to explore new cities and countries.
The onus is on us, the print industry and large vendors, like Canon, to get out and in front of the younger generation. Attend trade fairs, work with colleges and universities or why not even send personalised print directly to their doors? We need to be in front of them to show them what print is really capable of; demonstrate how they could be part of this evolving industry and how they can contribute to the future of it.
Innovate with new talent
Time and time again I’m told that I’m still ‘new’ to the print industry, whereas, in any other workplace, three and a half years isn’t considered a short period of time. This demonstrates that it’s rare for people from other industries to start working in print and proves the need for our industry to cast the net wider when looking for new talent.
The advantages for hiring from within our industry are clear – people know the markets, competitors and technology. However, all this knowledge can be learned, we can help teach new recruits. And the good news is that younger generations are quick to adapt, so we need to begin imparting our knowledge to help build the print generation of the future.
We know that it’s a combination of people and technology that bring about change and innovation. Technology is rapidly evolving, so now is the time to integrate new talent with new ideas and perspectives to not only enhance digital print technology, but to also evolve print’s role in the future.
The benefit for us? They will bring innovation and fresh ideas, which will help us change our ways of working, for the better, and position print as an exciting medium that won’t be disappearing anytime soon. Now, more than ever, is a time to be a part of this creative technology industry and re-shape its future.
Duygu Sanac Keçeci, EMEA Professional Printing Product Manager, Canon Europe (www.Canon-Europe.com)
Kelechi Deca
Kelechi Deca has over two decades of media experience, he has traveled to over 77 countries reporting on multilateral development institutions, international business, trade, travels, culture, and diplomacy. He is also a petrol head with in-depth knowledge of automobiles and the auto industry
The relationship between the Nigerian aviation authorities and Emirates airlines seem to have gone south as the airline was again banned from flying into the country as a result of what the Nigerian government continues to question Emirates Covid-19 testing regime which they described as discriminatory and lacking any scientific basis.
This is the second time in two months the Nigerian Government has banned the Dubai-based carrier from flying into the country. Emirates normally flies between Dubai and Lagos and Dubai and Abuja. Emirates cargo and emergency flights are exempt from the ban.
Emirates Airlines
It could be recalled that the Nigerian authorities slapped Emirates with a three-day ban on outbound flights in early February because of an airline-imposed COVID-19 testing regime at Emirates that was at odds with the Nigerian Government’s regime. However, the impasse was quickly resolved, and few, if any, Emirates’ flights were impacted.
But the Emirates’ COVID-19 testing regime is firmly back on the Nigerian Government’s radar. The Nigerian aviation authorities and health ministry slapped the airline with a further ban that took effect at midnight on March 17. This time the ban impacts both inbound and outbound passengers. Emirates has confirmed the ban and has suspended passenger flights to Nigeria until further notice.
In addition to accepting COVID-test results from local test centers not on Nigeria’s approved list, Emirates wants its passengers departing Nigeria to have three COVID-19 tests within 24 hours. That includes an initial PCR test, an antigen rapid test at the airport, and a PCR test at the arrival airport. Hadi Sirika, the Nigerian Aviation Minister Hadi Sirika calls the requirement nonsensical adding that “since they insist, their operations remain suspended.”
The Nigerian Government believes a single PCR test with 72 hours of departure should suffice. However, Emirates disagrees. This most recent flight ban was to run for five days but remains in force. Both the Nigerian Government and Emirates say talks are continuing to resolve the issue. “Emirates remains in close dialogue with the relevant regulators and authorities in Nigeria, and we are fully committed to making progress on a resolution to ensure the continuation and expansion of our operations,” the airline said in a statement.
It could be recalled that Emirates has been flying very few passengers on its outbound flights from Nigeria before this present ban. Except for UAE nationals and diplomats, Dubai has banned travelers who’ve been in Nigeria within 14 days of traveling. Passengers from the two groups allowed to travel must adhere to Emirates’ COVID-19 testing rules in order to fly.
However, it is not just Emirates Airlines that have issues over Covid-19 protocols with the Nigerian authorities. Dutch carrier KLM has also faced Nigeria’s displeasure with its COVID-19 testing regime. KLM had faced similar sanctions as Emirates, but according to the Nigerian Government, agreed to unwind their testing regime. As a result, KLM resumed flying passengers in and out of Nigeria from March 15.
Despite Emirates putting its flights to Nigeria on ice, a number of other long-haul airlines continue to fly into the country. Lagos’ Murtala Muhammed International Airport is hosting flights by Delta Air Lines, Ethiopian Airlines, Air France, British Airways, Turkish Airlines, Virgin Atlantic, Qatar Airways, and KLM among others.
Kelechi Deca
Kelechi Deca has over two decades of media experience, he has traveled to over 77 countries reporting on multilateral development institutions, international business, trade, travels, culture, and diplomacy. He is also a petrol head with in-depth knowledge of automobiles and the auto industry
Africa’s future depends mostly on its ability to embark on digital transformation, and run a climate-smart economy. This was the submission of the Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed who said that if the continent wants to compete for the future, it has to start working assiduously towards achieving digital transformation, a climate-smart economy, and an enabling institutional structure.
Ethiopian prime minister Abiy Ahmed
Abiy Ahmed made the remarks in his opening address to a conference of African ministers of finance, planning and development as part of the 53rd session of the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA).
“There is no doubt that Africa will overtime be a vital linchpin to the global economy,” said the 2019 Nobel laureate. “However, it must do these three things well and quickly to improve its chances of success.”
“We must scale up our investments – a trend already turbocharged by the COVID-19 pandemic. The digital economy is both a source of growth and a key competitive enabler of other productive sectors,” he said.
The ECA annual event – skipped last year due to the pandemic – was launched last Tuesday under the theme “Africa’s sustainable industrialization and diversification in the digital era in the context of COVID-19.”
“The second goal that every African country must adopt is making our economies climate-smart and resilient in diverse ways,” he said, calling for a climate-smart manufacturing sector to drive increasing exports and foreign currency earnings and create employment opportunities.
Africa, he said, must also put in place resilient institutions capable of implementing reforms to help the continent withstand the challenges of the future. Digital transformation is a key driving force for innovation and sustainable growth that can transform Africa into a global powerhouse, said the prime minister.
Kelechi Deca
Kelechi Deca has over two decades of media experience, he has traveled to over 77 countries reporting on multilateral development institutions, international business, trade, travels, culture, and diplomacy. He is also a petrol head with in-depth knowledge of automobiles and the auto industry
As African startups make inroads into fintechs, the biggest opportunities are in savings, wealth management and insurance. This was the opinion of the chief executive officer (CEO) of Africa’s largest mobile money operator, M-Pesa Africa who says that there is still ample room for growth for mobile money throughout Africa, according to Sitoyo Lopokoiyit, interim CEO of M-Pesa Africa.
According to Lopokoiyit the future of mobile money in Africa is fantastic. “We are leapfrogging the card generation and going straight into digital financial services and payments.”
Sitoyo Lopokoiyit, interim CEO of M-Pesa Africa
It could be recalled that Kenya’s leading telecoms operator Safaricom launched the revolutionary mobile money platform M-Pesa in 2007, a step many doubted its viability then. M-Pesa which bypassed the traditional banking system allows subscribers to transfer money between one another and deposit and withdraw cash through a network of agents. The service has presently been expanded to several other African countries and the CEO believes that the future growth in the fintech space resides within the provision of financial health solutions.
“On financial inclusion when M-Pesa started, it was about 23% [in Kenya]. In places like Kenya, it is [now] 84% and above; in Tanzania, it is about 70%. But while that has been really good, financial health has remained relatively low … at about 20%. In this area of fintech and mobile money, we need to start looking at areas in which we can provide savings, wealth management and insurance to be able to cushion customers on the shocks that they may have as they live their lives,” he said.
Covid-19, said Lopokoiyit, has, once again, made the impact of external shocks on financial health abundantly clear. He wants fintech players to be more innovative in developing these solutions and finding ways to make financial products – even those such as government bonds – available to a wider range of customers. M-Pesa is hoping to encourage this innovation by opening its platform even more to third party developers.
“How do we encourage more developers and fintech to come into our ecosystem and innovate?” he asked. “Today in Kenya, there are 29,000 developers on our platform. I would like to see 100,000 developers across Africa use our APIs to develop innovative products and services.”
Referencing the recent announcement that Silicon Valley financial services company Stripe had acquired Nigerian start-up Paystack, Lopokoiyit explained partnerships of this nature are key for African fintech companies to get the valuations they deserve. “If you look at the talent that is being recruited from Africa by the big tech companies it shows that there is potential.”
The intention to establish M-Pesa as a super app that will feature various services such as transport, tourism, e-commerce and utility payments on one platform, was reiterated by Lopokoiyit. He believes partners would be able to publish their offering onto the super app, immediately adding value to the M-Pesa subscriber (more choice) and providing 40 million potential customers to the partner (access to market). “I want customers to look at [the M-Pesa app] as much as they look at WhatsApp on a daily basis, or Instagram.”
Lopokoiyit wants fintech companies and innovative start-ups to embrace engagement with regulators in their jurisdictions. “We work with them every single time. There is no product and service that we launch without the regulator. We actually have discovered it is better to, even on a concept stage, to engage the regulator.”
He further touted the importance of considering a regulator’s perspective when they fulfil their mandate to protect the consumer from systemic risk. “We are commercially driven, we are about transforming lives, but the regulators look at it from a bigger and broader scope; they interact with other regulators across the world, so they do add a lot of value,” he said.
According to Lopokoiyit, Covid-19 pandemic was a the great accelerant for businesses because the impact Covid-19 has had on digital financial services has led to the speed up of adoption, as well as regulatory change and innovation.
There are three phases when looking at the impact of Covid-19, he explained. First, there was the response period from March 2020 when most countries went into hard lockdowns. During this time, various businesses, regulators and governments were looking specifically at how they could assist communities. “We worked, for example, with central banks on lowering or zero-rating transaction fees below $10 to drive more financial inclusion,” he said. Other projects included working with governments to enable disbursements of much-needed relief finance to vulnerable communities. “That showed the impact of mobile money especially in Africa.”
The second phase is one of rebuilding. “This is really critical for the future of businesses in Africa. As we open up, how we look at SMEs and micro-SMEs; how can we help them get back to business?” he asked. Possible interventions could be in one or all of four areas: capacity building; providing working capital at affordable rates; value-added services such as accounting solutions or simplifying cross-border payments; and improving connectivity at affordable rates.
The third phase is reimagining. “We’ve seen areas such as e-commerce really accelerate in the last nine months. Somewhere like Kenya, where we expected to be in 2025, has happened now.” It is time to rethink how to enable businesses to operate in the new dispensation post-Covid-19.
As an example, he listed the number of M-Pesa merchants at 157,000 in March 2020. By September of last year, this had already grown to 170,000. “I think this shift is permanent towards the digital channels,” said Lopokoiyit.
Kelechi Deca
Kelechi Deca has over two decades of media experience, he has traveled to over 77 countries reporting on multilateral development institutions, international business, trade, travels, culture, and diplomacy. He is also a petrol head with in-depth knowledge of automobiles and the auto industry
Startups in Tunisia have some great news. A $75m fund, backed by the World Bank and supported by German Cooperation, has been launched for startups in the country. Also launched are the “Anava” Fund of Funds and the “Startups and Innovative SMEs” project. The project, which will run for 7 years, was designed to support the government’s “Startup Tunisia” program, which aims to catalyze the creation and growth of digital and innovative startups and SMEs, and by ricochet, stimulate economic and employment prospects for young Tunisians.
Here Is What You Need To Know
The project is being championed by the Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations (CDC), Smart Capital, the BM and the GIZ, at the Palais du Baron d´Erlanger (Ennejma Ezzahra) in Sidi Bou Saïd.
The project will finance the subscription of the CDC to the Fund of Funds called “ANAVA”. The target size of the ANAVA fund is 200 million euros (approximately 655.5 million dinars). The ANAVA Fund will support the financial and growth needs of startups.
ANAVA is co-financed by the German Development Bank (KfW) which will manage funds from the European Union and Germany.
How The Fund Will Work
The “Startups and Innovative SMEs” project will finance equity or quasi-equity investments in innovative startups and SMEs, as well as render assistance for concept development, improvement of investment receptivity and technology adoption.
In addition to the Fund of Funds, the project includes a second ecosystem support component called “FlyWheel”, also co-financed by the World Bank and GIZ Tunisia.
This component will help actors in the entrepreneurial ecosystem — especially business incubators and accelerators — to improve and extend the reach of their programs, including startups and SMEs led by women or located in development regions.
What About Anava?
As for the “Anava” fund of funds, an essential component of the “Startups and Innovative SMEs” project, it was also launched at the same time, with a first closing (last stage of fundraising) of 40 million euros (approximately 130 million Tunisian dinars).
This is one of the key pillars of the national Startup Tunisia initiative, which aims to make Tunisia “a country of Startups at the crossroads of the Mediterranean, the MENA region and Africa”.
ANAVA will contribute to the promotion and financing of startups and innovative companies, and will thus make it possible to create wealth in an inclusive manner, generate jobs with high added value and promote the spirit of initiative among young Tunisians.
Its mission: to acquire a stake in collective investment funds or any category of mutual funds (the underlying funds) dedicated to startups and innovative companies and covering all their phases of life and development.
These include, in particular, underlying funds focused on seed or Seed stage funds, Early stage funds (funds focused on the initial stages of development of startups); Late Stage funds (funds focused on the advanced stages of development of innovative companies).
The ANAVA Fund is managed by SMART CAPITAL, the operator of the national Startup Tunisia initiative which aims to make Tunisia a Startup Friendly country (or friend of startups).
According to Meriem Zine, investment director at Smart Capital and responsible for leading the ANAVA Fund of Funds, this is the first fund of funds in Tunisia.
It is a regional fund with a maturity of 20 years, with the program investing in at least 16 funds dedicated to startups and funding around 350 startups.
The Minister of Communication Technologies, Mohamed Fadhel Kraiem, present at the launching ceremony of the said project, underlined the importance of the “Startups and Innovative SMEs” project which is based on three components: regulatory (Startup act), financial (Fonds de Fund and Flywheel) and a third component which will be focused around the development of a framework that will allow the administration to access innovative solutions in all areas, through the involvement of startups and innovative SMEs / SMIs.
He said that since the adoption of the Start Up Act in April 2019, no less than 450 startups have been labeled out of around 750 candidate startups, an average of 20 startups per month, affirming that the labeling dynamic has been maintained despite the pandemic, which reflects its durability.
Lessons from Tunisia’s seeming success with its Startup Act
Tunisia’s Startup Act has largely succeeded because of a collaboration between the public and private sectors. For instance, Smart Capital, the company in charge of administering the Tunisian Startup Act is privately managed, although with public shareholding. The company was approved by the Tunisian Financial Markets Council, and works with the country’s Ministry of Communication Technologies and Digital Economy and the Ministry of Finance. Smart Capital’s mission is simple and straight-forward: design and implement the Startup Tunisia initiative (including among others, the Startup Act and the Fund of Funds ANAVA), in order to make Tunisia a country of startups at the crossroads of the Mediterranean, MENA region and Africa.
Thus, handing over the administration of the Act to a private entity has saved the Act from the bugs of bureaucracy and inefficiencies that eat up most government commissions and agencies in Africa. The company has been promoting Tunisian startups and planning several launches of funds in support of startups, recently.
Charles Rapulu Udoh
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based lawyer who has advised startups across Africa on issues such as startup funding (Venture Capital, Debt financing, private equity, angel investing etc), taxation, strategies, etc. He also has special focus on the protection of business or brands’ intellectual property rights ( such as trademark, patent or design) across Africa and other foreign jurisdictions. He is well versed on issues of ESG (sustainability), media and entertainment law, corporate finance and governance. He is also an award-winning writer
Redbird, an Accra-based healthtech company that enables doctors and patients to display the specifics of test results at any time, has raised $1.5 million in seed funding to enable it to expand its operations in Ghana and to enter new markets that will remain unnamed.
“Very happy to be able to publicly share that Redbird has closed a seed round with J&J Foundation, Newtown Partners (via the Imperial Venture Fund), Founders Factory Africa, and others. The past year has thrown a lot of unexpected challenges in our path, but I’m very proud of the Redbird team for showing resilience and dedication to our customers and to patients needing convenient medical testing now more than ever. J&J Foundation, Newtown, and FFA each bring not just investment, but also the expertise that will help us continue to grow and bring convenient testing across the continent. Very excited to have them join the Redbird team and for what we’ll achieve together in 2021!” Said Redbird CEO Pattrick Beattie.
The team at Redbird. Image credits: Redbird
Here Is What You Need To Know
Johnson & Johnson Foundation, Newton Partners (via the Imperial Venture Fund), and Founders Factory Africa were among the investors in the round. This takes the total sum earned for the company to $2.5 million.
Redbird took part in the Alchemist Accelerator just a few months before its completion in 2018. It was the second African startup to participate in the six-month initiative, following fellow Ghanaian healthtech startup mPharma. In April of last year, the company was accepted into Founders Factory Africa.
Why The Investors Invested
Since 2016, lead investor in this round, Cape Town-based Newtown Partners, has actively been investing in startups in Africa via its Imperial Venture Fund. The VC took part in equity fundraises for Lori Systems; Field Intelligence; SweepSouth; Wala; OVEX, among others. The VC invests in a variety of startups, no matter the sectors.
“We’re excited about Redbird’s decentralised business model that enables rapid diagnostic testing at the point of primary care in local community pharmacies. Redbird’s digital health record platform has the potential to drive significant value to the broader healthcare value chain and is a vital step toward improving healthcare outcomes in Africa. We look forward to supporting the team as they prove out their business model and scale across the African continent,” Llew Claasen, the managing partner of Newtown Partners said.
Based in the UK, Founders Factory Africa runs an accelerator program for startups. Apart from its accelerator program, it also invests in startups. Redbird was part of its accelerator cohort in March 2020 when it poured $271k into the startup as well as in Truzo (South Africa), MVXchange (Nigeria) and WellaHealth (Nigeria). The fresh investment in Redbird is evident of the startup’s positive performance.
The Johnson & Johnson Foundation is funded entirely by the Johnson & Johnson Family of Companies, and it currently operates as the Johnson & Johnson Foundation US (founded in 1953) and Johnson & Johnson Foundation Scotland (founded 2007). Johnson & Johnson Impact Ventures, a creative finance vehicle designed to fix the current void in health-focused impact investing by financing social enterprises that help front-line health workers, is one of the Foundation’s initiatives.
Patrick Beattie, Andrew Quao, and Edward Grandstaff founded the healthtech company in 2018. Beattie’s work as a founding scientist at a Boston-based medical diagnostics startup was to create innovative rapid diagnostic tests. During his time in Accra in 2016, he met Quao, a Ghanaian trained pharmacist, at a hackathon, and discovered that their interests in medical research were close.
Redbird allows Ghanaian pharmacies to provide quick diagnostic testing for ten different health conditions as part of their pharmacy services. Anemia, blood sugar, blood pressure, BMI, cholesterol, Hepatitis B, malaria, typhoid, prostate cancer screening, and pregnancy are among the tests available.
“Pharmacies who partner with Redbird gain access to the software and all the ways Redbird supports our partners for free as long as they purchase the consumables through us. This aligns our revenue with their success, which is aligned with patient usage,” said the CEO.
In Ghana, this model is used in over 360 pharmacies, primarily in Accra and Kumasi. Despite the pandemic, Redbird has more than doubled its numbers since 2019. In the last three years, these pharmacies have recorded over 125,000 tests from over 35,000 patients who have registered on the website.
Charles Rapulu Udoh
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based lawyer who has advised startups across Africa on issues such as startup funding (Venture Capital, Debt financing, private equity, angel investing etc), taxation, strategies, etc. He also has special focus on the protection of business or brands’ intellectual property rights ( such as trademark, patent or design) across Africa and other foreign jurisdictions. He is well versed on issues of ESG (sustainability), media and entertainment law, corporate finance and governance. He is also an award-winning writer
HexGn is a world-renowned startup accelerator. It has partnered with Nigerian hubs Passion Incubator, Leadspace and HubOne by FCMB to launch its flagship program: Startup Ready. It targets African startups and aims to help them turn their brilliant ideas into concrete and sustainable businesses.
Accelerator HexGn
The Startup Ready by HexGn is open to anyone in the early stages of building a business with global ambitions. The program helps startup entrepreneurs set up Minimum Viable Products or MVPs to receive feedback and gain validation.
For three months, candidates take part in activities designed to help them refine their concept, solidify their business model and improve their readiness for global investors. HexGn offers scholarships and fee waivers to deserving startups; That is, with ideas that can evolve globally and generate new employment opportunities locally.
Registrations are possible by following this link.
Charles Rapulu Udoh
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based lawyer who has advised startups across Africa on issues such as startup funding (Venture Capital, Debt financing, private equity, angel investing etc), taxation, strategies, etc. He also has special focus on the protection of business or brands’ intellectual property rights ( such as trademark, patent or design) across Africa and other foreign jurisdictions. He is well versed on issues of ESG (sustainability), media and entertainment law, corporate finance and governance. He is also an award-winning writer
The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated digitalization around the world, but as life has shifted increasingly online, cybercriminals have exploited the opportunity to attack vital digital infrastructure. States across Africa, where digital capacity continues to lag behind the rest of the world, have emerged as a favorite target of cybercriminals, with costly consequences. In early October 2020, Uganda’s telecoms and banking sectors were plunged into crisis due to a major hack that compromised the country’s mobile money network, usage of which has significantly increased during the pandemic. At least $3.2 million is estimated to have been stolen in that incident, in which hackers used around 2,000 mobile SIM cards to gain access to the mobile money payment system. In June, the second-largest hospital operator in South Africa was hit by a cyber-attack in the midst of the COVID-19 outbreak, paralyzing the 6,500-bed private healthcare provider, forcing them to switch manual back-up systems.
Cybersecurity
In light of increased attacks, institutions such as the Central Bank of Nigeria and national cyber-response organizations in Tunisia, Ivory Coast, Morocco, and Kenya have sounded the alarm to businesses and citizens, urging them to improve security measures. But states across Africa still lack a dedicated public cybersecurity strategy. As a result, cybersecurity initiatives related to COVID-19 have been mostly led by the private sector, especially professional and sectoral federations. These are rarely enough, as it’s a long, hard grind for most companies just to cope with the business impact of the pandemic on their day-to-day activities.
Addressing these vulnerabilities in the context of heightened cyberattacks requires a coordinated and dedicated commitment to cybersecurity at a time when governments and organizations are already be strained by the health and economic consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic. African states and regional bodies have taken initial steps toward implementing a continent-wide strategy to improving cyber-resiliency, but the vulnerabilities exposed by the COVID-19 pandemic requires these efforts to be accelerated by building the institutional and coordinating mechanisms to better mitigate cybersecurity threats.
Policy tools for African governments
In order to strengthen cybersecurity, African governments can take a number of steps to improve their capacity to prevent and respond to cybersecurity vulnerabilities. First, it is essential that policymakers define a medium and long-term cybersecurity policy and strategy to integrate cybersecurity into government initiatives and to specify the resources needed to achieve them. This requires setting up national authorities or agencies with sufficient financial resources to implement the strategy and strengthen the country’s cyber-resilience. Additionally, governments must promote a responsible societal cybersecurity culture in order to strengthen the confidence of citizens and organizations in the cyber economy, digital services, and the broader internet. States must set up awareness-raising and training programs in cybersecurity for the public, private, academic, and civil society sectors in order to equip them with the skills and knowledge necessary to respond to cybersecurity risks. Governments must also establish the legal frameworks that are key to regulate the use of cyberspace and to sanction cybercrimes.
Fortunately, governments in the region have made some promising steps on these issues. The African Union, as part of its “Agenda 2063” for transforming Africa, has identified cybersecurity as a key priority to ensure that emerging technologies are used for the benefit of African individuals, institutions, and nation-states and to guarantee data protection and safety online. This project is guided by the African Union Convention on Cyber Security and Personal Data Protection (Malabo Convention), which was drafted in 2011 but only adopted in June 2014. The convention’s purpose is to establish a “credible framework for cybersecurity in Africa through organization of electronic transactions, protection of personal data, promotion of cyber security, e-governance and combating cybercrime.” But as of June 2020, the convention has only been ratified by 8 out of 55 AU members (Angola, Ghana, Guinea, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Rwanda and Senegal), while 14 countries have signed but not ratified it. The AU Cybersecurity Expert Group, formed in 2018, must provide leadership and momentum for the convention’s ratification and deployment. The need for progress on this issue is urgent: The International Telecommunication Union’s Global Cybersecurity Index assess in its 2018 report that African countries are the world’s least committed to cybersecurity.
To improve resiliency, African states must urgently define response plans to be deployed in the event of a major attack on their critical infrastructure. These plans should describe what immediate nation-wide actions would be taken, as well as digital fall-back alternatives, to ensure that government and organizations would still be able to operate even with a sudden loss of digital tools and networks. National and regional stake holders should be involved in the response plan, and the nation’s cybersecurity maturity and capability levels should be taken into account, in order to adapt the response to the local context and to available financial, human, and technology resources. This context-dependent response is particularly important, as Africa is home to many low-income countries and lacks cybersecurity specialists with the required skills to help carry out timely and adequate responses to cyber-attacks. Given that cybercrime has no borders, international and cross-stakeholder collaboration and coordination, as well as cooperation between public and private sector leaders, will be of great importance here.
National cyber-response plans can be strengthened through the establishment of well-resourced and fully functional regional and national Cyber Emergency Response Teams (CERTs) throughout Africa. As of early 2019 only thirteen African countries had stood up such organizations. Regular drills should be performed to assess plans and improve them, for example by participating in the national or regional cyber-drills carried out by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU).
Cybersecurity capacity building (CCB) provides the basis for countries to both improve their digital economies and boost their resilience against cyber threats. Many global CCB initiatives are already underway in African institutions and states. These include the Global Cyber Security Capacity Centre (GCSCC) with its Cybersecurity Capacity Maturity Model (CMM) as part of the Commonwealth Cyber Program, the Global Forum on Cyber Expertise (GFCE), and the International Telecommunication Union with the GCI (Global Cybersecurity Index), just to name a few.These initiatives promote international cooperation, which is key to global and national cybersecurity. They also provide a benchmark and reference for governments building their national cybersecurity policies and strategies. There are several frameworks available for capacity building initiatives, with the Cybersecurity Capacity Maturity Model (CMM) from the GCSCC being the most comprehensive one. This model suggests that the five following dimensions are crucial to building a country’s cybersecurity capacity: policy and strategy, culture and society, education and training, legal and cooperation, standards and technologies. Capacity building is a long-term objective that needs to be well planned, adequately resourced, and regularly monitored in order to be achieved with efficiency. Greater state capacity enables better policy and cybersecurity implementation.
Good progress has been made to improve African countries cybersecurity posture. Mauritius is often cited as a reference on the continent in terms of cyber capacity, because of its legal and technical infrastructure, its national cybersecurity agency (CERT-MU), its national training and awareness initiatives, and the involvement of public and private actors in these efforts. Mauritius ranks first among African countries and 14th globally, in the most recent ITU Global Cybersecurity Index (GCI) report from 2018. It has set up a National Disaster Cybersecurity and Cybercrime Committee that includes both public and private sectors and facilitates the monitoring, control, and transmission of decisions during cyber crisis situations. Mauritius is one of the eight African countries to have ratified the Malabo, with which their Computer Misuse and Cybercrime Act is aligned, along with the Budapest convention on cybercrime. Mauritius has built a centralized portal to report cyber incidents and a security operations center to detect and monitor malicious traffic in real-time to enhance the country’s cyber threat preparedness.
African states, institutions, and civil society must not only demonstrate their commitment to cybersecurity, but also work in close collaboration and partnership toward the shared objective of protecting citizens, businesses, and organizations in the digital era. This will be imperative to prevent more damaging cyber-attacks, which on the heels of the COVID-19 pandemic could have devastating impacts.
Landry Signé is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, a distinguished fellow at Stanford Universit while Kevin Signé is an information security senior fellow at the Global Network for Africa’s Prosperity.
Kelechi Deca
Kelechi Deca has over two decades of media experience, he has traveled to over 77 countries reporting on multilateral development institutions, international business, trade, travels, culture, and diplomacy. He is also a petrol head with in-depth knowledge of automobiles and the auto industry
Jumia, Africa’s first unicorn and largest e-commerce company is selling 9 million American depositary shares (ADS) in a move to raise more cash for its expansion drive. The e-commerce giant whose stock is currently trading at $42.14 at the New York Stock Exchange expects to raise about $400 million from the exercise. This is coming months after it sold almost 7 million shares at an average price of $30.51 per ADS, raising $243.2 million in the process. It is a smart move from the company as it is cashing in on the Bull Run it has enjoyed in the past eight months.
Jumia co-CEO Sacha Poignonnec
Critics expressed mixed feelings at the move as Jumia has not made a profit since it launched and although its losses have slowed down, they are still substantial. In 2020, the company lost $177 million, an improvement on the $270 million that it lost in 2019. Observers are of the view that Jumia is bleeding cash and now that it is a publicly listed company, burning cash at that rate could be tricky. Its cash balance for the year ended 2020 was $361 million despite the fact that it raised money in December.
With no clear indication of when the company will become profitable, raising money gives the company runway to survive a few more years without being profitable. Yet, raising money through the secondary sale of shares comes at the cost of diluting shares. The current sales will dilute the current shareholders’ positions by about 10% and Jumia has said the proceeds would be used for general corporate purposes. Yet, shareholders don’t seem impressed with the plan. While shareholders sometimes view secondary offerings as an unusual way to raise money, it is cheaper than debt. Yet, it comes at a cost to the shareholders of lower earnings per share (EPS).
Kelechi Deca
Kelechi Deca has over two decades of media experience, he has traveled to over 77 countries reporting on multilateral development institutions, international business, trade, travels, culture, and diplomacy. He is also a petrol head with in-depth knowledge of automobiles and the auto industry
