2019 has proven a good year for health and ride-sharing startups in Africa. More funding is coming than ever before. Kenyan startup Ilara Health, which is bringing affordable diagnostics services to doctors, has just joined the wagon. The startup has raised a US$735,000 seed funding round to grow its offering in the East African country and ultimately beyond.
Here Is The Deal
The US$735,000 seed funding for the startup came from investment firms ShakaVC, Chandaria Capital, and Villgro Kenya, with the round also including angel investors such as Esther Dyson, Nijhad Jamal, Aadil Mamujee, Selma Ribica, and Shakir Merali. Several of the new investors will become strategic advisors to the business.
“Seventy per cent of patients need some form of medical test to inform their treatment, but many doctors across Africa have limited ability to perform diagnostics in their clinics. When a patient needs a test, doctors often refer them to a lab. Given the infrastructure challenges across the region — the time, the money it takes to get anywhere — patients frequently fail to attend and care breaks down,” said Emilian Popa, co-founder and chief executive officer (CEO) at Ilara Health.
This round of investment will be used primarily to grow Ilara Health ’s peri-urban medical clinic customers in Kenya, and ultimately beyond. It will also allow the company to build a flexible technology platform to manage and protect valuable patient health and clinic financial data.
A Glance At The Startup
Founded in 2018, Kenyan health startup Ilara Health sources tech-powered diagnostics equipment and makes it accessible to Africans who struggle to afford it, bundling the equipment and integrating the devices via a proprietary technology platform. Doctors pay a deposit to use the equipment and then pay off the remaining cost in installments determined by usage.
What Drew Investors In
Esther Dyson, angel investor and executive founder at Wellville, said she had invested in Ilara because she had watched CEO Popa explore the market to find the perfect, sustainable product-market fit.
“Moreover, the need is great, and the benefits of simple, cost-effective diagnostic tools will extend well beyond the patients and doctors, affecting first Kenya and ultimately the continent at large,” she said.
Charles Rapulu Udoh
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based Lawyer with special focus on Business Law, Intellectual Property Rights, Entertainment and Technology Law. He is also an award-winning writer. Working for notable organizations so far has exposed him to some of industry best practices in business, finance strategies, law, dispute resolution, and data analytics both in Nigeria and across the world.
This is a huge chance for agritech startups across Nigeria. The FCMB-Wennovation Agritech Incubation Programme, in conjunction with Wennovation Hub, has launched a bid to guide early-stage AgriTech Start-ups across Nigeria so that they can test and validate their ideas as well as gather their first set of customers or pivot if need be.
This will be done through a combination of financial support, guidance, and training. The secondary objective is to prepare these start-ups for acceleration.
Here Is All You Need To Know
The goal of the 2019 incubation is to:
Expose 10 teams across Nigeria to the root of the pre-defined problem statement by merging an in-depth problem definition strategy with an immersion process.
Support at least top 10 teams with a demonstrable Minimum Viable Product to build a sustainable business model by taking them through a design thinking workshop and subsequently a 3 weeks incubation program.
Support at least tops 2 Agritech startups in Nigeria with seed investments and grants.
Offer access to experienced mentors and a cohort structure that encourages peer learning and support.
Provide opportunities to connect with potential customers and investors.
What Are Expected of Prospective Applicants
Applications should focus on four problem statements, namely Input, Production, Processing and Storage, and Marketing and Sales, with Wennovation Hub looking for MVP-stage startups with some form of market validation.
The programme commences with a one-week immersion component where selected startups get to interact with community members through Wennovation Hub immersion partners. Startups who successfully complete the immersion programme and the required reporting commitments will be invited to a two-week Bootcamp in Lagos.
It all concludes with a demo day in September, with all successful startups to be taken into a six-month post-Bootcamp aftercare programme
At the end of calls for application, 10 Agritech start-ups will be selected for the incubation program.
The program will be concluded with a pitching competition at the demo day where 2 Agritech startups will win a total of N3million in Grants.
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based Lawyer with special focus on Business Law, Intellectual Property Rights, Entertainment and Technology Law. He is also an award-winning writer. Working for notable organizations so far has exposed him to some of industry best practices in business, finance strategies, law, dispute resolution, and data analytics both in Nigeria and across the world.
Looking for an entrepreneur with the Midas Touch for startups? Cameron Chell, the CEO of his newest startup ICOx Innovations, which is one of only a small handful of companies that have the ability to address the demand for both branded currency and blockchain platform integrations, can fit into that description.
Son of a former rancher dad, who was also the local butcher, and a mom who was the local florist in a very, very small Canadian town of Fort Macleod, southern Alberta, Canada, Cameron Chell told Alejandro Cramades that he had not known anything apart from entrepreneurship all his life.
‘‘I’ve just never known anything else,’’ he said. ‘‘Both my parents were entrepreneurs, and back in those days, they didn’t call them entrepreneurs. They were small business owners. They worked seven days a week. We went to church on Sundays, but they still worked. All three of those industries or those businesses, you had to work every day. I just don’t know anything else. So, I feel very blessed and lucky to have been brought up that way.’’
So Many Startups In His Portfolio
Cameron Chell said he had built and exited eight to nine startups.
‘‘You know,’’ he said. ‘‘I haven’t actually kept track, but it would be probably in the range of somewhere between eight and nine. And it depends on what you call an exit too. If you call them partial exits or exits whereby they’ve gone public and were part of the team, and have been bought two or three times before it’s gone public, I would say a dozen at least. But in terms of just pure, pure like, “We built it once and sold it to one buyer then it would be six, I believe if I’m not mistaken.’’
Cameron built his first tech company, FutureLink. In terms of what FutureLink did, its first version would be called a cloud computing application.
FutureLink went on to work with a number of companies from Oracle and Sun, to Microsoft, IBM, and Compaq. It achieved around a $3.2 billion dollar market cap, back when a billion dollars was worth its bargain.
‘‘FutureLink, I would love to say, was purely my idea,’’ he said. ‘‘It was actually my brother-in-law who came up with the notion of being able to run apps in server farms and have the app be accessed via the internet. This brand new thing called the internet. This is back in ’94, ’95 when we were starting to talk about it. In ’96 when we launched it.’’
Cameron Chell said they were basically trying to enhance both the upgrade experience for users on FutureLink so that people wouldn’t have to go into the computer land or the computer store at that time and buy 3 1/2″ decks and load them into a computer.
‘‘Well, why do you even have to do all that?’’ He said. ‘‘Why aren’t you just accessing the software that sits on the server somewhere as well, as mobile computing was really starting to make its mark? Like, why do I need to carry a laptop? Why don’t we login via what we were calling it at that time a thin client? We were working with a number of companies, everywhere from Oracle and Sun, and Microsoft, and IBM, and Compact because there was this computer utility thin client kind of revolution that was coming. We actually dubbed the industry application service provider industry.’’
At the same time, Chell was also running similar companies, such as ASP Industry Consortium, and was heavily committed to engineering. This could be so dizzying considering that he was trying to run successful companies and not just companies for companies’ sake. Chell said he was usually highly effective if he had a couple of things going on at the same time
‘‘We launched the ASP Industry Consortium, and that was really a self-serving mechanism to try to get adoption in the industry, but also to try to bring some standards to the space,’’ he said. ‘‘We had positioned FutureLink as one of the founding companies, and I was lucky enough to take on the vice chairman role there and really became the promoter of that. Again, We also started a company called Engyro which went through a name change. Eventually, that company was sold off to Microsoft separately. I think in true serial founder fashion, I tend to work better if I’ve got a couple of things going on at the same time.’’
However, his multitasking turned out to be successful because according to him, he was very lucky to work with very accomplished teams.
‘‘They let me lead some of the strategic direction, and then they handle a bunch of the coding, the product design. I like to be involved on the architect side of things. But once we get a layer deeper, I’m either out of time or out of skill,’’ he said.
Chell said for each of these initiatives or startups he had co-founders, but he was careful about the roles they occupied in his startups.
‘‘In every single case, I’ve had co-founders,’’ he said. ‘‘I would say in the early days, much to my own character defect, I would stand out in the front, and I would say, “I was the founder, and the reality is I wasn’t.” I wasn’t the only founder. I think I was a really an important part at times to make a number of these organizations work, but not everything has worked by any stretch of the imagination. There has always been, not just two co-founders, but really a co-founding team when we really get honest about that. The co-founders I choose tend to be either technical or operational. Previous to this, they were much more finance co-founders. My role tends to have skewed over the years to a much more finance role and a strategic direction role.
So, the co-founders that I mix with tend to be more technical, more marketing and a bit more operational.
The Outcome of Chell’s First Set of Startups
Although Chell also built Engyro in the early days, it ended up pivoting to a billing payment system in particular for the Dotnet World.
‘‘It went through a couple of iterations to get to that point, but that’s where it ended up,’’ he said. ‘‘It was two management teams after us. We were still involved strategically, but it was two management teams after our initial initiative that eventually got that sold off to Microsoft. I don’t recall the amount. It wasn’t a huge exit. I think it was probably an 18-million-dollar total sale. We weren’t large shareholders at that time.
‘‘FutureLink was very successful and quite fortunate for us,’’he said. ‘‘It ended up having about a 3.2-billion-dollar market cap. This is back when a billion dollars was not what a billion dollars is today. It seems like there are a lot of companies with a billion-dollar market evaluations. Not to take anything away from any of them, but it was a really big deal for us. So, we were a company that had Fortune 500 customers. Our customers were people like Microsoft, Great Plains, and Citrix.’’
Chell said all of these were happening at great revenue base.
‘‘Then there was this other thing happening that we were relatively kind of almost ignorant to which was called the Dotcom,’’ he said. ‘‘We caught a hold of it, and we just ended up being a startup that had some fundamentals behind it and with beneficiaries of a great market. We were building something that we were really passionate about.’’
What Happened to FutureLink, Cameron Chell’s First Company
To get the picture clearer, Chell said he hired a new chairman for FutureLink at the insistence of the financiers of the company.
‘‘He came out of the Telco industry,’’ Chell said. ‘‘He came in, and unbeknownst to me, when he took on the chairman role, he actually started acting like a proper chairman. I was quite insulted by that. He obviously didn’t understand who I was or how important I was as a 20-some-year-old founder and CEO of this company.’’
At that point, events took a new twist.
‘‘What ensued was me getting fired for being an arrogant little ****. It was absolutely one of the best things that could have happened to me, but I was still too stubborn to recognize what a great lesson and opportunity it was. I took my arrogance and channeled it completely inappropriately; sued the company, and started a competing company, and did all the absolute junior mistakes that one would expect from a complete *** ****, which is what I was at the time. The other thing that was not of benefit, though I thought it was great at the time, was because I was fired, a bunch of my stock nested; a bunch of my stock didn’t nest; some of it did, and I was liquid. I was liquid before the crash.’’
Chell said events were not entirely bad after that ordeal.
‘‘So, I was able to garner a little cash, not as much as one would think, but I was able to get a decent little nest egg out of it which gave me some firepower to start a bunch more companies and create more problems for myself ultimately,’’ he said. ‘‘But if it wasn’t for that, I’m sure I would have never sold the share and rode the thing right into the ground. So, ultimately, the company did fail in the Dotcom boom, though I can’t take credit for that. I’m not saying it would have succeeded if I had stayed at the helm, but it was a high-flying Dotcom. All that being said, I do want to point out that this was a company that had approximately, if I’m not mistaken, about 80 million dollars in revenue.’’
Here Is Why Chell Could Manage All of These Startups At A Time
Cameron Chell said he was probably all successful because of the lean startup approach he had adopted at his startups.
‘‘We were, without knowing it, very lean-centric,’’ he said. ‘‘And of course, it wasn’t called lean then. It was basically called survival back then, and it wasn’t really an accepted practice in terms of how you built startups. The accepted practice of the day was raise a bunch of money, build a whole bunch of infrastructure, and hope customers show up. We were never huge, huge capital raisers. We were builders first, which I think is often quite characteristic of founders.’’
Chell said his startups would usually end up getting a customer first, and then build the product around their requirement.
‘‘That’s just how we’ve built things always,’’ he said. ‘‘As Eric Ries and that whole lean startup moment really came in, it was really exciting and familiar to see. We didn’t even recognize that that’s what we were doing. So, we’d become pretty strong proponents of what that is and how that works. It was interesting to see somebody from outside our organization teaching us what we were already doing.’’
‘‘I realized that I wasn’t in control of things’’
For Cameron Chell, the bombing of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, changed the way he previously viewed life entirely.
‘‘I went on and kept building a bunch more companies. Some were moderately successful. Some were complete disasters,’’ he said. ‘‘But in 2001, I was at the base of the World Trade Center on 9/11, and, my life, whether I knew it or not at the time, was headed for a major catastrophe because I was just running completely out of control, and just totally self-centered. By the end of the day on 9/11, I was in complete disarray wondering why I was alive, and other people weren’t. It was probably the first chunk of my self-centeredness being at least somewhat corrected. I realized that I wasn’t in control of things.’’
Chell’s life took a new downward turn afterward. He found himself suddenly homeless.
‘‘So, all this great value and brilliance that I thought I was creating, I really started to question it,’’ he said. ‘‘Within a very short time, I was drinking heavily, and within a very short time, I was abusing drugs. Within about two years, I was completely bankrupt and desolate. Within three years, I was living on the street, and I spent the next seven years after that working to get clean and spent a lot of time in the street, and rehabs, and such to get my life back on track, which by the grace of God and a lot of great people, I’ve now been clean for over 10 years.’’
Chell was literally watching his life slip out of his hands. At a time, he would make up his mind to get back on track, but that would not hold.
‘‘I wish that I could tell you that moment,’’ he said. ‘‘That moment happened two dozen times for me, where I said, “This is it. I’m done. I’m going to get better. I’m going to fix it.” Even two dozen times is a joke. I’d wake up every morning or be awake for three days straight, and every 10 minutes I’d be like, “Okay. That’s it. I’m done. I’m done.” An hour later I’m off running again, just doing whatever I could to get my fix. So, I would love to say it was willpower and I decided I was going to do it, and there was this great burning bush or something, and it wasn’t. What happened was a lucky situation. It didn’t seem lucky at the time where I was in a lot of danger. I was being pursued by a gang. I lived on the street, and I was getting beat up by them.’’
Chell said he was in the streets for a consistent four years that was on and off.
‘‘Like in and out,’’ he said. ‘‘Actually, my total round was about a decade, just a little bit over a decade, about 12 years from when I really slipped deeply until I finally got myself cleaned. I didn’t get myself cleaned up, but I was finally able to get cleaned up, which is quite a short timeframe for somebody that goes really deep and lives on the street because most people don’t come back from the street. But there were four years in there where I was just completely gone, un-findable.’’
Long story short, Chell had to get through a few days without DOC, the drug of his choice.
‘‘I ended up getting through 10 days without it while getting away from this gang,’’ he said. ‘‘ I just didn’t really have a choice. I hit rock bottom. That’s the bottom line. I didn’t have a choice to use it again at that time because I decided I did want to live. I didn’t know that I wanted to live, but I did want to live. At the end of 10 days clean, something just started to click. I had had 10 days clean before, but not having gone through what I had gone through in the previous 10 days. I knew that if I ever touched anything again, that I wouldn’t come back and I’d be done. I could just see so many people that were really sincerely and authentically trying to help me, and I was just disrespecting them at every moment.’’
However, Chell said since recovery, there were many tempting times over the weeks and the months and years ensuing where if it just weren’t for some pure luck he would have relapsed to his former position.
‘‘Founders can be incredibly impulsive, compulsive, and generally always determined people,’’ he said. ‘‘So, when there’s something that has worked before to solve a problem, like using a drug or something, it’s tough to get away from that. I see a lot of founders. I get to coach and mentor some of them, and I see the intensity that they approach things with. You generally have to be on some level incredibly intense to be able to do something like this or to take the risks or be willing to subject yourself to the things that you go through. It puts you in a lot of risky situations, but also, you’re generally kind of predetermined to be a certain type of individual that could be subject to falling into these traps. I guess my point is, there was no burning bush, and it was a lot of luck and a lot of great people that helped me get through that.’’
Cameron Chell said at that point when he was in the street, he had given up on himself.
‘‘I had not only given up on myself, I had actually believed that everybody, the entire world, my family, everybody was better off with me,’’ he said. ‘‘Like you justify it this way, that it was better off with me being on the street because I was so worthless. Homelessness itself is its own form of drug, and it is its own form of mental illness that draws you into it where you don’t want to leave. You don’t want to leave. In fact, I would say today when I’m hungry or lonely or tired or angry, just haven’t been looking after myself, the odd crazy thought of being homeless would slip into my head and be more attractive than the odd crazy thought of using drugs. It’s a very odd mindset that slips into that, but worthlessness is at the forefront in it.’’
A Ton of Lessons From That Experience
Chell said he learned many lessons from that experience.
‘‘There are so many great lessons that I’ve been given, but the one that I hang onto the most every day now is that I stay very, very present,’’ he said. ‘‘So, I only do the next thing in front of me. It’s almost counter-intuitive because we’re taught to be visionaries, we’re taught to be what’s the next big thing. We have to see around corners and anticipate the next move. If you’re not a great Chess player, you’re not a great CEO, and if you’re not all those things. But, you know, the reality is if you just don’t get done the next most important thing, none of it matters.’’
Chell said ninety percent, in his opinion, of founders today who don’t succeed generally do it not because they haven’t got a great idea.
‘‘There are amazing, great ideas out there,’’ he said. ‘‘I sit in Angel Forums and I listen to pitches, and the ideas and the thinking is incredible. But 99% of the time, the reason that you, whether it’s recognized or not, the reason that people don’t invest in those founders is because they don’t believe they can execute the next step. It’s really all just about what is the next most important thing to do.’’
Chell goes on further to say that when he gets up in the morning, his mind is already racing.
‘‘If the first thing I don’t do is meditate…I worry about the next 15 minutes getting to my workout, getting back on time, getting my kids’ breakfast ready. If I don’t take that level of pragmatic approach as a founder, I’m also not going to run my business well. So, those are the things that I’ve seen investors really focus on whether they recognize it or not. I’ve also found that the most successful founders have a high level of anxiety. One of the greatest ways for them to elevate that anxiety is to know that everything will be okay if you just get the next thing done.’’
Now 42 years old, and things are starting to turnaround, Chell is now a father and in a loving relationship. But he has also been diagnosed with lymphoma cancer.
‘‘It’s just another one of those great lessons where you realize you’re not in control. So, I didn’t recognize it, but now I had some clean time, I had somebody to love me, I had a family that was growing, and I thought, “Hey, I’ve done everything right. I deserve to be in this spot that I was in because I’ve done all the hard work,” he said. ‘‘Again, entitlement, a character defect of mine, just slapped me right in the face and said, “You’re not in control.” I was diagnosed with lymphoma cancer. Part of my first reaction was like, “What! I’ve done everything I was supposed to do. I’ve done everything right. Why would this happen?” So, it really, again, it was a blessing because it really took the need for me to let go of ego and start to understand, where is my self-centeredness in this, and understanding this isn’t all about me. I’m not a victim here.’’
‘‘And what are the most important things that I need to take care of in terms of my family, and the people that I was working with, and the investors that had put money into projects that I was building? And here I was diagnosed with lymphoma cancer.
‘‘When I got focused on those things rather than, oh, my gosh. What about me? Why am I not getting what “I deserve?” Things turned around. I was very, very lucky that physically and health-wise, I was able to get on the other side of it and I’ve been clean of that now for eight years, or lymphoma cancer-free for eight years. I promise you: I totally believe that if I would have stayed in a state of victimhood or entitlement, I don’t know if I would have beaten it.’’
It was a grace that I’m here, but it sure changed that whole experience. But even if I hadn’t (because I was able to get to a spot of not having that entitlement) even if I hadn’t been able to beat it, I believe that both my family and my co-workers and our investors would have been fine because of the steps we would have taken to help ensure that everything was fine. Again, it was just about the next thing. We won’t worry about 20 years down the road. We’re just worrying about what’s the next most important thing to get done.
Back To Work
Cameron Chell had since moved on. He has spent much of his time building series of other startups.
‘‘Again, I didn’t really know much else, so I had already launched a couple of companies,’’ he said. ‘‘The first one was a company called UrtheCast. Our idea was to build a competitor to Google Earth by putting live video cameras in space. In fact, we were going to put them on the International Space Station.So, we were successful in doing this. We raised a very small amount of capital to start. We started proving up the idea. We got a couple of customers onboard that liked the idea, and they funded some of the product development, and then eventually, we were able to raise bigger and bigger capital and bring on a more and more senior management team. Today, those cameras are on the International Space Station, and they provide live video feeds of earth. The primary customers are B2B, not B2C as we had originally contemplated.
To date, at least to my knowledge, they are still the only live video from space. All other video in space is all based on still pictures being taken. I mean, they’re fast still pictures, but none-the-less, it’s not video. Since then, I think we’ve got 22 companies in our portfolio to date.
UrtheCast Has Since Gone Public And Done Its IPO
Chell said UrtheCast has since gone public and has secured a series of funding for the business.
‘‘The total capital was 280 million dollars at the point that we were no longer part of the active management of the business,’’ he said. ‘‘They’ve raised capital since. Even 280 million dollars for a space company is a ridiculously small amount of money. We were building the cameras for literally 5 million dollars a piece. They were literally Canon SLR chips that were the sensors being used. Now, the housings were very expensive to pack that equipment, but it was all part of this new initiative called Small Space at the time which was all about being able to use commercially-available products in the space industry. We were also beneficiaries of space being pretty hot at the time with the XPRIZE going forward and such. Yeah, we just grabbed onto what we could and built what we did.’’
UrtheCast Is The First Portfolio Company of Business Instincts Group Formed By Chell
Business Instincts Group is a venture creation lab.
‘‘We come up with ideas internally,’’ Chell said. ‘‘We bring ideas in-house and incubate them. They are generally very early stage either ideas or businesses that we feel have a significant opportunity to scale. What we have is a proprietary process called The Rip Kit which is responsibilities in perspective, which is a system by which companies can build startups from idea right through commercialization.’’
Chell said the primary idea behind it is that rather than setting KPIs or Key Performance Indicators, what it is designed to do is to set responsibilities and perspective which basically involve the entire team setting the most important objectives on a monthly, quarterly, and yearly basis. The team then check in on those objectives on a weekly basis.
‘‘There’s a software system that helps drive the whole process,’’ Chell noted. ‘‘It’s one level above project management. But what it does do is it really ensures that everybody is on the same strategic page, and as such, it allows them or empowers them to make decisions because everybody knows they’re on the same page.
The other great advantage of the system and the software is that it provides full transparency and a dashboard to the investors. So, as we go out and we raise capital for our projects or we have our senior management teams raising capital for our projects. One of the things that they can show to investors is everything that is happening on a weekly basis. They can see exactly what the strategic initiatives are, who is in charge of them. Are they behind, on track, ahead, and by what percentage?
Chell said Business Instincts Group has crucially been driven by Big Thinking Process.
‘‘Big Thinking is, it’s anchored in the first question we call: What if?’’ He said. ‘‘So, imagine if Google Earth was live. Like, just what if it was? We know all the reasons that it can’t be, and it’s impossible. But, if it could, what would it look like if you could? Then we go through that question, and we end up coming up with the really cool product. This is how we started UrtheCast.
We come up with a really cool product of what it would be like to have a Google Earth live rather than three-year-old satellite data. Then we talk, well, we know it’s impossible to build this, but what if we could build it? What would that look like? After you go through like 7 to 15 what-ifs on a project, you end up getting it boiled down to natural potential or possibility to build a project that was thought impossible, literally five or six hours previous to that.
That’s our Big Thinking Process. So, we love big ideas, and we love all that kind of stuff, but we really like to anchor it in a pragmatic approach to like.’’
Cameron Chell’s success has also been with Slyce, a visual search engine startup.
‘‘So, obviously, search is a massive industry and a cornerstone on so many commercial aspects of what happens on the internet and e-commerce in general,’’ he said. ‘‘There was a lot of focus being put on audio search, so we see things like Siri, and Alexa, and so forth. Let’s just be a bit counterintuitive here and go down the path of visual search. We had done quite a bit of stuff in visual search before, not specifically for what Slyce was going to try to accomplish, but in particular we had done some machine-vision work way back in the 90s, and then at UrtheCast we had recognized the power of some visual recognition when identifying objects on earth using cameras from the space station.
So, the general idea was why don’t you — and this isn’t a novel idea. Lots of people have had it. Why can’t you just take a picture of something? Let’s say it’s an office chair, and you are in the Office Depot or Staples app, and you take a picture of that, and boom, it finds it in their inventory. You can buy it instantly. So, like no click at buying. Rather than one-click purchasing which Amazon built an empire on, what if you could do it on no-click buying. So, we envision that up in the little search bar there would be a keyboard. There would be a microphone, and there would be a camera. That’s what we wanted to create.’’
Cameron Chell has also gone ahead to launch other successful businesses such as ICOxinnovations.com, a publicly-traded company that creates blockchain economies and corporate currencies in partnership with established brands
Advice for Business Owners Starting Out
‘‘ I’ll tell you what I tell my son,’’ he said. ‘‘I get up every morning and meditate, and I just focus on one think big, but act small. Act small in terms of what you need to do next, and act small in terms of where your ego needs to be. That’s really four things I just told you there. You do those and everything, I believe, will work out right. Don’t get too far in front of yourself. Think big, but just learn how to act small, and I guess that’s the advice. Think big, act small. Some of those small acts are just doing what’s next and having a little meditation sometime throughout the day.’’
Charles Rapulu Udoh
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based Lawyer with special focus on Business Law, Intellectual Property Rights, Entertainment and Technology Law. He is also an award-winning writer. Working for notable organizations so far has exposed him to some of industry best practices in business, finance strategies, law, dispute resolution, and data analytics both in Nigeria and across the world.
Despite the important contribution small-to-medium enterprises (SMEs) make to the economic growth of South Africa, the sector battles to access funding using traditional means.
And even though there are about 2.5 million SMEs in the country, the biggest stumbling blocks they encounter still revolve around the risk barriers and red tape associated with traditional funding products. The underwriting systems and financials required by institutions to finance small business simply do not provide a true reflection of operating conditions.
This has seen the emergence of fintech solutions and alternative funding products that have been steadily gaining momentum.
Yet most local SMEs are unaware of how and where to gain access to funding. For many, the only apparent path is to obtain funding via banks. By the time the business receives the funding (if ever), it is often too late and beyond the point where it can help the company turn things around.
However, funding entails so many different nuances beyond the traditional, and SME owners need to make themselves aware of what is available, and what will suit their specific requirements.
For their part, investors must adapt their digital strategies to engage differently with SMEs. For example, by using mobile as a platform for funding, the investor not only differentiates itself in the market, but the SME gains access to a real-time solution capable of addressing its unique needs.
This cannot happen on its own.
By partnering with a range of fintech organizations, the mobile-driven funding model provides SMEs with real-time, pre-approved offers based on turnover. And thanks to the availability of machine learning and artificial intelligence, these solutions will become more common. However, investors need to be viewed as more than just funders.
They can be true partners in working with SMEs and assisting them in positioning themselves in the market. Of course, the benefit of this is that they become part of a growing enterprise that has a direct impact on the economy of the country.
By incorporating electro-neural networks that enable the use of a sophisticated decision-making methodology requiring no human intervention, funders can more effectively identify where to invest their money. Invariably, the technology has built-in affordability metrics providing the SME with the peace of mind that funding received will not leave them over-indebted.
The graphic below shows the contribution to total turnover by all companies in South Africa in 2015, based on their size (sizes are determined by DTI, cut-offs and adjusted for Stats SA sampling purposes).
Behind-the-scenes, machine-learning algorithms have a deep understanding of business trading patterns and seasonality. This ensures the SME is unable to access more funding than what the business can afford. Such an affordability measurement is a great way to drive financial inclusion, irrespective of physical location, without leaving the SME over-indebted.
Using this sophisticated technology also enables funding to be done faster and more conveniently than before. Eliminating reams of paperwork and manual-intensive application process enable the owner to keep their focus on driving business growth.
And thanks to the ubiquity of mobile, SMEs can apply for funding irrespective of the time of day, using an environment that they are comfortable in. Funding requires no collateral, or security, and is completely unrestricted.
Depending on the funder, it is possible for SMEs to access funding with same-day pay-outs. However, for it to be truly inclusive, such a solution must be available to formal and informal businesses.
For our part, Retail Capital is driving this mobile focus very strongly to be the first to market with a platform that does exactly all of this. It is about delivering SMEs with an enabling environment to get funding using more innovative methods as quickly and effectively as possible. In fact, this smarter funding approach has resulted in mobile now representing more than 20% of the funding taken up at the organization.
Irrespective of the platform used, funding is the lifeblood of an SME. In these challenging market conditions, a multi-product approach that highlights how digital is changing access to working capital is necessary.
This creates a powerful platform for growth and the betterment of the economy, entrepreneurs and the country’s SME sector.
Miguel Da Silva is the Managing Director of Funding at Retail Capital.
Charles Rapulu Udoh
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based Lawyer with special focus on Business Law, Intellectual Property Rights, Entertainment and Technology Law. He is also an award-winning writer. Working for notable organizations so far has exposed him to some of industry best practices in business, finance strategies, law, dispute resolution, and data analytics both in Nigeria and across the world.
David Cohen is the founder and co-CEO of Techstars. He has founded several companies and has invested in hundreds of startups such as Uber, Twilio, SendGrid, FullContact, and Sphero. In total, these investments have gone on to create more than $80 billion in value.
Prior to Techstars, David was a co-founder of Pinpoint Technologies which was acquired by the publicly listed ZOLL Medical Corporation in 1999. Later, David was the founder and CEO of earFeeder, a music service that was sold to SonicSwap. He’s also the co-author (with Brad Feld) of Do More Faster; Techstars Lessons to Accelerate Your Startup.
Techstars today has 49 accelerator programs in 35 cities across 16 countries, including in Paris, Berlin, London, and Lisbon. It invests €72 million into nearly 500 startups annually. Last week, Techstars announced they just raised €38 million to accelerate even more startups in Europe and across the globe. Good timing for an interview with Techstars founder and co-CEO David Cohen.
David, please take us back to the very beginning of Techstars. How did it all start and how did the Techstars model change over time?
Brad Feld, David Brown, Jared Polis and I started Techstars in order to create a better way to do early-stage tech investments as well as to improve our local startup community in Boulder, Colorado. I pitched Brad Feld on the concept early on and he committed to invest in our first 10-minute meeting.
We then recruited experienced mentors and in our first year had 302 applicants. Of that first group of 10 companies, 5 had successful exits (and one of the other five is still thriving today).
We then began scaling the platform to what you see today, given the impact on the communities and the success of the approach. In 2012 we increased the amount of capital we invest per company to today’s figures and started doing corporate partnerships (our first one was with Microsoft to power their Kinect and Azure accelerators).
Today we work with around 100 corporate partners. In the last year or so, we’ve launched several new products alongside our accelerators like Techstars Studio, Techstars Talent, and Techstars Ecosystem Development.
Can you share some numbers about the current state of Techstars? Like a number of startups, raised capital, number of exits, etc?
See techstars.com/companies — it’s always up to date — we’re very transparent here. Skip past the top 50 companies to see stats. At the moment, about 7.9 billion in capital raised. 186 exits by M&A/IPO. 1,759 companies that finished Techstars (another few hundred in programs now globally). Their enterprise value is about 22 billion. Check the page mentioned for more stats/data.
What differentiates Techstars from most other accelerators out there. Why and which startups should apply at Techstars?
Our network is global. We have activity in 120 countries annually, with accelerators in 16 countries. 10,000 mentors. An enormous talent network. I think our track record also differentiates us significantly. And, instead of us trying to fund 100+ startups in one room, we fund just 10 in a consistent model in each community that we participate in.
What would you say are the main differences between the US startup ecosystem and the startup ecosystems in Western Europe? What are some of the major changes you are spotting?
In some cases, there are still significant regulatory differences. We run into challenges in some countries with very high legal costs, challenges with employment structures, etc. These seem to be heading in the right direction, but unfortunately today you still can’t think of the EU as “one market” — there are significant operational complexities to invest throughout Europe that still create challenges. However, it’s amazing to see the growth in early-stage funding that is available — this is quite healthy now.
How important is location for the success of a startup? Would you recommend startups to move to one of Europe’s leading startup hubs like London or Berlin, or maybe even to Silicon Valley?
No. We believe that more and more, great startups are being created everywhere. As long as you have a vibrant startup community, you don’t need to move away. Live where you want to live. This is part of the freedom of entrepreneurship.
You just raised €38 million for Techstars to accelerate even more startups in Europe and across the globe. What are your plans and goals for the next 3 years?
We’ve been consistently profitable since inception which has allowed us to get to the scale that we have today. This cash injection won’t be used to invest in startups (we have $500M AUM to do that), but rather to scale our footprint and product offerings. We’ll certainly want to grow to more European locations over the next few years, perhaps doubling our existing footprint in that timeframe. But we’ll also be offering more resources to our founders and partners, such as Techstars Studio, Techstars Ecosystem Development, and Techstars Talent, in the region.
What is your take on equity crowdfunding as an alternative or additional funding source for startups? Do you think it will become more relevant over the coming years?
I’ve always believed it’s a nice addition and we’re supportive of it. I think it’s reached a more or less steady-state, where some startups are able to add on a bit more capital if they want more of the “crowd” involved.
Could you recommend our readers one or two books that helped you during your entrepreneurial endeavors?
Well, we just released the 2nd edition of “Do More Faster” that I wrote with Brad Feld, and of course new to the Techstars series of books is also “Sell More Faster” by Amos Schwartzfarb. Outside of self-promotion, I’m a huge fan of “The Soul of Money” and “Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance” for entrepreneurs.
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based Lawyer with special focus on Business Law, Intellectual Property Rights, Entertainment and Technology Law. He is also an award-winning writer. Working for notable organizations so far has exposed him to some of industry best practices in business, finance strategies, law, dispute resolution, and data analytics both in Nigeria and across the world.
As a conclusion to 6th edition of The African Football Night, Foot Media Events and the Organizing Committee released the key facts and figures of the event held on 27 July in Lomé under the patronage of His Excellency Mr. Faure GNASSINGBE, President of the Togolese Republic.
With 6 awards given to African football legends including Daniel Amokachi, Shabani Nonda, TP Mazembe, Thierno Seydi, Mohamed Aboutrika and Emmanuel Adebayor, 614 participants to the Gala Dinner, a record attendance of 30,000 enthusiastic supporters at the newly inaugurated stadium of Kégué, 15 media partnerships, a panel and a business networking event dedicated to the African sports industry, the 6th edition of The African Football Night is definitely a success.
“The Togolese Republic was very proud to welcome this federating event in its capital, in line with Togo’s wish to host major Pan-African events,” said Folly Bazi Katari, Minister for Communication, Sports and Education to Citizenship of the Togolese Republic.
“This event also gave us a great opportunity to present Togo’s efforts to promote sports activities, notably through the construction of new infrastructures and through the development of high-level training activities. Togo is committed to its athletes and federations and is keen to promote the sports industry as a whole,” he added.
A member of the organizing committee and director of Impulse Africa, Anne-Elvire Esmel spoke about the innovations of the 6th edition, whose theme was Sport and Development: “First, a business networking event allowed for presenting some key projects of interest to the sports community, including the AfricArena and DiaspoLab funds designed to support initiatives with a strong social and economic impact in Africa, and the MercyShips hospital ship project,” she explained, adding:
“We then organized a high-level panel with Joseph-Antoine Bell, Jimmy Adjovi-Boco, Founder of the Diambars Institute, and Samba Bathily, President of the ADS Group, on economic development opportunities in the sector, particularly in terms of training and enhancing sports infrastructure”. These two concepts have been successfully tested and may be repeated again in the future.
“For the organization of this 6th edition, we have received incredible support from the Togolese authorities, to whom we are very grateful. The coordination process was very efficient and enabled us to reach a result that was beyond our ambitions. I also want to thank all the teams mobilized in Lome, Abidjan, Ouagadougou, Dakar, and Paris for their dedication, enthusiasm, and professionalism.
The African Football Night demonstrates that we now have the African skills and competences to deliver high-quality events on this continent, “said Yves Sawadogo, President of Foot Media Events and promoter of the project.
“We want to remain a key milestone in the African sports calendar while becoming a reference platform bringing together sports communities closer to the private sector and public decision-makers, in order to allow for concrete projects in favor of sports in Africa to emerge” he added, explaining his long-term vision.
A documentary film focussing on key highlights of July 27 will soon be available. The teams have already started to prepare for the next edition, following the same approach consisting in involving sports communities, public institutions, and private sector actors and encouraging them to act positively in favor of the development of sports value chains in Africa.
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.
On the occasion of a high-level meeting convened in partnership with His Excellency Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, Vice-President of the Republic of Ghana, and bringing together investors, financing institutions and sovereign and private funds, the AfroChampion Initiative has formally launched a private sector investment framework to secure financing for the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).
The objective is to mobilize the private sector, in Africa and beyond, through a dedicated blended-finance vehicle to accelerate the continent’s economic integration, by rapidly deploying those infrastructure projects which are critical to successfully delivering the AfCFTA and making it a positive transformation for Africans.
The proposed framework is forward-looking and includes many proposals from the AfroChampions Boma on Infrastructure Financing and Delivery organized last April in Nairobi with the African Union’s High Representative for Infrastructure His Excellency Mr. Raila Odinga.
Considering that key enablers of the AfCFTA are the removal of non-tariff barriers, the deployment of transport and connectivity networks, access to cheap energy, and African economies’ upscaling towards more value-added products, the framework defines a range of priority opportunities as well as structuring projects to be financed, under certain conditions, by the fund set up for that purpose.
Most importantly, the AfroChampions Initiative also provides for an annual benchmarking process to follow up on this program as well as on national reforms transcribing the AfCFTA to improve African states’ cross-border business-readiness.
“With the AfroChampions Initiative, we have found partners committed to our vision of a prosperous and integrated Africa and working to implement practical solutions.
The AfCFTA Private Sector Investment and Financing framework is a very thorough approach: monitoring the AfCFTA agreement’s legal implementation, defining certification criteria qualifying projects eligible for funding, mobilizing the private sector in Africa, and a process to coordinate with the public authorities ” said H.E.M. Albert Muchanga, African Union’s Commissioner for Trade and Industry.
“The African Union’s Summit in Niamey gave us a great opportunity to raise awareness among Heads of State and we hope to be able to move quickly on this ambitious roadmap.”
“To address reluctance and concerns about the AfCFTA, we must demonstrate that it is a major and tangible opportunity for all stakeholders, whether states or companies regardless of size, civil society or individual citizens of the African continent. And this AfCFTA Private Sector Investment and Financing Framework is the best tool for realizing that goal,” said Ali Mufuruki, Vice-President of the AfroChampions Club for the East Africa Region.
“We need to work better together across borders and focus on high-impact regional or pan-African projects – because they are the most likely to attract the volume of funds that we need. This is our main challenge today”.
The participants in the Accra session defined at the end of their workshop a detailed roadmap, including various milestones over the next 18 months. Among the key dates is the presentation of the dedicated fund, scheduled for the 4th quarter of 2019 for the next AfroChampions Boma, the first benchmark and a follow-up report on the AfCFTA implementation and the organization of an exhibition on ‘made in Africa’ early 2020.
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.
Ecobank Transnational Incorporated, ETI, the Lomé-based parent company of the Ecobank Group, announce the appointment of Nana Araba Abban as Group Consumer Banking Head with immediate effect. Nana will be a member of the Group Executive Committee and report directly to the Group Chief Executive Officer.
Nana Araba Abban is a Chartered Accountant (FCCA) with over 25 years’ experience in the Financial Services industry. During her career at Ecobank, Nana Araba Abban has held several senior positions including Group Head of Direct Banking, Head of Client Engagement and Senior Group Manager for Personal Banking.
Commenting on Nana’s appointment, Ade Ayeyemi said- “We are happy to confirm Nana as Group Head, Consumer Banking. She has extensive experience in the consumer banking space in various areas.
Nana, who has been a senior member of the Consumer Banking team in the Group for some time will further grow our consumer business in line with our digital transformation agenda building on the successes we have had in the past. I convey hearty congratulations to Nana on this appointment.’
Mr. Ayeyemi continued: “We are particularly pleased with the effectiveness of our succession planning as we have been able to fill vacancies from within the Bank. We will continue to grow our talent pool.”
Before joining Ecobank, Nana Araba Abban held several senior positions with Standard Chartered Bank, Royal Bank of Scotland and other institutions in Product Portfolio Management, Product Accounting and Banking Operations.
Nana Araba Abban holds an MBA, in Business in Emerging Markets from the University of Liverpool and Bachelor of Science in Mathematics & Statistics from Queen Mary & Westfield College, University of London, UK.
She is also a Fellow of the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants Nana Araba Abban, the new Group Consumer Banking Head had been acting in that capacity prior to now, alongside her previous role of Group Head, Direct Banking.
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.
Europe’s foremost African polo event graced London for the second time today at the prestigious Ham Polo Club, hosting a glamorous crowd of polo aficionados and those celebrating the style and joie de vivre of African culture.
A sea of well-heeled guests, mostly head to toe in African inspired finery, proudly strutted one of the oldest polo clubs in the United Kingdom, to the soundtrack of Afrobeats and Fela Kuti, as Lux Afrique firmly marked its territory as the go-to annual African polo day.
Being so much more than a sporting event, but a celebration of African refinement and sense of occasion, the Lux Afrique Polo Day offered a myriad of attractions, all adding to the glamour and fun of the day. Fine dining of exquisite African cuisine was provided to guests courtesy of Waakye Leaf. The event also featured a shopping lounge in which deluxe brands, Backes & Strauss, Montegrappa, and Yoko London, showcased their finest products.
The Polo itself was a thrilling affair with two opposing teams with similar handicaps battling it out in front of a captivated crowd, who paused their mingling and revelry to enjoy the spectacle.
The match was opened by Lux Afrique founder Alexander Amosu alongside the Director of The Sofa and Chair Company.
Team Africa was narrowly defeated by Team Rudo – aka The Rest of the World – 4/3. The honor of ‘Most Valued Player’ was awarded to British born Louise Brown, who plays polo both in the UK and Argentina, while the title of ‘Best Playing Pony’ was awarded to Illuminado.
After the match closing, and the prize-giving – which of course involved the traditional spraying of champagne – the crowd voted on the pick for ‘Best Dressed’ at the event. While the competition was stiff, given the abundance of fashionably dressed attendees, a ‘best-dressed man’ and a ‘best-dressed woman’ was selected.
With the match game and set, the guests proceeded to enjoy themselves in true African spirit, as they danced the rest of the afternoon away to the live band, fronted by Nigerian legend Dele Sosimi.
The Lux Afrique Polo Day was fortunate to have exceptional partners, that included Remy Martin, Corinthia London, Artisan du Chocolat, FIJI Water, and the esteemed Val de Vie Events. Media Partners also included BET, Channels TV, Beat FM, Polo Lifestyle and Magazine and Elite Living Africa, and The Outside Organisation.
Lux Afrique used the occasion to shine a spotlight on a worthy charitable cause – Malaika – an initiative to bring education, water, and health to the poorest communities in the Congo. In 2011 Malaika opened a school in the DRC, which today provides an education to over 300 girls. The charity was set up by Congolese model and humanitarian Noëlla Coursaris Musunka who seeks to help communities “escape gender inequality, poverty, and lack of education that currently restricts their choices”. Attendees were encouraged to donate generously to Malaika on the day, and thereafter
Lux Afrique is a lifestyle and concierge company catering to UHNW across Africa, as well as a luxury multimedia platform for marketing and promoting luxury brands, targeting an audience on the African continent. It introduces luxury-focused brands to the high net- worth consumer markets growing throughout Africa, through a number of means, including high profile events, such as the Lux Afrique Annual Polo Day.
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.
For those doing business in Zimbabwe, this is a crucial time to tighten belts. The whole of the country is living daily without electricity for more than 18 hours and there are shortages of everything from bread to motor fuel.
To make it worse, Zimbabweans are now receiving food aid in cities for the first time and drought has necessitated the import of hundreds of thousands of tons of corn.
Here Is All You Need To Know
When Robert Mugabe was ousted after four decades in power in late 2017 his replacement, Emmerson Mnangagwa, promised economic regeneration and declared that Zimbabwe is “open for business.”
Things have however gone from bad to worse with the effects of rapidly expanding money supply through the sale of Treasury bills under Mugabe’s rule coming home to roost and this year’s outlawing of the US dollar in favor of a local quasi currency that can’t be traded outside the country causing panic.
“Zimbabwe is at a tipping point and if it falls over the edge it’s going to be quite a long way in coming back,” said Derek Matyszak, a Zimbabwe-based research consultant for South Africa’s Institute for Security Studies.
“The wheels are falling off. There is no way out of a Ponzi scheme other than a massive infusion of cash to pay off your creditors.”
The country with the world’s highest inflation rate after Venezuela also suspended annual consumer-price data for the next six months. The authorities need to collect comparable data since the introduction of the new currency in February.
That marked a return to 2009 when the country abandoned the Zimbabwe dollar in favor of the US dollar and other currencies after inflation surged to an estimated 500 billion percent.
If the more commonly used black-market exchange rate is used, Zimbabwe’s annual inflation is currently 558%, about three times the official rate, while Venezuela’s is 35,004%, according to Steve H. Hanke, a professor of applied economics at the John Hopkins University in Baltimore.
Scrapping the official annual rate is “no real loss from an analytical perspective,” said Jee-A van der Linde, an economist at NKC African Economics in Paarl, South Africa
“These elevated inflation readings did little more than create panic and damage what little confidence was left.”
‘‘A quarter of the population has already emigrated, more may follow’’
A de-linking of the country’s quasi-currencies from parity with the US dollar in February and the re-imposition of the Zimbabwe dollar overnight in June has fueled depreciation with the currency officially trading at 9.28 to the dollar on Aug. 2.
The black-market rate was 10.8, according to Marketwatch.co.zw, a website run by analysts. While the government has argued that in the face of foreign-currency shortages it has no choice but to reintroduce its own currency, Hanke disagrees.
“The Achilles heel is the introduction of the new currency to the exclusion of the dollar,” he said.
“They have decided to go in the completely opposite direction and claimed it’s the best thing since sliced bread and it’s going to be an absolute disaster.”
While the cost of basic services has climbed 400% this year, pay rises have been around 10%, said Japhet Moyo, secretary-general of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions, which has 130,000 members.
“People are very angry” and even though a quarter of the population has already emigrated, more may follow, said Matyszak.
“The Zimbabwe I once loved has become a cemetery for my son’s future” said Ashley Randen, an unemployed single mother of a 12-year-old boy in Harare.
The Rate of Inflation Is So Bad That There Would Be No Statistics On Inflation In Zimbabwe Going Forward
Zimbabwe’s finance minister responded to the country’s worsening economic crisis last week by blacking out inflation statistics for the next six months, boosting the price of the little power that’s available five-fold and admitting what the International Monetary Fund told him in April: the economy will contract for the first time since 2008.
At the same time, he spoke of fiscal surpluses and relaxation in local ownership requirements for the key platinum industry.
Still, the decision evokes other countries in crisis. Venezuela halted publication of inflation data and while it periodically releases figures, it isn’t operating on a regular schedule. In 2013, Argentina was censured by the IMF for tampering with its data.
Finance Minister Mthuli Ncube tried to highlight the country’s first positive current-account balance in a decade as a sign of progress. Since his appointment last year, the government has sold only marginal amounts of Treasury bills.
And earlier this year, the Cambridge University-trained economics professor forecast that month-on-month inflation, which surged to 39.3% in June, would be close to zero by year-end.
The fundamental problem is that the government has failed to attract significant investment and hasn’t substantially changed the policies of the Mugabe era, said John Robertson, an independent economist in Harare, the capital.
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based Lawyer with special focus on Business Law, Intellectual Property Rights, Entertainment and Technology Law. He is also an award-winning writer. Working for notable organizations so far has exposed him to some of industry best practices in business, finance strategies, law, dispute resolution, and data analytics both in Nigeria and across the world.
