solution - Afrikan Heroes

Nigeria Based Mobile Solutions GONA Raises Multi-million Dollar Fund For Expansion

August 4, 2019

More Africa-focused startups are raising funds to either expand or grow their businesses this year. Apart from Opay’s recent funding round, GONA, the Chinese startup that offers cashless bus services and payment solutions with a focus on the Nigerian market is the latest to join the bandwagon.

This is remarkable because it shows that the African startup ecosystem is gradually fusing into the global startup ecosystem.

Here Is The Deal

News website, c.m.163.com says the Chinese-led investment came from Crystal Stream Capital, UnityVC and Shaka VC.
According to Liu Xiaojun, the founder and CEO of GONA the round of financing will be used for team building and product technology upgrades.
This new investment will further allow GONA to employ more locals to help develop the product and expand its popularity.

“We will try to employ the best people to help the most Lagosians have a better daily commuting experience,” says co-founder, Noah Gu.

Larry, a partner at ShakaVC, notes that the minibus scene provides more efficient and convenient travel services for hundreds of millions of Africans, and the market potential is huge.
As the first Chinese fund to focus on early African investment in Africa, ShakaVC will support the development of GONA in local resources, experience, and capital.
GONA boasts of thousands of active users and nearly 10,000 transactions every day.

What GONA Does

GONA is a mobile payments platform with primary operations in Lagos.
GONA is enabling cashless payments on ‘informal transit’ public buses in Lagos and is also working to solve the pains of inconvenience in the local travel market. This it is doing by using technical means to improve operational efficiency.

‘‘The Rains Are Here, You deserve a less stressful bus ride to work. Pick up your smartphone and purchase a ticket on GONA, monitor the closest buses to you and hop onto one. Pay for your ride in style, avoid the chaos of “No Change”, Gona tweeted.

The startup recently announced the completion of a multi-million dollar Pre-A round of financing.
Even though GONA is headquartered in China, Lagos remains its primary focus. In Lagos, GONA has fully completed localization, with roll-out in certain routes within Lagos, one of which is Yaba to the University of Lagos (UNILAG) campus.

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.

Facebook: https://web.facebook.com/Afrikanheroes/

Truecaller Launches User Verification Solution For The Mobile Web

July 18, 2019

Enables developers to instantly verify users on mobile web products.

Truecaller has announced the global launch of its Truecaller SDK solution exclusively for the mobile web platform. With this, Truecaller SDK now supports all the key mobile platforms across Android, iOS, React and now mobile web including Progressive Web App support. Developers can access the mWeb SDK from Truecaller’s global developer portal.

Across emerging markets like India and Africa, mobile web-based experiences on smartphones are proving to be the first point of discovery for users trying to access products and services online. One of the key challenges in these markets has been to on-board users using email or other modes and getting verified using the inefficient OTP process.

This SDK solution on the mobile web is intended to simplify this process for developers through its OTP-less and free to use phone number based verification solution, allowing their users to seamlessly and securely access services using their Truecaller credentials.

This ensures there are reduced barriers along with fewer user drop-offs and resulting in increased growth in verified users that contributes to minimized business risks for the developer.

Commenting on the launch, Priyam Bose, Global Head, Developer Platform & Relations, Truecaller, said: “Our vision has always been to enable the developer community by providing them with solutions that help them to build user-focused, trust-based and growth-oriented products.

User onboarding and verification continue to be one of the critical use cases for developers as it is crucial in creating the first impression for their users in terms of building a seamless and secure product experience. On an average, developers in growth markets are starting to see anywhere between 40%-60% of their users now coming from mobile web, giving us more reasons to launch our Truecaller SDK solution for mobile Web interfaces.”

This launch extends Truecaller’s philosophy of building and solving problems at scale for users and developers globally, with value-driven functionalities. Truecaller SDK service for the mobile web platform can be used to fulfill use cases such as mobile number based signup, login, checkout, verification, and more such touch-points across the user journey.

Early access developer partners for this service also shared their experiences.

Mukund Laddha, Product Manager, OYO, said: “At OYO, we have been expanding globally at a rapid pace. Improving user experience during authentication has been a key area of focus. This integration with Truecaller presented us with an opportunity to present users with a reliable alternate login method with a large presence across countries. This has made user on-boarding on the web more fluid and frictionless.”

Zairus Master, the CEO, Shine.com, said: “At Shine.com, our constant endeavor is to improve our end-user experience by adopting best-in-class technologies. As an early access partner, the integration with Truecaller’s verification solution for mobile web platform will help candidates simplify their registration process on Shine.com and facilitate a constantly active and verified set of candidates on the platform, complete with their updated contact details. We believe that this product integration will give Shine.com a competitive edge over other job portals which solely rely on traditional, OTP-based verification.”

According to Udit Tyagi, Product Head, Times Internet Limited – Indian Languages News Business: “In the ever-evolving world of PWA’s the gap between app and mWeb is slowly fading away and users expect uniformity and seamlessness in terms of experience and onboarding irrespective of the platform.

By leveraging Truecaller SDK for mobile web, we have been able to improve the on-boarding experience of users in our canvas of mobile web apps. In our case, onboarding conversions via Truecaller are 41% higher compared to standard onboarding processes.”

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.