Business Tech Africa — African business and technology news, insights and analysis

Former British soldier builds a $1 billion lending business in Kenya

Wayne Hennessy-Barrett arrived in Kenya in 2013 with little experience in finance and no loan book to speak of. What he did have was a question for the small traders he met in the country's informal markets: what do you need? The answer was simple. “I walked around and asked people what they needed,” Hennessy-Barrett

Former Goldman Sachs banker turns to Africa's funding gap

Grace Legodi has worked on both sides of the finance industry. She studied finance at the University of Cape Town, worked in mergers and acquisitions at Goldman Sachs in New York and Johannesburg, and later moved into venture capital and entrepreneurship development. She is now using that experience to fund early-stage businesses in Southern Africa

Founder Fridays : Booi Industries

Founder Fridays : Booi Industries

Certain engineering problems can be solved on paper. Others demand years of understanding what happens when people, machines and rock meet underground. For Delisile Booi, that challenge began in 2007, when he started researching the limitations of conventional mining methods and looking at how engineering could make underground operations safer and more productive. That early

Geely launches its Riddara electric bakkie in South Africa

Geely has launched its Riddara electric bakkie in South Africa, with prices starting at R611,900. The Chinese brand is bringing three versions of the double cab to the local market, with one rear wheel drive model and two all wheel drive models. The range topping Riddara Apex RD6 4WD produces 315kW and 595Nm. This makes

African startups are making money by solving everyday business problems

African startups are increasingly building products for other businesses instead of trying to get millions of individual consumers to use their apps. The shift is showing up across areas such as payments, accounting, payroll, procurement, logistics and business software. For a startup, selling to another business can mean fewer customers are needed to build a

Cameroon Seeks US Capital for $3bn Hydropower and Digital Projects

Cameroon Seeks US Capital for $3bn Hydropower and Digital Projects

Cameroon is using its first bilateral Economic and Commercial Dialogue with the United States to seek US capital and expertise for major infrastructure projects. The portfolio includes the $3 billion Grand Eweng hydropower project, a proposed new airport for Douala and large-scale data and cloud infrastructure. The meeting is taking place in Yaoundé on August

Kenyan fintech Flowt is using AI to help small businesses get working capital

Kenyan fintech startup Flowt is using AI to assess small businesses for working-capital loans, using the financial information they already generate through banks, accounting systems and M-Pesa. The Nairobi-based startup has raised an undisclosed pre-seed round from Delta40 Fund I and Impacc, with grant support from the Argidius Foundation. Flowt was founded by Elana Laichena