The World Economic Forum has identified young African startups as leading the way in cutting-edge sectors.
Some weak signals, such as the one that StartupBlink from Israel just delivered on Africa, do not deceive. With an index published annually, it specializes in the study of the best innovative ecosystems in the world. It has recently ranked Lagos 122nd in the survey that compares 1,000 metropolises from a hundred countries according to their capacity to create a favourable environment for entrepreneurship.
Due to this, Lagos is the leading city in Africa to launch a start-up. With more than 17 million residents, the metropolis has dethroned Nairobi, relegated to 136th place in the world after falling 20 places in one year. The two capitals are ranked ahead of Cairo (180th), Abu Dhabi (169th) and Riyadh (192nd) in the Africa-Middle East region, which are desired technology hubs.
The World Economic Forum (WEF), which is held in Geneva in Switzerland, sent another strong signal. The WEF has selected seven start-ups from the continent as some 100 technological pioneers to be recognized this month.
The companies are 54Gene, mPharma, Cambridge Industries, FlexFinTx, Kuda Technology, Moringa School and Sokowatch. In the past, this selection has already recognized Google, Airbnb, Twitter, and Spotify.
54Gene
In 2020, his firm, which specializes in sequencing African genomes, was widely recognized for its pioneering role in managing mobile Covid-19 screening campaigns in Nigeria – at the expense of its geographical development.
The startup’s flagship project is sure to continue after raising $15 million in April 2020. Its founder is a geneticist who graduated from Imperial College London and Claremont College in the U.S. Specifically, this is the monetization of a gene bank in order to accelerate the advancement of research to better suit the physiology of the continent as quickly as possible.
Cambridge Industries
Energy production from waste, insect farms, recycling… Samuel Alemayehu’s company is on the cutting edge of technology, without question. The operator of the waste-to-energy plant, located near the Koshe landfill near the capital, is allied with the China National Electric Engineering Company (CNEEC), which has funded the entire plant.
In addition to providing electricity to 25% of Addis Ababa’s residents, Cambridge Industries says its facilities can remove 80% of the city’s waste.
He studied science management and engineering at Stanford University. Samuel Alemayehu, the eloquent CEO of Cambridge Industries who speaks at Harvard conferences, is an American who studied at Stanford University. He intends to sort the waste with metal sorters, filter the water with toxic materials, and create a brick out of the ash.
Read: 8 African Startups You Should Watch Out For In 2022
Kuda
For the first time, this online bank with pan-African ambitions surpassed one million customers earlier this year. The company was founded in 2016 by Babs Ogundeyi and Mustapha Musty as Kuda Money. Originally, the company specialized in online loans and moved from there to Kuda.
The company obtained a banking licence in Nigeria and raised $36.6 million through four rounds of financing. Capital comes from several renowned investors, including Ragnar Meitern, former CEO of the Dutch bancassurance group ING. The investment comes from New York-based Valar Ventures, which manages over $1.2 billion in assets.
Unlike other online banking companies, this Nigerian bank is inspired by success stories such as Nubank in Brazil, N26 in Germany, and Revolut in the UK in order to stand out from the crowd. The unique point of these “neo-banks” is that they are all 100 percent digital, have extremely attentive customer service, and charge almost zero fees for banking transactions.
Sokowatch
The start-up, which provides informal shops, is ranked among the world’s most innovative companies by Fast Company magazine. A company founded by American Daniel Yu has demonstrated in two or three algorithmic moves that good inventory management minimizes waste and maximizes income for companies of any size.
The Moroccan venture capital fund Outlierz Ventures took part in the seed round in 2018, encouraged by the model in which consumer goods companies such as Unilever and Procter & Gamble are embedded as suppliers.
Thus, Catalyst Fund precedes other prestigious funds including the investor dedicated to East Africa, Catalyst Fund (whose investors include Proparco and the CDC Group), or the American 4DX Ventures, which participated in the $30 million fundraising of Trella, an Egyptian logistics company in June.
FlexFinTx
In addition to its fascination and controversies, blockchain technology is also a powerful way to create a register of identity documents that is accessible without a connection for the 400 million Africans without internet connections, according to Zimbabwean Victor Mapunga and his Indian counterpart Haardik.
One simply needs a WhatsApp account to register their identity in a chat managed by a chatbot (a software program that communicates with a user). Information is retrieved from a blockchain called Algorand by the chatbot.
The Harare-based start-up’s FlexID service enables users to open bank accounts, take out insurance policies or sign employment contracts through connections with financial institutions and government services providers.