Safaricom's $257.4 million funding

Wednesday, 09 August 2023

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Good morning!

Nothing is as misguided as any iteration of that take that government should stop the importation of goods and services from abroad in a bid to compel the public to buy locally-made products.

So the new report on ICT experts in Nigerian demanding "the Federal Government should adopt a policy that bans importation of computer hardware especially those that are already being assembled in Nigeria," is dangerously myopic a best.

One of the experts said that "this will not only help boost local production, it will encourage efficiency in local production, create jobs, direct and indirect, through the entire value chain, including marketers, support services and logistics.”

It won't.

Last week, a series of local news outlets erroneously reported that India had banned the importation of the aforementioned gadgets. What the Indian government did was try to restrict the importation. Importers in India will now have to apply for a licence to import said gadgets.

For years, India has been perfecting its electronics manufacturing industry; making cars, tablets, Airtel and soon iPhones. The American chip maker, Micron is considering moving into the country.

And so as a policy, the Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi can sell it to his populace as progress.

Nigeria doesn't have a thriving technology manufacturing industry and Nigeria doesn't need to. Some of the greatest economies in history rose to the top selling spices; as in salt and pepper. Let's focus on what we can actually create in bulk and export, oils, afrobeat, agriculture etc.

Placing a ban on the importation of gadgets in the country will drag us way backwards, because, within the thriving electronic coupling industry in Nigeria, there is hardly any product that can really compete with the top products in the international market.

So why do we keep hearing these ideas of forcing Nigerians to buy Nigeria when we are not in the position to make the best?

It's good old nationalism. The modern nationalist movement has divulged into less national progress and more national isolation, stoking fear for our neighbours. Ideas of banning "Made in China" have quickly found favour in that circle. Likewise "Ghana must go," "Nigeriens must go," "You can't vote in Lagos," "the immigrants are taking our jobs," "the versus syndrome," etc.

When you slip in a policy that argues on the surface that banning the importation of gadgets is progress, then it is easy to miss how insidious that take it.

By the way, we've tried it before. It tanked our economy.

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Below are the tech stories and news you need to know to start your day, carefully curated by Technext.

A word from MyCover.ai

We are thrilled to share that MyCover.ai has successfully raised pre-seed funding of $1.25M! This round was led by Ventures Platform and Founders Factory Africa, with participation from TechStars Toronto.

With this funding, we can strengthen our operations in Nigeria and strategically fuel our expansion into other African markets. Join us on this exciting journey as we tackle the issue of inadequate insurance access, coverage and affordability in Africa and beyond!

Summary of the news

Amazon said it will offer fertility and family planning services to employees
5 people have been detained by Senegalese authorities for selling Starlink
Nigerian creators on X have started receiving revenue for their content
Opay and Kuda made CNBC’s Top 200 Fintech list

Ecosystem

Uber's violence row: Uber is facing new backlash over the safety of passengers in South Africa as violent acts against users rise. In the last month alone, at least six attacks have been reported in Pretoria, South Africa.

One driver reportedly attacked the passengers with a can of pepper spray before grabbing a victim’s smartphone and unlocking the doors as two men repeatedly approached the vehicle, saying they would shoot at them.

Even as the company rebrands from a profit focus to become more customer friendly, including rolling out a trip recording feature on its app, ride-hailing companies have struggled to curb violence during trips.

A wave of violent attacks was melted out on drivers during trips by passengers in some parts of West Africa including Nigeria and Ghana in the past few years.

Uber said that the allegations had been received and would be investigated. (Technext)

Other ecosystem news:

Egyptian recruitment startup, Talents Arena, has raised $750,000 in pre-seed funding from UI Investments. Several Saudi Arabian and Egyptian angel investors also joined the round. (Techpoint Africa)
Nigeria's Opay and Kuda, alongside 4 others from across Africa made CNBC’s Top 200 Fintech list. Bank Zero, 22seven and Yoco from South Africa and Fawry of Egypt also made the list. (Technext)
Egyptian startup, Grinta, has announced the acquisition of Auto Cure for an undisclosed amount, after acquiring PH Store and EME. The acquisition will help Grinta expand its footprints across Egypt, and is its third since it was founded in 2021. (Techpoint Africa)
Safaricom Ethiopia will receive $257.4 million (KSh36.8 billion) in funding from the World Bank Group to support the telco’s greenfield telecommunications projects, a move that will significantly increase Ethiopia’s mobile connectivity. (Techpoint Africa)

Policy

Enugu's digital revolution: The Enugu State government has introduced an e-ticket scheme which it said will curb the excesses of touts masquerading as government levy collectors. It added that the purpose of the scheme is to make tax and levy payments easier and more convenient for transporters and eliminate multiple taxation and harassment by touts across the state.

Called the Enugu State Unified e-Ticket Scheme, the system will become fully operational by August 11.

“The electronic ticket scheme makes it easy and convenient for the payment of taxes such as road taxes, tickets from tricycles, tippers, emblems and passenger manifest, while eliminating harassment and loss of revenues,” Head of Media to the state governor, Dan Nwomeh. (Technext)

Other policy news:

Five people have been detained by Senegalese authorities for selling Starlink terminals without requisite authorisation amid the government-enforced internet blackout that has kept the country offline since last week. (WeeTracker)
IT experts in a report said President Bola Tinubu should without delay toe the path of the Indian government which recently imposed restrictions on the import of laptops, tablets, all-in-one personal computers and ultra-small computers and servers with immediate effect. "The Federal Government should adopt a policy that bans importation of computer hardware especially those that are already being assembled in Nigeria. This will not only help boost local production, it will encourage efficiency in local production, create jobs, direct and indirect, through the entire value chain, including marketers, support services and logistics,” one expert said. (Nairametrics)
President Bola Tinubu said he will break Nigeria’s cycle of excessive borrowing for public expenditures and the resulting debt burden on Nigeria’s limited government revenues. "We aim to transform the tax system to support sustainable development while achieving a minimum of 18% tax-to-GDP ratio within the next three years," the government said. (Nairametrics)

Social Tech

Broadband decline: New data from the Nigerian Communications Commission shows that the country recorded a drop in broadband penetration, active internet subscriptions, teledensity, and a few other industry segments.

In June 2023, Nigeria’s broadband penetration dropped from 92,169,176 subscriptions (48.28%) to 89,730,341 subscriptions (47.01%, representing a difference of 1.27%. It’s worth noting that this is the lowest the broadband access has been since November 2022 (88,273.293 subscriptions/46.24%).

The NCC also reports 159,498,826 active internet subscriptions across GSM, CDMA, Fixed (Wireless), ISPs, and VoIP channels. This is a minor decline in the numbers considering that the country registered 159,598,451 subscriptions in May 2023.

Here’s a breakdown of the figures: GSM had 158,944,660 subscribers, CDMA had zero, Fixed (Wireless) registered 16,897 users, ISPs had 208,612, and VOIP had 328,657.

Similarly, the teledensity/subscriber data for June 2023 indicated a drop from 221,258,372 (115.91%) to 220,086,951 (115.30%). Based on the above figures, there’s a difference of 0.61% (Technext)

Other social tech news:

Google has announced its plan to roll out a new tool that will enable users to detect and delete their personal information if it shows on its search engine. (Technext)
Spotify’s leading female podcaster, Alex Cooper has launched a new Gen Z-focused podcast network called The Unwell Network. (TheVerge)
Nigerian creators on X have started receiving revenue for their content. (Twitter)
Spotify said it will roll out its AI-powered personalized music feature ‘DJ’ to Nigeria and other regions around the world, marking a huge expansion six months after its first introduction in North America. (Technext)
Apple Music has launched “Discovery Station,” a personalized radio station that will produce a bespoke collection of new songs tailored to individual tastes. (Technext)
YouTube is disabling all of its recommendation tools for users that don’t have watch history turned on — including its home feed. (TheVerge)
WhatsApp has unveiled a new screen-sharing feature for users, to improve the app’s video call experience, effectively entering a competition with Zoom and Meet. (Technext)

Global News

X revenue plan: X says that a new ad-tech partnership and enhanced safety tools for brands will lure back advertisers who departed in the months since Elon Musk purchased the company.

X said that it signed a one-year deal with Integral Ad Science, which sells ad-verification technology. IAS CEO Lisa Utzschneider said her company is offering its so-called pre-bid tools, which companies often use to ensure their online ads don’t appear near controversial content before an auction takes place.

“We classify the content on behalf of marketers before they run their ads to ensure that the environment is brand safe and brand suitable for the advertiser,” Utzschneider said. (CNBC)

Other global news:

Amazon said it will now offer fertility and family planning services to employees through a partnership with Maven Clinic. The free offering will be available to more than 1 million eligible Amazon employees spread across 50 countries outside of the U.S. and Canada. (CNBC)
According to research by 21e6 Capital, the classic buy-and-hold approach to Bitcoin outperformed most crypto funds by 68.8% in the first six months of the year. This is largely due to the fact that bitcoin was one of the best-performing crypto assets in the first half of 2023, seeing massive gains from prospects of the SEC approving a Spot Bitcoin ETF. (Technext)