Gloomy news: On Tuesday, June 14, 2022, Tefo Mohapi of iAfrikan died aged 43. But who is Tefo—many of our West African and US readers might ask? In short, Tefo is one of the leading tech media practitioners in Africa. He launched iAfrikan in 2014—a few months after TechCabal, one of the early tech-focused media publications launched.
Over the years, iAfrikan has grown from South Africa to be a leading and reputable tech news platform in Africa. He was laid to rest on Saturday, June 18, 2022. We extend our condolence to our colleagues at iAfrikan Media and the Mohapis.
For Letter 119, we will explore:
- how MFS Africa intends to use its Series C $100 million addition.
- the reduction in mobile money transaction levy in Tanzania
- Uganda’s first satellite launch in September
As always, we share opportunities—jobs, events, grants, accelerators, and more—at the end of the letter.
But first, let’s interact with the startup deals of last week.
African Tech startup deals
Quick points:
- Seven African startups raised over $105 million between June 13-19, 2022
- Cairo Angels Syndicate Fund (CASF) made its debut Nigerian investment into Credpal
- Africa witnessed another mega-deal with MFS Africa’s $100 million Series C extension
Other things to note:
- CASF is a micro-venture capital fund that invests between $100,000 and $250,000 in post-seed and pre-series A startups across the Middle East and Africa.
- We might have to rethink whether to continue classifying MFS Africa as an African startup, following the relocation of their HQ to London. More on MFS Africa is below.
On MFS Africa and its $200 million Series C
MFS Africa is on a growth tear, it would seem. According to TechCrunch, they connect 320 million mobile money wallets across 35+ African countries and 700 corridors.
Last week (June 14, 2022), MFS raised a Series C extension round of $100 million comprising both equity and debt financing. This extension round brings its total Series C to $200 million. A new Rwanda-based PE firm, Admaius Capital Partners led MFS Africa’s Series C extension round. New investors—Vitruvian Partners, and AXA Investment Managers (AXA IM Alts) joined the round, alongside existing investors—AfricInvest FIVE, and CommerzVentures. Stanbic IBTC Bank Nigeria and Symbiotics financed the debt portion of the round.
In the second week of June (June 6, 2022), MFS Africa acquired Global Technology Partners (GTP), a US-based prepaid card firm with Africa focus.
It was just about six months ago (Nov 10, 2021), when MFS Africa announced their Series C round, which was followed by acquiring Nigerian super-agent, Baxi’s parent company, Capricorn Digital Limited. Baxi’s acquisition was one of many and a sign of many more to come, for which GTP is an example.
“The fundraising marks another milestone in MFS Africa’s expansion, following a series of acquisitions and investments in other African fintechs, including the recently announced acquisition of Baxi in Nigeria”, according to a statement on MFS Africa’s website.
Following MFS Africa’s Series C and C extension round, we extract five key objectives the company is pushing.
Five objectives that MFS Africa will achieve with this funding:
MFS Series C is aimed at:
- hiring key management talent: Hired a Chief of Staff (Meghan Taylor) and Chief Financial Officer (Julian Adkins) from BCG and Tigo, respectively.
- deepening integration into the global digital payment ecosystem: They are already doing this through continent-wide and intercontinental expansions and company acquisitions.
- pan-African expansion: Opened offices in cities like Abidjan (Côte d’Ivoire), Kampala (Uganda), Kinshasa (DRC), Nairobi (Kenya), and Lagos (Nigeria). Take Nigeria for example, MFS Africa has acquired two key payment licences (PDF)—PSSP, and PTSP—from the apex bank. It’s important to note that following MFS Africa’s Series C raise, they changed their headquarters to London from Nigeria.
- inter-continental expansion: Expansion into Asia with LUN Partners (one of its investors). Opening of regional offices in China and the USA.
- synergizing across its child companies: There is an impending integration of GTP with Baxi to give the latter’s agents prepaid cards.
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Tanzania to reduce mobile money transaction levy
What’s the news? To cushion the effect of the rising inflation caused by the Russian-Ukraine war, the Tanzanian government has announced that it will reduce its mobile money (MOMO) transaction levy by 43%.
Mwigulu Nchemba, Tanzania’s finance, and planning minister disclosed this last week while presenting the national budget for the financial year 2022/2023 in Parliament. The fee for sending and withdrawing money on mobile platforms in Tanzania will reduce from a maximum of $3 to $1.72 per transaction.
“This measure is intended to reduce the cost of living for Tanzanians, especially during the current period of ongoing economic crisis, and to rationalize the transaction levy,” Nchemba said.
History: From 1 July 2021, Tanzania introduced a new fee on mobile money transfer and withdrawal transactions, excluding merchant, business, and government payment transactions effective 15 July 2021. The levy applies in addition to VAT (18%) and excise duty on mobile money transfers and withdrawal fees (10%).
Following criticism from the Tanzanian public, the fee was reduced by 30%. Following the introduction of the mobile money levy, the number of P2P transfers and cash-out transactions fell heavily in July and August 2021 to only slightly stabilise in September 2021, according to GSMA Tanzania Mobile Money Levy Analysis [pdf].
In addition to reducing their usage of mobile money, users also removed their assets from their mobile money accounts to use them through alternative payment methods such as cash, GSMA revealed.
Tanzania’s MOMO players and their market influence
These six companies are competing to serve 26 million active users. The Tanzania MOMO market reached a value of $54.5 billion in 2021 and is expected to grow to $120.4 billion by 2027.
Uganda will launch its first satellite in September
What’s the news? Uganda has announced that it will launch its first satellite into the low Earth orbit from the International Space Station, in collaboration with the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) this September.
In May 2022, the three Ugandan students, namely; Edgar Mujuni, Derick Tebusweke, and Bonny Omara, completed the development work on the 10 cubic meter satellite named PearlAfricaSat-1, which was handed over to the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) for final testing.
Why does it matter? The Ugandan authorities said that the ground station at Mpoma, Mukono, will receive data from the satellite, which will be used for meteorology, environmental monitoring, urban planning, mineral exploration, and disaster management. Ugandan Finance Minister, Matia Kasaija said that the government allocated UGX 274.4 billion ($73 million) towards advancing innovation and technological development in the country.
Other African countries that have also rolled out space programmes include South Africa, Egypt, Nigeria, Ghana, Algeria, Morocco, Ethiopia, and Kenya. The 2021 edition of the Africa Space Industry Annual Report shows 125 new satellites have been lined up for development in 23 African countries by 2025, as activities in the continent’s space market heat up significantly.
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✍ Noteworthy
Check out these interesting stories we came across last week:
- Six ways to build a great startup culture by HR Leader, Weyinmi Barber
- NITDA’s latest Code of Practice is another attempt by the Nigerian government to regulate social media
- Lagos domesticates the Nigeria Startup Bill to create an enabling environment for startups in the State
- Kenyan students hack credit cards via email phishing and use the money to buy Bitcoin
- Only two out of the 14 Nigerians selected for Google’s Black Founders Fund Europe were women
Opportunities
Curated opportunities in Product & Design, Data & Engineering, and Admin & Growth.
Product & Design:
- Meta — Product Resident (Lagos)
- Google — Product Manager (Nairobi)
- Reliance Health — Head of Design (Lagos)
Data & Engineering:
- Seamfix — Android Developer (Lagos)
- Renmoney — DevOps Engineer (Lagos)
- Paystack — Senior Automation Engineer (Africa)
Admin & Growth:
- Binance — PR Intern (Africa)
- Amazon — Startup Account Manager (Lagos)
- BBC — Digital Journalist, Africa Business (Nairobi)
Other opportunities:
- For women (and men): Apply for Stutern’s African Tech Sis Scholarship to get 50% off to learn Product Design, Frontend, and Backend Engineering.
- For Ghanaian startups: MEST Express Accelerator opens applications for Ghana startups
- For Lagos-based fintech and proptech startups: The ARMS Labs Lagos Techstars Accelerator Program is now accepting applications from early-stage African fintech and Proptech startups
Thanks for reading.
You can get in touch with us by emailing hello@benjamindada(dot)com and we’d reply within the hour.
