Kenya police seize Worldcoin equipment

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Editor’s Note

Week 32, 2023
Read time: 5 minutes

Hello👋🏾

Time for your weekly dose of African tech-tastic updates 🌍🔌.

Your thoughts mean the world to us, so please sprinkle a little magic on our TC Weekender by sharing your insights in this 3-minute survey.

Pamela Tetteh Editor, TechCabal.

Editor’s Picks

Kenya police seize Worldcoin equipment

Kenyan law enforcers stormed into a Nairobi warehouse and carted away equipment belonging to Worldcoin – the crypto project scanning people’s eyes in exchange for about $50.

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Senegal arrests Starlink sellers

After hitting the off-switch on the internet, the Senegalese government
is now rounding up Starlink sellers, accusing them of illegally hooking folks up with internet.

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Sendy is in acquisition talks

Word on the street is that Kenyan logistics startup Sendy is deep in talks with potential buyers.

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Vodacom acquisition of Maziv halts

South Africa’s competition referee just blew the whistle on Vodacom’s game plan to snatch up Maziv, the owner of Dark Fibre Africa, South Africa’s second-largest fibre network operator.

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DStv exits Malawi

Looks like the show’s over for DStv in Malawi. Multichoice is unplugging the service after a court order to cease any further subscription price hikes. .

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TC Live: Reducing the cost of crossborder payments

Join us next Friday at 11 AM (WAT) with experts in the payment and international trade industry as they share perspectives and potential solutions on navigating the challenges of cross-border payment in Africa.

Slow internet in SA

The West African Cable System (WACS) and the South Atlantic 3 that connect South Africa to the global network broke. South Africans were left to juggle load shedding and internet speeds that move slower than a snail.

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Payday on Twitter for Nigerians

Several Nigerian influencers and X (formerly Twitter) Premium users were greeted with credit alerts, receiving payments of between $251 and $500 for being active on the platform.

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Safaricom finalises $257 million deal

Safaricom Ethiopia has bagged $257 million from the World Bank’s private investment arm for its greenfield telecommunications project.

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The African startups in Ycombinator’s summer class

Y Combinator has dropped the curtain on its star-studded lineup for the Summer 2023 class. There are three African startups on the list.

Meet them.

Who brought the money this week?

Nigerian mobility company Moove raised $76 million in an undisclosed funding round led by Mubadala Investment Company with participation from Blackrock and other undisclosed investors.
Talents Arena, an Egyptian human resource(HR) company, raised $750,000 in pre-seed funding from UI investment.
Egypt-based Bugaurd, a cybersecurity company, secured $500,000 in seed funding.
FinMeUp, a South-African fintech company, raised undisclosed funding from SAAD and Blu Sky Investments.