Samsung breaks the law in Kenya

Lire en français

Read this email in French.

Editor’s Note

Week 25, 2023
Read time: 5 minutes

Hello 👋🏾

How are you doing? Read on for your weekly dose of relevant tech news from across the continent.

Pamela Tetteh Editor, TechCabal.

Editor’s Picks

Glade loses $214,000 to hackers

Glade has joined the list of Nigerian financial service providers that have had a not-so-merry encounter with hackers. This time, $214,000 was lost.

What is the founder saying?

Google to invest $4 million in black founders

Google is granting equity-free funds, $4 million, to startups in Europe and Africa through its Black Founders Fund (BFF).

Which startups?

Samsung breaks the law in Kenya

Toeing the steps of Apple, Samsung and other phone providers are defying the South Africa’s ICT regulator’s guidelines by selling phones without chargers in Kenya.

What is Kenya doing about it?.

Somalia launches QR code

The Central Bank of Somalia has launched a Quick Response Code (QR code) standard—the SOMQR—to facilitate cashless payment across the country.

Is this a big deal?

Airtel Nigeria launches 5G

Airtel Nigeria has joined the 5G gang. It launched its 5G network in four states in Nigeria—Lagos, Ogun, Abuja, and Rivers states.

Learn more.

Kenya gets contactless payment

KCB and Visa have partnered to offer contactless payments powered by NFC. Telco Safaricom had tried to pull off something similar with M-PESA but failed more than five years ago.

How will it work?

A pricey data violation

In this week’s episode of costly lessons, 100 banks and institutions in Nigeria paid over ₦‎200 million ($289,885) as penalties for violating the data privacy of Nigerian citizens.

Learn more.

Entering Tech

Interested in getting tech career resources and insights?.

Then sign up for Entering Tech to get started!

A Safaricom CEO steps down

Anwar Soussa is exiting his role as CEO of Safaricom Ethiopia. He was the first CEO of the telecom, which launched in the country in 2021.

Learn more.

Load-shedding bites another gaint

South African retail giant Mr Price has blamed its multi-million dollar loss on load-shedding. Other publicly traded companies including MultiChoice, Vodacom, Telkom, and MTN have done the exact same thing too. Wondering how many millions of dollars the business lost?

Find out.

Heritage Bank denies fraud

Last week, reports surfaced that ₦49 billion ($83 million) had been stolen from the Nigeria-based Heritage Bank’s accounts. This week the bank has denied all reports.

Learn more.

Who brought the money this week?

South African solar energy company Yellow raised $14 million in Series B funding, in a round led by Convergence Partners.

Nigerian electronics B2B marketplace Eze received $3.7 million in seed funding.
Egypt’s fintech company Agel raised an undisclosed amount in an undisclosed funding round from Sand River Venture Capital.