African Tech Roundup Podcast

Latest Episodes:

South Africa's New Banking Wave + Huawei Or The Highway? + Kenyan Repat Diaries feat. Mark Karake Jun 12, 2019

Show notes

Joining Andile Masuku and guest co-host, Vije Vijendranath, for this episode of the African Tech Roundup podcast is Kenyan repat, founder of Impact Africa Network and host of the Chini ya Maji podcast, Mark Karake. Following professional stints in Silicon Valley, working for the likes of Google, TrustArc and Oracle, Mark decided to return to his native Kenya in March 2018 to get involved in early-stage startup acceleration and investment activities in Nairobi. In this show, Andile, Vije and Mark will unpack three weighty questions: 1) What is behind the new wave of banking currently sweeping South Africa? [18:28] 2) Is the African Union's decision to maintain Huawei's preferred partnership status well-advised? [47:07] 3) What are the critical, yet not-so-obvious grassroots issues in Nairobi's early-stage startup ecosystem that must be seen to if a sturdy pipeline of local investible prospects is to be built? [59:10] Image credit: Shalom Mwenesi

Jumia's NYSE Listing + Are Blockchains Safe? + Security Token Offerings, Yay or Nah? Apr 25, 2019

Show notes

Good friend of the show, entrepreneur, investor and incurable blockchain technology fanatic, Simon Dingle, joins Andile Masuku and Musa Kalenga to chat through three big questions: 1) What are we to make of Jumia’s much-publicised New York Stock Exchange listing? 2) Is blockchain technology as full-safe as we are often led to believe? 3) How excited should we be about PopCom founder, Dawn Dickson, becoming the first black woman to raise over $1 million for her company via a security token offering? Regular listeners of this podcast will know that during our in-studio episodes Andile, Musa and a guest normally highlight and briefly unpack as many as ten important ecosystem developments before tackling a discussion topic. But, in response to feedback we've been receiving from our audience, we’re changing things up a little. Going forward, our in-studio flagship recordings will only cover three big questions, giving us to us a chance to discuss issues more thoroughly. Do enjoy the show and be sure to let us know what you make of the changes to the format. Image credit: Aditya Vyas

Investment Diaries With Dr Nigel Chanakira Part 2 - Patient Capital & Savvy Commercialisation Apr 15, 2019

Show notes

This is the second and final part of an insight-filled conversation Andile Masuku had with one of Zimbabwe’s most well-known and well-respected business people, the economist turned banker, entrepreneur and investor, Dr Nigel Chanakira. In this instalment, Dr Chanakira shares entrepreneurial wisdom around commercialising market-relevant tech and innovation and explains why he remains pragmatically bullish about Zimbabwe’s investment prospects. Dr Chanakira is probably most famous for founding Kingdom Financial Holdings Limited in 1997, and for orchestrating that company’s much-publicized merger and demerger with the Meikles Africa group before eventually selling out to the Mauritius-based AfrAsia Holdings in 2013. Prior to founding Kingdom Financial Holdings, he spent long stints working for the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe and Bard Discount House. Over the years, he has sat on the boards of numerous leading companies and institutions, including Econet Wireless Holdings, Success Motivation Institute (Africa), the Christian Community Trust and Kingdom Meikles Africa. Image credit: Daniele Levis Pelusi

Investment Diaries With Dr Nigel Chanakira Part 1 - Worst investment decision in Zimbabwean history? Apr 12, 2019

Show notes

This podcast is the first instalment of a two-part conversation Andile Masuku had with one of Zimbabwe’s most well-known and widely-respected business people, the economist turned banker, entrepreneur and investor, Dr Nigel Chanakira. Dr Chanakira is probably most famous for founding Kingdom Financial Holdings Limited in 1997, and for orchestrating that company’s much-publicized merger and demerger with the Meikles Africa group before eventually selling out to the Mauritius-based AfrAsia Holdings in 2013. Prior to founding Kingdom Financial Holdings, Dr Chanakira spent long stints working for the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe and Bard Discount House. Over the years, he has sat on the boards of numerous leading companies and institutions, including Econet Wireless Holdings, Success Motivation Institute (Africa), the Christian Community Trust and Kingdom Meikles Africa. Listen in to hear Dr Chanakira's fascinating personal and professional origin story. And heads up, this episode features an intriguing anecdote about role Dr Chanakira played in setting up Econet founder Strive Masiyiwa to become one of Zimbabwe’s most prolific entrepreneurial successes to date, and how he may have simultaneously made the poorest investment decision of his career. Image credit: Pepi Stojanovski

London Village Diaries With Dayo Akinrinade of Africlick Part 2 - Pan-African dating solutions Apr 08, 2019

Show notes

This is the second instalment of a 2-part conversation with Africlick founder Dayo Akinrinade, which was taped at the fringes of the London stop of Afrobytes' 2018/19 International Event Series. Africlick is a new dating and networking app that aims to connect people of African and Caribbean heritage through their culture, and in this episode, Dayo sketches the magnitude of the business opportunity she is looking to convert and unpacks her company’s growth focus. Dayo holds a Bachelors degree in Computer Science from the University of Manchester and a Masters in Technology Entrepreneurship from University College London, and has spent over ten years working in IT Management Consulting— delivering analytics and financial transformation programmes at Accenture and Deloitte. While embedded at those firms, she designed solutions and led global teams at the likes of the London Stock Exchange, Lloyds Banking Group and the Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria. Dayo formerly served as a Director at YSYS Consultancy Ltd, where she worked with Capital Enterprise and the JP Morgan Chase Foundation on the OneTech programme, which aims to raise a total of £15.1 million of investment for diverse, female founders. While inhabiting that role, she also delivered "diversity in technology advisory" to Space Camp, Startupbootcamp and Techstars. Currently, alongside running Africlick, Dayo advises two African fintech startups, Akkiba and DTL Cafe. Image credit: Justin Follis

London Village Diaries With Dayo Akinrinade of Africlick Part 1 - Working in tech while black Apr 02, 2019

Show notes

Dayo Akinrinade is the Founder of Africlick, "a new dating/networking app for professionals and creatives of African and Caribbean heritage". Dayo holds a Bachelors degree in Computer Science from the University of Manchester and a Masters in Technology Entrepreneurship from University College London and has spent over ten years working in IT Management Consulting— delivering analytics and financial transformation programmes at Accenture and Deloitte. While embedded at those firms, she designed solutions and led global teams at the likes of the London Stock Exchange, Lloyds Banking Group and the Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria. Dayo formerly served as a Director at YSYS Consultancy Ltd, where she worked with Capital Enterprise and the JP Morgan Chase Foundation on the OneTech programme, which aims to raise a total of £15.1 million of investment for diverse, female founders. While inhabiting that role, she also delivered "diversity in technology advisory" to Space Camp, Startupbootcamp and Techstars. Currently, alongside running Africlick, Dayo advises two African fintech startups, Akkiba and DTL Cafe. This podcast is the first of a two-part London Village Diaries-themed conversation, which was taped at the fringes of the London stop of Afrobytes' 2018/19 International Event Series. Listen in to hear Andile Masuku catch up with Dayo to gauge the temperature of London's growing community of African Diasporan tech innovators and to learn how Africlick is using unique user profile data to help people connect on the basis of shared culture. Image credit: Supplied

Conservation Meets Conscious Capitalism With The Desert Date Company's Lauren Servin Mar 22, 2019

Show notes

This bonus podcast miniseries episode features Lauren Servin, the American Founder and "Chief Tree Officer" of the Desert Date Company. The Desert Date Company is a natural ingredient supplier and skincare brand based on the banks of the Nile River in Northern Uganda. Lauren was previously SPARK’s South Sudan Country Manager – a role she inhabited for four years. In that role, she implemented an agribusiness entrepreneurship development programme focused on value chain development. In this conversation with Andile Masuku, Lauren explains how she and her team are looking to merge the conservation of threatened desert date trees (Balanites aegyptiaca)— which combat climate change, and a focus on creating meaningful wealth for women in an economically-challenged region of East Africa, with ambitious capitalist ambitions involving the mainstream commercialisation of desert date oil. Editorial Disclaimer: SPARK is the presenting sponsor of this podcast, which is part of an African Tech Roundup miniseries focused on inclusive economic progress being made in vulnerable states. African Tech Roundup retains full editorial control over all published content. Opinions expressed by the host, Andile Masuku, and his guests, do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the presenting sponsor, SPARK. This podcast series was taped at the fringes of SPARK’s 6th annual IGNITE Conference - a premier gathering of refugees, entrepreneurs, educators, private sector actors, government leaders, academics and NGOs. Image credit: Kelly Sikkema

Kahawa 1893's Margaret Nyamumbo on disrupting fair trade in the global coffee industry Mar 08, 2019

Show notes

Kenyan Margaret "Maggie" Nyamumbo is the Founder and CEO of Kahawa 1893, a San Francisco-based coffee company intent on revolutionising the global coffee supply chain and closing the industry's abhorrent gender gap. Prior to launching her bid to "disrupt fair trade" in the international coffee sector, Margaret worked on Wall Street evaluating retail and consumer companies, and, before that, she was a Private Sector Development Consultant specialising in emerging economies at the World Bank. Margaret holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and studied Economics at Smith College and at the London School of Economics. In this conversation with Andile Masuku - published in celebration of International Women's Day 2019 - Margaret eloquently unpacks the economic inequity that persists in the global coffee industry and explains how blockchain technologies could be used to help small coffee farmers get paid more fairly and to efficiently track the journey of speciality coffees from farm to cup.

Heidi Lovett of Swerve Robotics on plans to ignite enthusiasm for STEM in Botswana's youth Mar 01, 2019

Show notes

Former live theatre production specialist Heidi Lovett is the Executive Director of Swerve Robotics, a Washington-based organisation which uses applied-STEM education programmes to empower young people to pursue advanced STEM studies and career opportunities. Heidi initially started Swerve Robotics club (originally the Gothic Lawn Gnomes FIRST LEGO League team) as a means to channel her son's creative engineering inclinations at a young age. She enjoyed coaching his team so much that when he left for college, she kept doing it. She has been active with the FIRST programme for more than 10 seasons in many different capacities. Listen in to hear Heidi unpack the merits of the global FIRST initiative which has so far enabled over 320,000 youthful participants from 98 countries to engage in competitive STEM challenges which promote critical thinking, team-building and a solid work ethic. Heidi also shares Swerve's plans to ignite enthusiasm for STEM in Botswana's youth by introducing FIRST programmes in that country. Image credit: Jelleke Vanooteghem

Simanga Madhlabuta of Zimbabwe Investment Tours & Wisdom Gakaka of Cyrex on thriving in Zimbabwe Feb 26, 2019

Show notes

Mere days before 2018 came to a close, Andile Masuku sat down two bright, young Zimbabwean entrepreneurs to learn what it takes to engineer business success in Harare. Simanga Mdhlabuta is commercial sales and business development professional and Wits MBA who gained invaluable corporate experience working for leading Zimbabwean entrepreneurial giants such as Innscor, Econet and Africom. Simanga has also made meaningful entrepreneurial plays of his own in the investments and property industries, and in doing so, gained an enviable grasp of the nuances of Zimbabwe’s investment potential. He is currently Co-curator and Head of Partnerships at Zimbabwe Investment Tours. Wisdom Gakaka is Co-founder and CEO of Cyrex Business, a group of companies which spans high-end corporate branding, flatpack furniture manufacturing and serviced office operations. In just over ten years, Wisdom and his co-founder Annabelle have grown a modest branding solutions brokerage into a profitable business with impressive in-house production capabilities. This podcast offers invaluable insight into the pragmatic realities of leveraging long-term entrepreneurial investment strategies to crack one of Southern Africa's most promising markets. Image credit: Henry Hakulandaba

Our TOPPODCAST Picks

Follow Us

Stay Connected

African Tech Roundup Podcast

Related Podcasts

Links

Stay Connected