What do Gerald Begumisa, Nick Hargreaves, Matt Toplis, Silas Okwoche, Churchill Nanje Mambe and Vince Diop have in common? They are all mobile entrepreneurs. Each one of these individuals has recognized the mobile phone as a promising channel for delivering services to Africa’s growing middle class and rural populations. It is also fair to say the mobile opportunity is an African one as these ventures gain traction in markets as diverse as Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Cameroon and Nigeria.
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Gerald Begumisa
Yo! Payments is a secure web-based mobile payments gateway which enables businesses and other organizations to conveniently and securely manage mobile money payments. As a communication device, the mobile phone has been widely adopted on the African continent. The introduction of mobile money, as a mobile value-added service, has met significant success as a facilitator of person-to-person payments. Yo! Payments makes the success of mobile money services a reality for businesses and other organizations by offering a secure, convenient way of managing payments received or made to/from the mobile phone.
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Nick Hargreaves
This is an sms information service where subscribers receive useful information for free like breaking news, stock market, quotes, etc… according to the categories they subscribe to. The sms are appended by unobtrusive short location based adverts that are paid for by advertisers. Info160 is the cheapest way to advertise (with rates beginning at KSH 100) and the most effective when taking into consideration that over 77% of world population have mobile phones. The big difference? Advertisers can choose to make their adverts location sensitive.
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Matt Toplis
AfricanBrains is acting on behalf of one of its members who needs funding for M-PATA; a Mobile / Web Application for Tracing Lost Documents such as Passports or National Identity Cards, etc… M-PATA addresses the headache many people endure when they lose their precious documents such as Passports or National Identification Cards. M-PATA will be funded by member’s paid subscription. There is also potential for sponsorship & advertising revenue on the M-PATA website and related channels.
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Silas Okwoche
Ideacentric e-Education, Nigeria
Ideacentric is a strategy, media and technology consulting/services firm based in Abuja Nigeria. They are currently working on the digitalization of the Nigerian school curriculum into custom courseware for delivery on portable devices. The team has made strides in securing tentative governement orders for supply of their courseware. The software will be distributed on tablets to students at the secondary school level with the main aim of boosting student pass rates. The team is seeking venture capital needed to secure master resale rights (for the identified tablet) in Nigeria.
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Churchill Nanje Mambe
Njorku puts it simply, use the mobile phone for jobs search in Africa. They provide job search solutions for Africans world wide and have more services in the pipeline at Njorku.com. Their solutions include, email alerts and sms alerts. Asked about their motivation for starting the company they explain, ‘We are trying to solve unemployment in Africa by providing solutions to make job search faster and more affordable’
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Vince Diop
Belcash Mobile Banking, Ethiopia
Belcash seeks to provide an ICT platform for mobile banking in Ethiopia i.e. micro money transfer (P2P), pay my bill, send local/international remittances, online payment solutions. Via the service you can send money directly to anyone with a mobile phone, a free bank account for the receiver is opened promptly as a result. Ethiopia is one of the most underbanked Sub-Sahara countries, only 5% of 85 million population has a bank account. Most rural areas lack banking infrastructure. An LOI with local banks are signed for implementation this summer. Project is supported with a former CEO of a large Dutch Development Bank and 2 international banks in the advisory board.
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This is only a snapshot of the ventures now on VC4Africa.biz and we look forward to following the progress and successes of each venture listed. And are you working on an exciting mobile startup? Take a look at the ventures section on VC4Africa and consider posting your own venture. Why not connect with like minded entrepreneurs and investors in 159 countries around the world?