Hustle Enabling micro-entrepreneurs through finance and knowledge

Hustle is a mobile microloan platform in South Africa that grants instant loans to informal entrepreneurs, by building credit scores based on transaction data and interactions with the broader platform. The platform will include an edtech component through which users can learn more about how to run a business, and use this data to feed into the credit scoring algorithm (alongside broader AI/ML techniques using financial transaction data).

I have worked for the World Bank in the informal economy space over the past 5 years and believe this is a massively underserved area in South Africa: if South Africa were to match the self-employment rates of its peers, it could potentially half its unemployment rates. In South Africa self-employment represents only 10% of all jobs, compared to 30% in most upper middle-income countries such as Turkey, Mexico and Brazil. This venture will jump on this big opportunity.