Google Africa and the International finance corporation released a report stating that Africa’s internet economy could be worth $180 billion by the year 2025.
This figure would show 5.2% of the total GDP (Gross Domestic Product) of the whole Continent.
The report also identifies the main source for achieving these heights which are mainly digital startups.
This was accentuated by Google Africa’s Director; Nitin Gajria “Google and IFC have created this report to highlight the role the digital startup sector is playing and other factors driving the continent’s growth in order to showcase and support the opportunities the continent presents.”
Furthermore, the report, states that in the last decade over 300 million Africans gained access to the internet resulting in 60% of the total Continents population connected to the web.
Around the same time, over half a billion smartphones were connected to the grid.
By 2025 the report approximates that over 167 million people would have subscribed to mobile services rounding the total to 623 million users.
During the same year, it was predicted that smartphone connections would have doubled.
Google and IFC progressed further ahead of the timeline and projected for the next decade that internet usage will grow by 11%, which will account for 16% of the total global amount.
This rise will present the Continent as a great destination for digital startups.
The report also highlights that 44 million jobs will be created.
Interim Managing Director, Executive Vice President, and Chief operating officer of IFC; Stephanie Von Friedeburg says that “The digital economy can and should change the course of Africa’s history.
This is an opportune moment to tap into the power of the continent’s tech startups for much-needed solutions to increase access to education, healthcare, and finance, and ensure a more resilient recovery, making Africa a world leader in digital innovation and beyond.”
The uptrend of connectivity in Africa has made way for startups to introduce new technologies, which created 144 mobile money services in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Together, the mobile money services serve over 469 million registered accounts with daily transactions giving rise to $1.25 billion by the end of 2019, surpassing the 298 million registered accounts for traditional bank accounts in 2017.