Hello, morning guys!
We are back at it with the Big 5 Daily, giving you the hottest and latest in African and World Tech.
We start with really big news as Andela, the biggest African fellowship for African Developers announced that they secured $100 million in Series D funding. The investment round was led by Generation Investment Management and was assisted by Spark Capital, GV, CRE Venture Capital and the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative. It is the biggest Investment an African Startup has ever received and it brings their total venture fund to $180 million. This is a different kind of flex to be honest and we are still in awe.
Still on funding. It was recently announced that Superfluid Labs, which is a Kenyan fintech startup that provides software service offering data analytics and artificial intelligence to businesses and individuals received funding from Green Tec Capital, the German Investment firm. Founded in 2015, Superfluid aims to channel this fund to expand its services to e-commerce platforms, assisting business to offer customers their own credit service. Great development!
Speaking of events, Suguba announced yesterday that it will host the Francophone Africa Investors Summit (FAIS) which is set for the 28th and 29th of March in Bamako, Mali. The summit serves as a platform to engage budding francophone African entrepreneurs with investors who not only want to invest in the ideas of these entrepreneurs but also mentor them. Rebecca Enonchong, Tidjane Deme, Marième Diop, Maxime Bayen are confirmed Keynote speakers at the event.
Over the past weeks, Zimbabwe has experienced quite a rollercoaster of events. It all started on January 12 when the government introduced a drastic increase in fuel prices. Protests ensued and the Congress of Trade Unions called for a national strike which saw demonstrations break out in many cities. On January 14, it was announced that the National Security Minister issued a directive to place a block on social media– a move that caused a large uproar. The Tech community took the government to court and on Monday, the High Court ordered an end to all net restriction on the basis that the Security Minister cannot legally withhold the freedom of expression. We hope things stay peaceful and Zimbabweans move past this.
Finally, It was revealed yesterday by the China Unicom that the Chinese Government has issued a block on Bing. China used a DNS corruption method to prevent its citizens from using the search engine. This development has come with mixed reactions as Microsoft in the past have repeatedly tried to alter their products so it will fly in the Chinese market. Former Microsoft Executive, Steven Sinfosky said that Microsoft worked so hard to be successful there. Microsoft has expressed no interest in relaunching its product in China.
And that is all for the day, see you next time.