Pakistan backs climate tech startups

The Pakistan government is supporting climate-tech startups with a $50m fund. The Climaventures initiative is led by the National Rural Support Programme (NRSP). The money will be used to provide technical help, grants and equity to those startups involved in the climate tech industry. It is hoped that the project will increase private sector investment … Read more

Pudu launches new semi-humanoid robot

Pudu Robotics has unveiled its latest service robot. The PUDU D7 is the company’s first general embodied intelligent semi-humanoid robot.  The company, which is based in Shenzhen, China, says the robot represents a significant advancement in the company’s mission to develop cutting-edge solutions that address persistent operational challenges faced by businesses worldwide.  In May of … Read more

IT outage rocks the world

Australia was the first in line as the latest global IT outage brought systems to a grinding halt. At about 9am Sydney time on Friday, it all kicked off, with transport, healthcare, media, and healthcare systems taking the brunt. Airlines had to cancel flights, TV screens went blank, hospitals were paralysed, and doctors were unable … Read more

ORA Tech raises US$1.5m

Omar Alami

ORA Technologies has bagged seed-funding worth US$1.5m. Money from for the Moroccan-based super-app came from locally-based entrepreneurs. It will use the money to expand. ORA’s mobile app offers P2P transactions, e-commerce, on-demand services, chat functionality, social networking and a future digital wallet. It was founded last year by CEO Omar Alami. Last November ORA raised … Read more

Start-Up Nation Central hosts UM6P

Start Up Nation Central

Start-Up Nation Central and Morocco’s Mohammed VI Polytechnic University (UM6P) have got together to promote greater partnership between the innovation ecosystems in both countries. A delegation from UM6P has just visited Start-Up Nation Central, a non-profit that promotes the Israeli innovation ecosystem around the world. The delegation’s visit follows the memorandum of understanding (MOU) that the … Read more

Cryptocurrency hardware expands

Cryptocurrency hardware market

The global cryptocurrency hardware wallet market will be worth USD1328.7m by 2028, up from USD250.7m in 2021. Cryptocurrency hardware wallets are physical devices used to store the digital keys pertaining to any crypto based asset. It enables users to securely the critical information needed to authorise any sort of outing transaction on the blockchain network. They enable enable crypto owners to facilitate the buying and selling … Read more

Thursday November 3rd – the day when scale-ups fell back to earth

Scale-ups

Thursday 3rd November is going to be remembered as one of the darkest days this year for scale-ups. On that one day alone, three high profile scale-ups announced major job losses. Uber competitor Lyft said it will lay off 13% of its staff, or nearly 700 employees. Ubiquitous payments company Stripe chopped 14%, some 1,100 … Read more

French speaking startups get head-start

Digital Africa

The French government is backing early-stage African startups who speak the same language. Via the Digital Africa initiative, Francophone African companies can get up to 50,000 euros in equity funding. The money is made up of 20,000 euros in funding followed by a 30,000 euros SAFE investment. Important why? Seed financing is the crucial first step … Read more

Dramatically fewer European fintech start-ups

fintech starts-ups

The number of European fintech start-ups continues to decline steeply year on year. In 2017, there were 1,553 new finetch start-ups – last year, there was just 225, down 51% from when 456 made their entrance in 2020. Does it matter? The fintech industry isn’t that big to start with, nor is it very old, so … Read more

MaxAB raises $40m

MaxAB

The food and grocery B2B e-commerce and distribution platform MaxAB has raised $40m in a pre-series B equity round. MaxAB serves a network of traditional retailers across Egypt and Morocco. Why it matters: MaxAB is trying to transform the food and grocery supply chain by re-engineering it. The company connects suppliers with underserved traditional retailers … Read more

New fund targets Moroccan startups

Moroccan Startups

BMCA Capital Investment has launched a new venture capital fund to help Moroccan startups. The Moroccan based fund is raising money from local and overseas investors, hoping to hit MAD 50m ($4.5m). 👉Why it matters: Morocco is a hot spot for startups, many in the fintech and agritech spaces. Local and international investors are seeing … Read more

The Open Finance Association kicks-off

Open Finance Association

The Open Finance Association (OFA) has been launched with 13 fintechs as members. Why: To further open up financial data and payments for consumers and businesses through API (application programming interfaces) technology. What does it aim to do? enable consumers and businesses to access their data across all their financial accounts, and make use of … Read more

Surge in B2B embedded finance demand

Embedded finance

Most US B2B businesses are familiar with embedded finance and already offer a solution. Key takeaway: The top three critical business pain points being solved by embedded finance today are: customer retention, cash flow management and revenue growth. So says Juniper Research in collaboration with Galileo Financial Technologies. Take note: Galileo Financial Technologies is a … Read more

Cloud Bike enters Moroccan market

Telus bike

Moroccan startup Cloud Bike is beginning to sell its Telus electric bikes brand to its home market, having previously exclusively exported to the EU and the US. Sigificance: Demand for sustainable Telus bikes in the home market is rising and the 15% sold in Morocco will commercialise electric bikes in the country. More about the bike: known … Read more

Total Banking-as-a-Service platform revenue to skyrocket 

The total revenue derived from Banking-as-a-Service platforms will be over $38bn globally by 2027 says research house Juniper.  Why it matters: Brands are using Banking-as-a-Service, or more particularly, embedded finance, to take control of their own customer finance journey proposition. And that means a sea-change for banks, as they spend less time consumer facing, and … Read more