Meltwater Entrepreneurial School of Technology  announces third MEST Africa Summit

Now in its 10th year investing in tech entrepreneurs in Africa, Meltwater Entrepreneurial School of Technology (MEST) has announced the third MEST Africa Summit, which will take place in Cape Town, South Africa, June 18-20.

Formerly the Africa Tech Summit, this year’s event will go Pan-African, bringing together top entrepreneurs, investors and executives from Africa, Silicon Valley and Europe, to network and discuss trends, challenges and opportunities affecting markets across the continent, under the theme The Year of the African Scaleup?

Following two successful events in Accra, Ghana and Lagos, Nigeria, this year’s Summit will take place in Cape Town, South Africa - the location of the third MEST incubator, which officially launched in November 2017.

MEST is also announcing the MEST Africa Challenge, a Pan-African pitch competition open April 1 in Nairobi, Lagos, Accra and Cape Town. The final pitch event for the competition will be held on Day 2 of the Summit and will include winners from each city’s regional event, which will be held in late April/early May.

Details and application can be found at www.MESTAfricaSummit.com.

“We’re excited to bring together leading players in the tech and investment space from across the continent and the globe once again, this time in our new home in Cape Town,” MEST Managing Director Aaron Fu said. “The MEST Africa Summit serves as a meeting ground for Pan-African entrepreneurs, investors and ecosystem partners, and this year looks to ignite discussion around the real challenges and opportunities businesses face when reaching scale, as the startup space in Africa continues to mature.”

Panel discussions during the Summit will feature expertise from leading African entrepreneurs, investors and executives, and will highlight those companies looking to scale to new African markets and the partners who can help them succeed. Topics include a debate over the best African country to start a business; a discussion of the latest fintech, agritech and blockchain innovations, why women code better, and more.

MEST is currently accepting applications for partners and speakers. Early sponsors include Merck  and MTN  and ecosystem partners AfricArena , SiMoDiSa, Wesgro, Alpha Code and Silicon Cape. Previous Summit partners include Samsung Business, AB Consulting, Google, Interpay, Agrivi, Interswitch, VC4Africa and more.

Past speakers include Mitchell Elegbe of Interswitch, Jason Spindler of I-Dev, Funke Opeke of MainOne, Matt Flannery of Kiva, Iyin Aboyeji of Flutterwave, Angel Adelaja of Fresh Direct, Jason Njoku of iROKO, Tomi Davies of ABAN and more.

In November 2017, MEST launched incubator spaces in Lagos, Nigeria and Cape Town, South Africa, adding to its flagship incubator and training program in Accra, Ghana. Truly Pan-African, MEST also has a presence in Nairobi, Kenya and Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire.

Since its inception in 2008, the Meltwater Foundation has invested $20 million into the programme, supporting aspiring African entrepreneurs through the training programme and incubator. Now in its 10th year, nearly 300 individual entrepreneurs have graduated from the training programme and over 50 tech companies have been launched via seed funding and mentorship from MEST. Three companies — Claimsync, AdGeek and messaging app Saya — have been acquired.

MEST entrepreneurs have developed solutions addressing local and global markets, received outside follow-on funding from global investors, and have gained admittance to top accelerator programs such as Y-Combinator, 500 Startups and TechStars. MEST entrepreneurs have also been selected by President Obama as representatives of the African business community at the U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit in Washington, D.C.; have been named Mandela Washington Fellows, a flagship programme of Obama’s Young African Leaders Initiative (YALI); and have been selected for Forbes’ 30 Under 30 in Africa.

African Food Security Prize Launched to Stop Devastating Crop Pest

Feed  the Future, supported by Land O'Lakes International Development and the Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research, has opened its call for applications for the  Fall Armyworm Tech Prize. The prize offers to fund up to $400,000 in digital solutions that aim to help stop the spread of fall armyworm in Africa-a pest that is devastating agriculture and demolishing billions of dollars' worth of crops across the continent.

Selected digital solutions will strengthen resilience against fall armyworm and  mitigate risks to food security across the continent.

Fall armyworm attacks over 80 different plant species. Agriculture experts estimate the pest could cause between $2.4 and $6.2 billion in losses for maize,  a major  staple crop in Africa on which more than 200 million people depend. Crops like  sorghum, rice, and sugarcane are also at risk. Unchecked, fall armyworm is a threat to the livelihoods of farmers and to food security across the continent.

How the prizes will be awarded:

·         One grand prize of $150,000 will be awarded to the most viable solution

·         Two awards of $75,000 for the most promising solutions

·         Two runner-up awards of $50,000 for early stage developments that show  potential

Applications may involve a range of digital solutions and must demonstrate how the proposed tool(s) will help smallholder farmers and those that reach them, such as extension agents, monitor, identify, treat or report the incidence of fall armyworm.

The application deadline is 14 May 2018 via https://fallarmywormtech.challenges.org/ The Prize welcomes entries from around the world that are specific to the context of fall armyworm in Africa.

Final prize awards will be announced later this year.

Trusted Objects demonstrates end-to-end security from IoT edge devices to Amazon Web Services

Trusted Objects, a security expert for the Internet of Things (IoT), announces a new step in edge device to cloud security with a plug and play secure connection between a Secure Element running with its secure firmware TOSF and Amazon Web Services (AWS) IoT.

Edge device-to-cloud seamless security is now facilitated for system integrators thanks to the projects Trusted Objects has just published on hackster.io (http://hackster.io) website. These demonstrations are showing how to connect edge devices to AWS IoT, based on either LoRaWAN or TLS protocol. The projects objective is to securely provision edge device identifiers (LoRaWAN), digital certificates

(TLS) and more generally various data related to each device to make them available in AWS cloud. With this solution, the edge device will be automatically authenticated by the AWS servers during its whole life cycle and will communicate data securely from end to end.

The first project demonstrates how to secure a LoRaWAN node using Trusted Objects secure firmware into a Secure Element (SE), with Kerlink gateway, Actility servers and AWS IoT backend. The SE is based on a secure hardware platform designed by Idemia StarChip and is the root-of-trust to achieve end-to-end security, first by providing strong authentication between the LoRaWAN node and the gateway and,

secondly, by encrypting/decrypting applicative data up to the servers and using HTTPS protocol between servers and AWS.

Mastercard appoints new Sub-Saharan Africa Division President

Spurred on by  the company's steady growth in Sub-Saharan Africa and in line with its focus on  investing in the continent, Mastercard has appointed Raghav Prasad as Division President for Sub-Saharan Africa. Prasad will strengthen the company's ongoing commitment  to delivering value to customers and consumers in Africa by leveraging technology to build stronger and more inclusive payment ecosystems.

Prasad brings his extensive 30-year global financial services and payments industry experience to further Mastercard's goal of financially including 100 million people by 2020 - an objective that can only be achieved by working with partners across  the public and private sectors and by introducing market-relevant digital payment solutions such as Masterpass QR, Mastercard Payment Gateway Services along with  its core Debit, Credit, Prepaid and Commercial solutions.

With a proven track record as a leader, Prasad has a deep understanding of the payments sector, and brings unique insights into the region honed while running his own consulting practice focusing on the Middle East and Africa as well as working for global players like Citibank and RBS.

"The influence and true potential of technology is seen on the continent like almost nowhere else in the world. Africa has an amazing advantage of not having invested in legacy infrastructure and can embrace the latest technologies, especially mobile, to transform the payments landscape. Technology innovation is influencing the way consumers engage with the world around them, shaping economies, creating smarter, more connected and financially inclusive cities," said Prasad.

Mobile continues to act as a critical conduit of growth in Sub-Saharan Africa, currently accounting for nearly a tenth of the global mobile subscriber base and is predicted to grow faster than any other region globally over the next five years. Additionally, the World Bank estimates that over 64 million adults in the region already have  a mobile money account - making it the most easily accessible technology for those currently excluded from the formal financial services sector.

It also serves as an increasingly important tool for the continent's growing youth population. Africa will become the youngest and most populous continent in the next few decades, according to the Africa Development Bank Outlook 2018 Report Its labour force will expand to nearly two billion in 2063, a trend that is supported by the fact that over 12 million young people join the workforce every year.

Prasad predicts that the demographic dividend of a large young and tech-savvy population will lead to many of these youth starting up businesses of their own, and becoming job creators. "Our work in supporting the MSME sector is critical to our role in  Africa, and solutions such as Masterpass QR are turning the tide on cash dependency as well as helping millions of merchants to go digital for the first time. This  is more attractive for businesses and consumers alike - and we see youth being a  key driver of the adoption of new technologies now, and in the future"

Qualcomm Europe chief bullish on 5G race

Enrico Salvatori argued there is “big traction and interest” in 5G from all of Europe’s major operators, following concerns the continent was lagging behind Asia and the US.

The US tech giant’s president of EMEA operations  said the market is “open to multiple directions” when it comes to the first 5G services, echoing the sentiment that enhanced mobile broadband – “the smartphone migration to 5G” – is an early case using sub-6GHz spectrum.

He also acknowledged the potential for mmWave frequencies, “where the fixed wireless access CPE [customer premises equipment] devices will play a role”.

With regard to making suitable spectrum available across the continent, Salvatori said: “I don’t see challenges, I see a programme that has to be executed. So we need to stay on track with the schedule, the auctions, so the regulators making available the spectrum at the proper time, in 2018, and then the operators taking part and bidding.”

With testing and spectrum auctions taking place this year, commercial launches will pick up pace moving into the second half of 2019.

Following questions about Qualcomm’s future, in light of Broadcom’s aborted bid and Paul Jacobs’ efforts to take over the company, and with the NXP deal still dragging on, the executive said that Qualcomm Europe is “happy and focused”, working on its 5G programme.

“We are working with the ecosystem, so we need to align the operators, we need to align the infra vendors, we are working with all our partners, Nokia, Ericsson, testing with Huawei, Samsung, all of them,” he said.

9mobile Customers to Enjoy Lowest Roaming Rates in USA

     … Partners AT&T, America’s leading mobile network

9mobile, has revved up the market once again by offering customers visiting the United States of America, another superlative package that enables the lowest call, text, and data rates while in the USA.

For as low as 50 Naira per minute, 9mobile customers can now stay connected with loved ones on the newest ‘9mobile Super 50 Offer’.

This rate is currently the lowest offered by any Nigerian network operator to customers traveling to the USA. Amongst the unique features of 9mobile Super 50 Offer is local calls within the US and calls to Nigeria are charged at N50 per minute; incoming calls at N50 per minute; SMS at N50 per page, while PAYG data is now N50/MB.

Director, Consumer Segment, 9mobile, Adeolu Dairo, reiterated that the roaming package affords 9mobile subscribers the opportunity to stay connected with family, friends and business partners while in the USA as the package enables them to continue to enjoy seamless and affordable connectivity on voice, data, and text on the go.

He noted that 9mobile Super 50 Offer is for new and existing customers who have hitherto been concerned with exorbitant connectivity bills when visiting the US. “Many traveling customers believe roaming in the US is expensive and can only be afforded by the rich, and this has led to some roaming customers relying solely on WiFi when abroad; thereby limiting their ability to remain connected.

Dairo revealed further that 9mobile and its U.S. partner AT&T are making the offer available to customers on AT&T roaming in Nigeria and 9mobile customers roaming in the USA; in his words, “This package is not just about lowest rates, it is also driven by care for our subscribers – bringing people together no matter where they are and ensuring that they stay connected to their family, friends, loved ones, and business partners”.

In addition, 9mobile is offering a hybrid data bundle that affords its subscribers the opportunity to enjoy data either locally or in the US. All that is needed to enjoy 7.1GB of data in Nigeria or 200MB while roaming in USA, is to dial the activation code *4184*1# at a cost of N5,000 with 30 days’ validity.

With this value-adding and unbeatable offer, customers can stay connected to the 9mobile network while in the US.

Dairo affirmed 9mobile’s continued commitment to increase innovative platforms and touchpoints that enhance engagement with customers and assured the telco will continue to offer best-in-class products, services and solutions in line with rapid technological advancements that set the pace of this digital age.