2024 Annual Impact Report reveals how M-KOPA is deepening digital and financial inclusion across Africa

NEW YORK, United States of America, September 24, 2024/APO Group/ — 

M-KOPA (https://M-KOPA.com/), a leading emerging market fintech, announced that it has surpassed 5 million customers across Kenya, Uganda, Nigeria, Ghana and South Africa. Two million of these customers have come onboard in the past 15 months.

M-KOPA’s innovative model makes affordable smartphones embedded with financial services available to ‘Every Day Earners’: the wide majority of African adults who earn their income daily but struggle to afford smartphones and typically fail to qualify for conventional financial services. According to the World Bank, 75% of adults in sub-Saharan Africa remain financially excluded. To date, M-KOPA has supported its customer base with more than US $1.5 billion in financing.

Starting with smartphone access, customers gain entry to the digital economy with an affordable daily repayment model, which fits their daily income and cash flow and makes it easier to manage. By leveraging rich payments data and proprietary AI-driven analytics, M-KOPA builds a credit record for each customer which forms the foundation for a long-term financial relationship for lower cost digital loans, affordable data subscriptions and medical insurance.

According to M-KOPA co-founder and CEO, Jesse Moore: “We are thrilled to welcome our 5 millionth customer to M-KOPA this month. The scale of our operations and our positive impact on customers is what keeps us working hard to go even further. We’re just getting started; the opportunity for much larger impact and scale is right in front of us.”

M-KOPA also published its 2024 Impact Report this week, in which the company annually releases its progress against key social and environmental impact metrics.  As with prior reports, the 2024 survey of M-KOPA customers was undertaken by a third-party company – Dalberg Research.

Our impact extends beyond our customers, reaching their families and communities, and contributing to building a more sustainable world

Key impact highlights from the 2024 report include:

• 92% confirm that M-KOPA’s financing has made technology more affordable.
• 80% of customers report an improved quality of life thanks to M-KOPA’s products.
• 70% credit M-KOPA with helping them achieve their financial goals, demonstrating the company’s contribution to financial empowerment.
• 62% use their M-KOPA product to generate income

The company is having a major impact in improving digital access in Africa. Nearly 2 million customers are first-time mobile internet users and 40% are women. M-KOPA also built the first and largest smartphone assembly factory in Kenya – which has produced more than 1m phones locally and further reduced the cost of access.

As with prior reports, M-KOPA’s board and management use the annual impact report to help shape forward company strategy. Based on this year’s findings, M-KOPA is working to further increase its percentage of female customers to 50%, to reduce its carbon footprint by making circularity central to its smartphone supply chain, and to continue pioneering green products like electric motorbikes that contribute to the health and sustainability of the communities where it operates.

M-KOPA’s Chief Product Officer Nena Sanderson, notes: “Our product and services build pathways to prosperity for our customers and agents, enabling them to overcome financial setbacks, generate income and progress towards the futures they aspire to. Our impact extends beyond our customers, reaching their families and communities, and contributing to building a more sustainable world.”

Headquartered in London, UK, M-KOPA now creates employment for more than 3,000 staff and 30,000 commission-based sales agents across Kenya, Uganda, Nigeria, Ghana and South Africa.  The company has been recognised by the Financial Times as one of Africa’s Fastest Growing Companies for the past 3 years, and by Time Magazine as one of the 100 Most Influential Companies globally for the past 2 years.

To read the full report, download it here: M-KOPA Impact Report 2024_Pathways To Progress  (http://apo-opa.co/3Xv5PZ6).

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of M-KOPA.

Following several successful partnerships launching Camara-compliant Network APIs under the GSMA Open Gateway initiative, telcos and MNOs globally want to launch and monetize emerging and future services

CASABLANCA, Morocco, September 24, 2024/APO Group/ — 

Global communications platform Infobip (www.Infobip.com) is bringing together global mobile telecoms business Nokia, mobile industry association GSMA, leading Croatian telco Croatian Telekom (Hrvatski Telekom) and other companies at its leading developer-focused conference Shift this year.

Following several successful partnerships launching Camara-compliant Network APIs under the GSMA Open Gateway initiative, telcos and MNOs globally want to launch and monetize emerging and future services. Many firms still need better relationships with developers to do so quickly and efficiently. That’s why MNOs are attending Infobip Shift this year.

Matija Ražem, VP of Business Development at Infobip, said: “We are among the first to support the Camara project and the GSMA Open Gateway initiative, and closely working with telcos to deliver new added-value services. Our collaboration with Nokia, GSMA, and other MNOs at Shift Zadar shows how we work with our telco partners to expose customer experience-friendly APIs to developers”.

Our collaboration with Nokia, GSMA, and other MNOs at Shift Zadar shows how we work with our telco partners to expose customer experience-friendly APIs to developers

At Shift, Elmo, a tech-automotive company, will present its remote driving technology where attendees can drive a car in Finland through a console in Croatia. Elmo worked with Nokia to implement its Network as a Code API to control Elmo cars remotely by operating the remote consol through the wireless 5G Campus network of Croatian Telekom and will count on Infobip’s and Croatian Telekom’s support to bring this experience in this year’s Shift Zadar edition to the guests.

“The work of building the Network API ecosystem has advanced remarkably well this year. This important developer event that our partner, Infobip, is hosting further underlines the strong appetite in that ecosystem to come together to share the latest information and solutions as we progress with making it easier for developers around the world to utilize network capabilities and develop new use cases for their customers,” said Shkumbin Hamiti, Head of Network Monetization Platform, Cloud and Network Services at Nokia.

For GSMA – one of the main Shift Zadar sponsors this year – the Open Gateway initiative has a crucial role in the ecosystem of Telco APIs combined with CPaaS APIs. “The GSMA Open Gateway initiative is going from strength to strength and has culminated in the birth of a new API era. We want to nurture and grow this opportunity and provide access to developers, cloud providers, and telcos so they can launch game-changing new services. Our presence at Shift helps drive awareness of this opportunity and ensure its growth,” said Henry Calvert, Head of Networks at GSMA.

As one of the companies participating in Shift Zadar and providing the underlying communication technology for the Elmo remote driving experience, Boris Drilo, Chief Technical & Information Officer (CTIO) at Croatia Telekom, said: “Network APIs are bringing the engagement of our customers and their favorite brands to the next level. Croatian Telecom offers this new business capability to Croatian businesses, bringing them eye-to-eye with their European peers. Telecom network capabilities exposure to developers has never been easier or simpler, revealing great possibilities. GSMA’s Open Gateway Initiative is making this approach scalable, creating the foundation for the rapid introduction of new use cases throughout telecom operators’ footprints. Croatian Telekom is opening the door to this new opportunity for all our partners to deliver their services in Croatia”.

As a great promoter and participant in the Open Gateway initiative, and one of the main guests at Shift Zadar 2024, Cedric Gonin, API Business Strategy and Channel Management Director at Orange, said: “Making Network APIs accessible to developers is fostering innovation in several industries. At Orange, we are committed to share our APIs with developers and partners to experiment and implement new solutions. Our participation in the Infobip Shift event highlights our dedication to empowering the developer community with innovative tools that enable the creation of tomorrow’s digital services through the CAMARA API within the Open Gateway initiative.”

See the Shift agenda here: https://apo-opa.co/47G7cbT

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of Infobip.

Digital technologies, including satellite technology and artificial intelligence, will be utilized to improve agricultural productivity and decision-making processes for young farmer cooperatives

ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast, September 24, 2024/APO Group/ — 

The Board of Directors of the African Development Bank Group (www.AfDB.org) on 20 September 2024 approved a $129.71 million loan to Tanzania for the implementation of a youth-focused agribusiness program.

The loan will fund the first phase of the “Building a Better Tomorrow: Youth Initiatives for Agribusiness” program, which aims to create business opportunities and jobs for young people in key agricultural sectors.

The total cost of the project is estimated at $241.27 million. In addition to the Bank’s loan, which covers 53,76 percent of the cost, the funding package includes grants of $1.15 million from the Korea-Africa Economic Cooperation (KOAFEC) Trust Fund and $210,000 from tropical vegetable seed firm East-West Seed. The Tanzanian government will provide $110.41 million, representing 45.76 percent of the total.

This project is expected to incubate and empower approximately 11,000 ‘agripreneurs,’ including at least 6,000 young agribusiness owners

Patricia Laverley, the Bank’s Country Manager for Tanzania, said: “This project is expected to incubate and empower approximately 11,000 ‘agripreneurs,’ including at least 6,000 young agribusiness owners.” She added that the program will facilitate access to finance for an additional 2,500 young people already involved in agribusiness but lacking access to commercial loans. We expect each agribusiness run by a young person will employ an average of five workers.”

The project will implement strategies to raise awareness and manage knowledge using youth-oriented information and communication technologies. It will also provide training and support for agrifood business incubation and acceleration, with a particular focus on the recruitment of female applicants.

Digital technologies, including satellite technology and artificial intelligence, will be utilized to improve agricultural productivity and decision-making processes for young farmer cooperatives.

As of 30 June 2024, the African Development Bank approved 25 projects in Tanzania, with a total commitment of $3.48 billion.

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of African Development Bank Group (AfDB).