SME Snapshot has launched an updated version of its business management dashboard, aimed at helping small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) demonstrate their financial health more clearly to potential funders. Access to finance remains one of the biggest barriers to SME growth in South Africa, despite the sector contributing over a third of GDP and employing…
The COVID-19 mRNA-based vaccines that saved 2.5 million lives globally during the pandemic could help spark the immune system to fight cancer. This is the surprising takeaway of a new study that we and our colleagues published in the journal Nature. While developing mRNA vaccines for patients with brain tumors in 2016, our team, led…
African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) and Shelter Afrique Development Bank (ShafDB) have signed a groundbreaking Joint Project Preparation Facility (JPPF) Framework Agreement. This strategic partnership aims to unlock a cumulative investment value of at least US$1 billion and is set to significantly transform housing and urban development across the continent and boost trade and investment. Signed…
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia–A major discussion point at the Second Africa Climate Summit in Addis Ababa is a shift in how African leaders address climate finance. The central question is how to “shift from aid to investment in local innovation,” and to assess whether current grant-based climate finance is truly fit for its purpose. The goal…
African ministers in charge of transport and civil aviation, along with directors general of civil aviation authorities, have adopted the Kigali Communiqué on the acceleration of the Single African Air Transport Market (SAATM). The aim is to reaffirm and mobilise political will to fast-track the initiative’s implementation, liberalise Africa’s air transport market, boost connectivity, and…
Africa has an enormous ocean area at its disposal. There are almost 20 million square kilometres of ocean, seas and inland water that could be developed into environmentally sustainable blue economies. The G20 group of 19 of the world’s largest economies and the African Union also view the blue economy as key to developing the…
How a bank digitised, automated document output to unlock paperless savings and 100% compliance. Most vendors promise savings. This bank delivered them, to the tune of R48 million a year. With full audit compliance, no paper and zero dev bottlenecks, this is what real document automation looks like in financial services. From chaos to control…
In an effort to deepen economic ties between Japan and Africa, the African Trade & Investment Development Insurance (ATIDI), Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MUFG) and Nippon Export and Investment Insurance (NEXI) co-hosted a high-level side event on the margins of the Ninth Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD9) in Yokohama, Japan. The event brought…
From smart IDs to AI hubs, digitisation can fast-track growth and close the gap with global peers like South Korea. Ghana and South Korea gained independence around the same period, and their developmental trajectories are often compared. For five centuries, Ghana has been part of the Gold Coast, and the mineral is still the country’s…
Your customers are checking their WhatsApp messages multiple times a day. (Image: Cellfind) How many potential customers have you lost because they couldn’t reach you after hours? How often do your staff members spend their days answering the same basic questions over and over? Are your competitors responding to customer queries faster than you can…
