It is said that many years ago, when a group of Africans first saw an Englishman’s watch, they believed it was an instrument from the future. Many were afraid to touch it, and others seeked to unravel the mystery behind the small ticking object. They later found out that it was simply something that could tell the time more accurately than their own guesses. There are also stories of how Young African children marvelled at the sight of an Iron horse (bicycle) which they believed existed only in a world different from theirs. Fast forward to many years later, Africans have invented cars and iron horses.
The world is characterised by rapid and fast-moving technological advances, and Africa is always the last to catch up. However, Life is evolving faster than ever, and in this time of digital and industrial revolution, technology has influenced the sectors of all known continents including Africa. Africa’s late arrival to the digital economy comes with certain competitive advantages. It benefits from advances and mistakes already made by Silicon Valley. Its population is younger than that of any other continent. Its marketplace amounts to a new frontier. Its largely untapped labor force presents an appealing prospect for tech-assembly plants.
Africa, to the unaware, might seem like a dark, primitive place, but multiple trends and research shows just how much technological advancements have been made on the rich continent. Here are a few:
MELLOWCABS:
Mellowcabs develops and manufactures light electric cargo vehicles, called MellowVans that provide low cost, efficient and emission-free delivery services in cities. Developed in South Africa, Mellowcabs are eco-friendly as they are powered using kinetic energy, and are made out of recycled materials.
Mellowcabs designed by IDESO
MellowVans are three-wheeled electric minicabs that are designed to provide efficient on-demand taxi service in urban areas. The rides are almost free (less than 2 USD irrespective of the distance traveled), and a single Mellowcab can provide over 120 km of transport per day. Commuters are connected to the cabs by a mobile app and payment can be made via the app.
M-PESA:
M-Pesa (M for mobile, pesa is Swahili for money) is a mobile phone-based money transfer service, payments and micro-financing service, launched in 2007 by Vodafone Group plc and Safaricom, the largest mobile network operator in Kenya. As a branchless banking service, M-Pesa allows users to deposit, withdraw, transfer money, pay for goods and services (Lipa na M-Pesa), access credit and savings, all with a mobile device.
The service allows users to deposit money into an account stored on their cell phones, to send balances using PIN-secured SMS text messages to other users, including sellers of goods and services, and to redeem deposits for regular money. Users are charged a small fee for sending and withdrawing money using the service.
M-pesa has been a life changing innovation for the remittance world. It has eliminated the need for bank accounts, bank charges and the inconvenience of depending on a public transport driver to deliver money to the village. One of the most significant things about M-pesa is that it is a reminder that you have to know your environment really well in order to create lasting and useful solutions to the existing problems.
JUMIA:
Jumia is a three-headed online giant: a marketplace with one billion annual visits largely dominated by third-party sellers, a logistics arm that handles shipments and deliveries, and a payments platform. Jumia launched in Nigeria in 2012 and grew to become the largest e-commerce retailer in the country. Jumia currently works with 16 African countries and sells anything from electronics to clothes and home goods. Initially starting with three employees, Jumia presently has a staff of 1,000 young and entrepreneurial Nigerians. In 2014, Jumia set-up its first e-commerce academy in Nigeria, the Jumia Academy, building young entrepreneurs pioneering various aspects of business in Nigeria.
STERIO.ME
Sterio.me is a service to reinforce learning via pre-recorded interactive voice lessons, as well as SMS-based lessons, which are accessible via any type of phone without requiring an Internet connection. This saves teachers time by automating the homework process in Primary and Secondary Schools, where they sometimes face overcrowded classrooms. Sterio.me is reinforced education made simple, effective and affordable.
It’s as simple as this: a learner sends a unique code via SMS referring to a specific lesson they were taught at school. They then receive a call back with an interactive quiz, which is answered via the keypad or by speaking into the phone. When they’re done, it’s automatically marked and the results are sent to the teacher, saving them time and providing them with useful data on learner progress. Teachers can further engage their learners via SMS messages, complementing the voice quizzes, to enable full pedagogical input involving reading, writing, listening and speaking.
First launched in Zimbabwe, Sterio.me provides a good way to engage learners outside the classroom, and opens up an opportunity for everyone who wants to learn.
GSMA M-HEALTH:
GSMA mHealth has brought the mobile and health care industries together by bringing solutions to long-term health problems. Patients are able to access basic health information through their mobile phones. As of December 2017, these services have cumulatively delivered lifesaving maternal and newborn child health and nutrition content to over 1.59 million women and their families across eight sub-Saharan African markets: Nigeria, Ghana, Malawi, Tanzania, Zambia, Mozambique, Uganda and Kenya. A significant advantage of this technology is that it allows access to people in rural areas who have been typically neglected.
These are but a few out of the numerous technological developments currently making or expected to make a positive difference in the continent. Africa is going through a creative phase of digital evolution, and as more and more innovative solutions are being created, the wide technological gap is closing, thus birthing a digitalized continent.