Innovators across Africa continue to encounter several barriers such as high operational costs when starting up. Many can’t afford office space, data, airtime and transport and other needed logistics.
In different countries across Africa, such challenges are eased by innovation and technology centers which Innovators turn in to their ideation, incubation and launch bases. While these spaces are not entirely free, they are much cheaper and well equipped for innovators to succeed.
In Zambia, one of such places is BongoHive; an innovation and technology hub. For over 14 years, BongoHive has been working with start-ups and other organizations; helping them become sustainable and investor ready.
“Our mission is to unlock Africa’s potential by working with various entrepreneurs so that we can achieve a smart Africa. In the past 14 years, we have helped over 2,800 start-ups. These include over 1000 women founded and led start-ups. One of our main women focused programs is the Standard Chartered Women in Tech. Some 160 Zambian female founders have been funded with 20,000 USD by this program,” Tilyenji Mundungani, Marketing and Communications Lead at BongoHive, Zambia said.
She noted that in the course of their work, they have observed a glaring financial literacy gap which they are now bridging through trainings and supporting FinTech innovations.
“Some of the works we have done include the Investor Ready Hackathon in partnership with MTN Zambia. This Hackathon was able to prepare our start-ups to understand how they can become investor ready. We also had the FinTech For You Solution. This one gave our start-ups financial literacy and financial understanding lessons,” Mundungani said.
She noted that rigid policies, limited access to funding and unreachable global markets remain some of the main challenges affecting start-ups across Africa.
“We at BongoHive welcome any collaborations and partnerships that will help bring in bigger organizations that can further support our start-ups. Currently we are more bent towards supporting more women founded and led start-ups because we have noticed that women have been the least included on matters like access to funding across Africa. So, if we could work with organizations like HiPipo, COMESA Business Council and others to support women businesses, then it would be a plus for us,” Mundungani concluded.
BongoHive appeared on Day 8 of the 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative; Zambia and Malawi edition. Though not a FinTech, BongoHive is home to several Zambia founded and based FinTechs. The roll-out of the 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative in Zambia and Malawi followed its success in East Africa. Over the past 5 years, the 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative has featured over 200 FinTech stories from Uganda, Tanzania, Kenya, and Rwanda. This initiative has also engaged hundreds of end-users and shared their stories with millions worldwide. The primary objective of this initiative is to support and showcase innovative FinTech giants and start-ups from across Africa, with a focus on promoting financial inclusion and economic growth, in addition to giving start-ups access to the resources they need to develop new and innovative financial solutions that can benefit underserved populations. Such resources include but are not limited to Level One Project guidelines, Mojaloop Open Source Software and Inclusive Finance systems, etc.