Flippy Campus is a social application that takes an interesting approach to help students in Africa get updated on what is happening on their campuses. The team secured its space to launch at DEMO Africa 2015 at the pre-pitch event in Accra, Ghana. On Flippy, students can get to know other people on their campus, department and halls; they can also discover trending hot topics as well as events happening on campus. Announcements from the school departments also
live on Flippy Campus platform so students don’t need to visit any notice board for information. Finally, it allows students to interact with students from other universities. See the website: www.flippycampus.com | Location: Ghana
———-
Pliby is an online platform to discover underground artists and in turn facilitate crowdfunding for these artists and their albums. Users can find thousands of African songs, artists, and albums. On Pliby, the users are who approve, create, and popularize the artists of tomorrow. Currently, they are launching a round of crowdfunding initiatives as well as reaching out to some very entertaining and interesting artists. See the website: pliby.com | Location: Benin
———-
Matibabu is a premiere smartphone based diagnosis system for malaria, using an innovative procedure that checks the shape of red blood cells without taking blood samples. Malaria is still one of the biggest health concerns in Africa. The team Code8 from Uganda have developed this ingenious idea and also won the Microsoft Imagine Cup. The mobile app can diagnose malaria without pricking the body. The idea was developed after one of the team members fell sick of malaria and went through a painful and traumatizing process of needle pricks in an attempt to draw blood out of his body to test for malaria. In addition, the painful process took over 30 minutes just to get the laboratory results. As a result of this experience, the money question was literally and figuratively raised: “Is there a better way to have this process be less painful and more timely?” After multiple brainstorming sessions and hospital visits, the idea has been solidified.
See the website: matibabu.blog.com | Location: Uganda
———-
Nerve delivers low cost smartphones together with a content store, cloud services, and mobile payment solutions. Nerve pitched at DEMO Silicon Valley and has been recognized with multiple awards. This startup company delivers its cost-effective mobile convergent smart devices and services in a unique way to inspire greater productivity for “the next billion people in emerging nations”. The company’s products (smartphones and accompanying accessories) are designed from the ground-up to provide desktop convergence and access to mobile content and cloud services; this is particularly noteworthy as younger generations of cellphone users in Africa are making the switch to smarter phones. See the website: nervemobile.com | Location: Nigeria
———-
———-
Shield is a digital finance company offering payment processing, payroll finance, and more. The team secured its space to launch at DEMO Africa 2015 at the pre-pitch event in Nairobi, Kenya.
Their pitch: We are a FinTech company using proprietary technology while leveraging Mobile Money to offer under-banked employees affordable salary advances directly to their mobile phones. We provide a solution where employees can access salary advances quickly, conveniently, and at lower interest rates.
Problem 1: High interest rates
1. 9% – 15% from banks and mainstream lenders on salary advances respectively
2. 30% from shy-locks
Shield solution: 7.5%
Problem 2: Manual process
1. A lot of paperwork before approval
2. Advance origination – takes a lot of time for the employee (3 – 10 days)
Shield solution: Instant, 100% online approval
Problem 3: Lack of transparency
1. Fixed interest rates i.e. monthly
2. Hidden charges
Shield: no hidden charges, time based interest rate
Benefits to Employers – Shield for Employers
1. No double payroll – takes away the hustle and bustle around advance processing
2. Better management of credit risk and CAPEX – Shield carries the risk associated with the advances including capital expenditure
Targeting formal sector employees, 14.3mn (Kenya), generating revenue on interest charged on salary advances. See the website: shield.co.ke | Location: Kenya
———-
Botanica Natural Products makes natural ingredients for cosmetics from indigenous African plants, offering a stable source of income to 25 full-time staff in a remote rural location. This family-owned social enterprise is located in rural Limpopo, South Africa. Established in 2009, Botanica specializes in identifying, producing, and supplying indigenous plant extracts to markets in Africa, Europe, the USA and Asia in a socially and environmentally sustainable manner. Botanica is situated in the heart of the South African Bushveld region– this is where the staff cultivate an indigenous plant called Bulbine frutescens. The extract from the plant is processed and packaged before being marketed to cosmetic producers around the world. The company’s production facility meets certification standards. The agricultural process used to produce Bulbine frutescens is ECOCERT certified organic. They are also a registered ‘Proudly South African’ company. See the website: timola.weebly.com | Location: South Africa
