Ethiopia is fast emerging as the land of opportunity
Africa’s innovation revolution
Intro Africa explores investing in possibilities in Africa. Over the next 5 years Africa will see 137 million new connections on the mobile phone network and all these are going to be on smartphones and all these are going to be consumers of digital solutions. In Africa, mobile phones are everything, 60% of all mobile phone users are doing it from a smartphone and that’s the largest driver of internet access within the continent.
In Africa, people are well-versed in using mobile phones to access financial products and it’s through IT and technology that businesses can reach the masses.
To grow a community you need to have access to credit, to banking services, anything that is around financial inclusion is part of our scope of investment.
Endre Skolt
Founder & Owner
Change Com
Bringing mobile solutions into existing community structures such as savings groups or SACCO’s, digitises this social capital and gives rural communities access to affordable financial and insurance services, with technology being the bridge to affordability and scalability.
Eferio Communications’ solution architect, Chris Daniels believes the time and opportunity are ripe for new possibilities of services we have not even begun to think about with highly specialised operators that can bring services and solutions that matter.
Navigating these opportunities and challenges is Change Com, an Oslo-based investment and advisory company,creating change through investing in the startup ecosystem.
Investing in the 3 key areas of mobile internet, digital financial services and renewable energy, Change Com is lifting and empowering startups to set up profitable businesses.
We decided to go into renewable energy because we believe that that is a big demand especially in the rural areas of East Africa.
Endre Skolt
Founder & Owner
Change Com
The demand for renewable energy in Africa is huge and off- grid solution providers such as Change Com investee, Spark Possibilities, can reach rural communities where the grid can’t, providing lighting and solar solutions which can give people income generating activities.
Communities need access to credit and banking services in order to grow. Financial inclusion features strongly in Change com’s scope through their investment in digital financial services providers FinAccess and DDFinance.
Our solution aims at digitising the social capital. Using the mobile phone platform in existing communities, we’re able to really cut the cost and make insurance affordable.
Grace Wambui
Project Manager
DDFinance
Photo: Thought Leader Global Media
How ChangeCom’s investing in possibilities in Africa.
Mobile technology provides the affordable financial and insurance services that these companies offer, delivered through the convenience of a phone, to the previously excluded communities who could otherwise not access or afford these services.
Chris Daniels from Eferio Communications, Change Com’s mobile internet investee, predicts that The IT space is going to impact significantly how industry is organised, how trade is conducted, it represents the next billion of connections that is going to emerge out of Africa, as the building blocks for the 4IR, the emerging economy that Africa is rising into. Investing in possibilities in Africa.
