Raphael
As you know, we are at TechInAfrica, passionated with startups all around the African continent. We will start now that series of watchlist of startups in different African countries, and let’s start this with Uganda.
Uganda is part of East Africa, and has a population of 45 million people and is ranked among the top three countries with advanced technological and innovation capabilities in Africa, according to a study conducted by Martin Prosperity Institute of the US. With 25 million mobile subscriptions, which represent more than 55% of the population and 42% of the mobile users connected to internet, Uganda has a huge advertising audience on Social media where Facebook and Instagram represents 3 millions of active users every month. Here are 12 startups that we have selected in Uganda for 2019, that are disrupting different industries with new technologies.
Honexus produces a health information system and a data collection platform for the developing world. They provide clinics and hospitals with a health information system featuring electronic medical records, pharmacy management, lab reports, report generation to fulfill government obligations and more. This same software is also used to collect information which is then used by NGOs and similar relevant stakeholders to improve the performance across multiple clinics either through sharing resources and improved monitoring or for research purposes.
Asaak provides world-class financial services via a mobile application. They provide a full suite of financial services and use mobile technology to keep our operating costs low. Their first product is credit, built on sophisticated risk algorithms capable of scoring a borrower instantaneously. Asaak’s mobile platform uses a community-based approach to build trust with customers and provide a lifetime of easy financial access. Investors have few options to produce consistently high returns and billions of emerging market consumers lack access to credit; Asaak provides the link between these parties with a comprehensive lending marketplace.
Patasente is an online supply chain financing platform that enables people lend to growing businesses. Entrepreneurs get working capital loans against purchase orders and invoices. Lenders finance them by buying interest bearing promissory notes to earn solid returns.
Coinpesa is a digital asset exchange based in Africa, focused on bringing crypto currencies and other digital assets to the masses. Coinpesa is on a mission to accelerate financial inclusion on a global scale through the distribution of blockchain based digital assets.
Motorcycle taxis (boda-bodas in Uganda) are the lifeblood of many large cities in Africa, but they are disorganized, informal and extremely unsafe. At the click of a button, SafeBoda provides a safe, convenient, mobile-first platform for urban mobility for Africa’s booming young population.
The service enables people from all over the world to transfer money to the mobile wallets of their relatives, friends and associates in Africa. Remit.ug aims to be the fastest, safest and most affordable mode of remittances to Africa. Redcore Interactive customers are mainly African Diaspora sending money home to their families. According to the World Bank, remittances to Africa hit $60b in 2012.
EzeeMoney is a multi-national company offering Mobile financial services to individuals and businesses. The EzeeMoney solution is largely telecom independent and will therefore further financial inclusion for the more than 60% of the population that is excluded due to lack of handset ownership. Their solution will enable users to purchase temporary value using the EzeeMoney vouchers, send & receive money using the EzeeMoney card and cash in / out at the various authorized EzeeMoney agents countrywide. With an ambitious growth strategy, EzeeMoney Uganda Limited’s vision is clear: ‘To lead the way in Mobile financial payments in Uganda, Africa and beyond.
Sendy is an app and web platform that enables individuals and businesses to request on-demand or scheduled courier services at any time, 24/7. They strive to be the Marketplace for Package Deliveries. To support our mission, they crowdsource vehicle drivers, enabling us to service volatile market demands 24/7 while providing alternative sources of income, banking solutions, savings opportunities, and life insurance to drivers on the road in developing countries.
Kola studios is a gaming studio that takes locally existing offline games, and port them to mobile! They started with Uganda, and made Matatu, which is based on a local card game. It’s the most popular Android game in Uganda, with over 1,000,000 games played every month. They also recently made Karata for the Kenyan market, which is also based on a very popular local Kenyan game. They currently have 32,000 downloads, and this number has been growing organically.
Powah is where creativity meets impact. They create community based innovations that fall under the UN Sustainable Development Goals including: access to energy, education advancement, water and sanitation to name a few. They believe that these are the foundations for sustainable communities and livelihoods. Through creative designs and project management They develop solutions for social impact innovation. They design campaigns, programs, products, services, and experiences that are implemented in Uganda.
EasyPay is a smartphone and web based mobile digital wallet that helps you make electronic commerce transactions with utmost convenience. These include paying bills, paying for goods and services, ticketing and crowdfunding. With instant value addition at your fingertips, we offer enormous business opportunities for both customers and merchants that register on the EasyPay wallet. It is free to register, convenient to use and we encourage integration with other existing mobile and web based platforms. EasyPay has been built to suit the requirements of the Ugandan Market.
Social Pay is a platform that enables you to sell & advertise your goods or services to people who already know & trust you on Social Media Platform like Whatsapp, Twitter, Facebook and Google+. Social Pay monetizes your existing social networks
