100 Startups Honored at The Ghana Innovation and Startup Awards 2023.
Ghana's digital ecosystem week in review: GPRTU Launches “Tap N Go” Ride Hailing App, GoG Has No Plans to Sell its 30% shares in Vodafone, MAKA Raises $2.65 Million In Pre-seed, GH's e-justice System.
Accra Digital Digest No. #101011
Date: 11th December - 22nd December, 2023
Dear Friends,
Happy holidays!🎉 Here are the most important news, perspectives, analysis, and insights about the Ghanaian digital ecosystem from last week.
Digital governance
News updates
Tech experts push for more efficient data protection, privacy regimes.
Experts and participants at the 2023 Data Protection Africa Summit held in Accra, have stressed the need for more efficient data protection and privacy regimes. They called for governments, corporations, civil society organisations and other stakeholders to work together on creating a trust framework for data flows across Africa – as this is essential for fostering innovation, collaboration and economic progress while maintaining data security, privacy and protection.
Digital infrastructure and platforms
News updates
Ghana Private Road Transport Union Launches “Tap N Go” Ride Hailing App In Accra.
The Ghana Private Road Transport Union (GPRTU) has launched a digital taxi service called Tap n’ Go for local taxi drivers and riders in Accra which features including ‘private dropping’ (private cars operating as taxis), and ‘metered service’ (where a passenger instantly stops a taxi in the middle of the road and a meter is turned on to determine the charge), in addition to the usual online service app.
Government has no plans of selling its 30% shares in Vodafone – Ursula Owusu-Ekuful
The Minister of Communications and Digitisation, Mrs Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, in her response to parliament on whether Government has any plans to sell its shares in Vodafone Ghana has disclosed that Vodafone Ghana, which holds 70 per cent of the Ghana Telecommunications Company, transferred its stake to the Telecel Group in February 2023 but
the Government of Ghana has no plans of selling its 30 per cent shareholding in Ghana Telecommunications Company Limited (Vodafone Ghana)
MAKA, an African social commerce platform has raised $2.65 million in pre-seed round to improve its operations in Ghana and Nigeria. Founded by Diana Owusu-Kyereko, ex-CEO of Jumia Ghana and ex-CCO of Jumia Kenya, MAKA is a social commerce platform that enables users to discover products that fit their style through live try-on hauls, reviews, and user-generated content.
Ghana leads Africa in utility database management
In June 2021, the African Development Bank (AfDB) with funding support from the Korea-Africa Economic Cooperation (KOAFEC) Trust Fund, piloted the first phase of the DBMS initiative. Ghana’s implementation of this digital utility regulatory management platform, which enables PURC to gather, analyse and use financial, accounting, technical, operational and commercial data to improve its regulatory functions and service delivery, aroused the interest of some five African countries to adopt the Database Management System (DBMS).
How Lantern Provides Outdoor Advertising for the Mobility Space In Ghana
Lantern is an outdoor advertising tech company that allows brands/businesses to advertise on cars. The company was launched in 2023, leverages both private and commercial vehicles in the ride-hailing business such as Uber, Yango, and Bolt to place ads. Owners and drivers who are willing to rent out the outside of their cars for ad placements are paid monthly based on the kilometers they cover.
op-ed
What Happened to Ghana’s eJustice System?
In 2019, President Nana Akufo-Addo launched a $97 million e-Justice project, a paperless court system that would enhance Ghana’s efforts at improving its justice delivery.Funded by the World Bank, the project sought to automate the existing manual filing systems within the court registries, from the filing of cases to the execution of court decisions. Fast forward to 2023 and the platform appears to have setbacks due to delays and technical challenges which have slowed down implementation in the court systems. This Op-ed digs deeper.
Digital finance
News updates
BoG committed to fighting cybercrime – Governor assures
Dr. Ernest Addison, Governor of The Bank of Ghana (BoG) at the launch of GCB’s new mobile banking application called ‘RECODED’ remarked that the central bank is committed to fighting cybercrime in the banking industry stating that BoG’s financial industry cybersecurity project has commenced operation this year, to provide real-time visibility into cyber-attacks targeted at the banking sector.”
Digital entrepreneurship
News updates
Techstars Announces 12 New Investments Through Its Africa- Focused program
Techstars, one of the most active startup investors in Africa, has announced its second cohort of 12 companies to participate in its pan-African accelerator program in partnership with Lagos-based innovation program, ARM Labs. This year focuses on entrepreneurs from Ghana, Nigeria, and East Africa who are changing Africa and the world, by using technology, data, and intelligence to serve a population growing in size, youth, income and digital access. Sectors invested in include FinTech, Logistics, E-commerce, HealthTech, Renewable Energy, and Future of Work.
2023 Ghana Innovation and Start Up Awards Honors 100 startups
100 Ghanaian Startups were celebrated and honored at the Ghana Innovation and Startup Awards held at the Accra Digital Centre. The awards formed part of the Ghana Start-up Week which aims to promote ecosystem dialogue and knowledge management as an important driver of policy planning and implementation, as well as building capacities and highlighting the promising industrial sectors that attract investment or funding, continental trade and sustainable growth of our economy to drive the engagement of Startups, SMEs, Youth and Women entrepreneurs.
MTN Opens Platforms Accelerator Program for Ghanaian Startups.
MTN Ghana, Ayoba, Chenosis and Mobile Money Limited (MTN MoMo) have together launched the second edition of the start-up accelerator program to empower Ghanaian start-ups and offer them the opportunity to reach millions of people on the MTN Ayoba Super App. MTN plans to reward outstanding start-ups and also get them on to the Ayoba super app giving them access to all 2.8 million users of the App.
Digital talents
News updates
BoG announces winners of maiden e-Cedi hackathon
The Bank of Ghana has announced winners of it’s maiden e-Cedi hackathon which kicked off on October 6, 2023 under supervision of the BoG and its technology partner EMTECH Solutions. The competition brought together creators, developers and entrepreneurs to ideate groundbreaking solutions leveraging the e-Cedi.
Forward Titans was adjudged the overall best and won a prize of GHS500,000. The first runner up Nokofio received GHS300, 000 while the second runner up Pay code received GHS200, 000. All the 10 finalists received certificates of participation.
NEIP Holds Maiden National Innovation Challenge To Reward Innovative Ventures
HUSK TECHNOLOGIES, an agritech company specializing in an automated mobile cocoa pod-breaking machine, has emerged the ultimate winner of the inaugural National Innovation Challenge, receiving a reward of 100k. The competition under the theme ”Creating Sustainable Development through Collaborative Innovation and Commercialization” was designed to spotlight and reward the top 10 innovations and business ideas poised to bolster the landscape of new, innovative ventures in the country, right from their inception.
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