Jumia is one of Nigeria's largest online retail stores and offers a range products from women's high-heels to cheap smartphones and books. To further help prove itself as a leading electronics store, the ecommerce outfit recently announced that it will be exclusively stocking the cost-friendly yet capable X-touch tablet. The X-touch is said to be one of the best tablet brands currently available in Nigeria with specifications to fit a wide range of tablet users. The tablet is available in ...

With the evolution of cloud services over the years, entrepreneurs from across the world can compete with each other by simply having access to the internet. Cloud services may have their perks, although having access to the skills to adequately develop innovative internet-based products and services is either scarce or too expensive for your average SME -- especially in emerging markets. With a focus on startups in Africa, StartSmart offers turnkey software solutions to other companies that don't have the adequate ...

To many small and medium business owners, the word "governance" sounds scary and Victorian. However, despite popular opinion, the value the governance process adds to even the smallest of enterprises is fundamentally misunderstood. Business owners often go into their particular business because they are passionate about it. They may know anything from a little to a lot about actually running a business, the particular industry they are entering and the roles that will be required. Among this group of business owners, ...

My father was a great entrepreneur. He came to South Africa at the age of 20 with £5 in his pocket and went on to build one of Johannesburg’s most iconic retail food brands. When he opened Fontana Highpoint in 1970, it was the first 24-hour convenience store in the southern hemisphere. In keeping with his flair for the dramatic, my father held an opening ceremony at which he threw away the keys, publicly declaring that the store would never close. ...

There's a new startup space blooming in East Africa and it's all about leveraging Africa's latest tech trends. Nigerian accelerator LeadPath recently unveiled its US$1.5-million fund and startup workspace to the Lagos tech community. The accelerator has a strong focus on startups doing business in software apps, mobile apps, electronic payments and big data. According to serial entrepreneur and head of LeadPath, Olumide Soyombo, the accelerator's investments ranges between US$25,000 to US$100,000 and includes follow-up investments from itself and other venture ...

Online vehicle marketplace officially launched under the name Carmudi Nigeria October last year with the hopes of becoming the region's largest online car retailer. With current indicators of both the relevant industry as well as the site itself showing impressive figures of growth, this Rocket Internet-backed venture seems to be on the right road to success. The car marketplace recently announced that it had reached a 10 000 vehicle listing milestone and is seeing more than 62 000 unique site ...

When the ecommerce boom first hit, retailers scrambled to develop an online presence. Whole departments were created to manage this separate branch of commerce and create an identity and back end that was both distinct and similar to their brick-and-mortar experience. At the time, it made sense that the ecommerce business and the brick-and-mortar business should be run in separate silos. After all, something that seemed so new required a different approach from traditional retail -- or at least that was ...

The South African leg of the U-Start startup conference has come to an end with four impressive contenders awarded the opportunity to present their ventures in Milan, Italy. Mellowcabs, wiGroup, CapeRay and Over have been chosen to present South Africa in the global startup pitch competition taking place 13-14 May. In an attempt to give the top of the crop startups from emerging markets and beyond exposure and access to high net-worth funding, these four ventures will have access to mentorship, ...

As Microsoft charts a new course under Satya Nadella, the company's former head and now Microsoft board member, Steve Ballmer, has been candid about his experiences at the Redmond software giant. The ex-CEO's latest public words came via a fireside chat hosted by Professor Peter Tufano, a long-time friend of Ballmer's and Dean of the Saïd Business School, part of England’s Oxford University. We've extracted some entrepreneurial gems from the talk, but if have an hour to kill, the school has ...

This is pretty cool. Africa has its fair share of innovation prizes but the vast majority of them are aimed at entrepreneurs and thinkers rather than engineers. Now of course those categories can and do overlap, but the Royal Academy of Engineering's (RAEng) decision to launch an innovation prize specifically aimed at engineers from all sectors is a pretty welcome one. RAEng, which is the UK’s national academy for engineering, says that the Africa Prize for Engineering Innovation will be ...