Last year, the South African development group MEDO offered entrepreneurs training as well as international exposure to business and investment partners. Last week, 12 businesses returned to South Africa from the International Trade Programme in the UK. After hundreds of entrepreneurs across South Africa applied for this opportunity, 14 were eventually chosen. The aim of the trip was to stimulate trade between these successful entrepreneurs and UK partners to further job creation in South Africa. This is the organisation's third ...

"The internet revolution is similar to the industrial revolution," said Nigeria's ICT Minister Omobola Johnson at Social Media Week in Lagos. "President Goodluck Jonathan said that we missed out on the industrial revolution, we shouldn't miss out on the internet revolution. Our lives revolve around technology today." The tech minister, who has been travelling the globe collecting thoughts on how to improve Nigeria's tech industry, says that based on government assessment, Nigeria's tech sector showed growth in all sub-sectors even ...

It started with an ambitious idea to fix the bleeding music industry in an age of rampant piracy, and it ended with an email. Just after 5pm one Wednesday evening, South African tech entrepreneur and Airborne founder Justin Melville finished composing his letter of thanks and farewell and hit ‘send’ on the message informing his users that his startup was dead. “We had a dream that one day we might help remake the music business,” he wrote in the email explaining ...

If you're going to start an internet business in Nigeria, get ready to be screwed. That's IROKO Partners' founder Jason Njoku's biggest takeaway from the company's journey since its inception. In the last three years, the company has become synonymous with Nigerian content using the infectiously popular Nollywood as a segue, but getting there hasn't been particularly easy. The early days of the company mostly involved founder Njoku negotiating rights for movies in Nigeria. It's a not hard to see ...

Last year Nigerian online retailer Konga debuted the online storefront Konga Mall which gave certain businesses the opportunity to have their products available online. Today, the company is announcing Konga Marketplace which is said to "revolutionise" the local trade industry by inviting all business owners online, big or small. Set to launch in the coming weeks, Konga's updated Marketplace will cater not only for the big retailers, but also the small local players from the market traders and designer to the ...

StartupBus Africa was great fun and brought about some really exciting ventures. Some of them, however, have crept off the radar since the startup competition slash hackathon concluded last year November. Sterio.me isn't one of them. The energetic mobile education outfit recently announced that it will be rolling out a trial of its services across 75 schools in Nigeria, once it has secured crucial partnerships. Sterio.me was founded by Christopher Pruijsen, Dean Rotherham and Danielle Reid and is an elearning startup ...

The online language learning space just got a bit more exciting. TutorGroup, an online language learning platform based throughout Asia, just closed a second round of US$100-million from big regional investors including Alibaba, Qiming Venture Partners, and Temasek. As reported by VentureBeat, TutorGroup sought out investors in China and Singapore as it wishes to build its brand in those regions. The company had previously raised US$15-million in April 2012. Founded in 2004 by brothers Ming Yang and Dr. Eric Yang, TutorGroup ...

There is a lot of talk about mobile penetration in Africa. Even if you dissect the stats down to the number of unique subscribers, there is no doubt that mobile has had, and continues to have, a huge role on the continent. But what about data? Or more specifically, what about the cost of data? It's no good if everyone on the continent has access to a mobile phone but cannot afford the cost of bandwidth. Is mobile really enabling as ...

Although the concept of romance on Valentine's Day focuses on roses, cards, perhaps even jewellery, Nigerians have remained loyal to the classic idea of dessert as the most romantic gift of all, says food delivery platform Hellofood. According to the Rocket Internet, MTN and Tigo backed platform, personalised cakes and chocolate selections are the most orders products. In fact, around 20% of all daily food orders being placed on the website and through the mobile app include some aspect of dessert. ...

In an effort to uncover and nurture Africa's best young entrepreneurs, entries for the Anzisha Prize for 2014 has opened this week. The competition is part of a bigger picture to group organisations and media brands all over the continent and find, celebrate and support the most innovative social and business entrepreneurs younger than 22. Hosted by the African Leadership Academy and in partnership with The MasterCard Foundation, the Anzisha Prize has been celebrating initiative and innovation for the last ...