AfricaCom’s AHub Pitch and Win shortlist announced

Tech, media and telecoms conference and exhibition AfricaCom has announced the five startups shortlisted for the AHub Pitch and Win competition which it holds in partnership with GSMA.

AfricaCom said in a statement on Tuesday (1 October) that the winner of the competition will be selected by public vote. Voting will close on 18 October at 12pm SA time with only one vote permitted per valid email address.

Entrants of the competition submitted video pitches on their business for a chance to be awarded a consultation with GSMA’s start-up experts, one-to-one introductions to investors, enterprises and peers and a pitching slot on the AHub start-up stage.

Public voting for the five shortlisted AHub Pitch and Win finalists will close on 18 October

Additionally, the winners will also be given two all-access passes to AfricaCom 2019 which takes place in Cape Town between 12 and 14 November. At the conference, they will also gain access to AfricaCom’s official networking party, AFest.

The five innovators competing for top honours are:

Greenfingers Mobile (South Africa): GreenFingers Mobile is a mobile technology platform which manages and finances large groups of smallholder farmers in value chains. It replaces pen and paper based management systems with real time big data to reduce transaction costs and enable the efficient inclusion of smallholder farmers in global value chains.

MiMi Money (Uganda): Peer-to-peer mobile and blockchain technology company that aims to reduce Africa’s high cost of remittances. MiMi Money is especially useful and relevant for millions of unbanked Africans, while at the same time, creating a multitude of jobs for computer and smartphone literate African youth, as end process agents.

One Kiosk (Nigeria): E-commerce platform that leverages GPS, artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to match customers to merchants within a one to two kilometre radius and bridges the delivery dilemma through their community One Kiosk Pros for timely delivery, ideally within 59 minutes.

Rainmaker (Namibia): Rainmaker has developed the Vista Destination Network Open Platform and Ecosystem which seamlessly connects all hospitality and tourism businesses, among other stakeholders, with each other.

WiPo (South Africa): WiPo provides wireless powered solutions for drone, electric forklifts and factory robots which allow for automatic charging using wireless power. It has developed a drone port solution that enables the autonomous operation of drones while automating charging of drone batteries without the need for human interaction.

Those looking to cast votes can do so here.

Featured image: The Connecting Africa series of tech and telco events via Facebook