These are the tech-related news that you have missed over the previous week.
- Bolt Nigeria introduces offline trip cancellation feature, bans drivers soliciting for it
- AltSchool launches a virtual academy in Kenya
- Moniepoint processed over 5 billion transactions in 2023
- Founder of Chaka, Tosin Osinbodu, departs the company after the Rise merger
- 4IRTA lists ten startups to receive ₦10 million grant
Bolt Nigeria introduces offline trip cancellation feature, bans drivers soliciting for it
Bolt Nigeria has included a new feature to its latest update in its app, which is aimed at protecting the safety and ride trips of its riders.
Nigerians have often complained of Bolt drivers looking to bargain for offline trips so they can charge whatever fee they desire without the notice of Bolt.
However, in its recent update, riders can now cancel offline trips, and such riders soliciting offline trips will be suspended.
With the new feature, riders can now state that the “driver asked to pay off the trip” whenever they offered an offline trip.
AltSchool launches a virtual academy in Kenya
AltSchool Africa has expanded its learners beyond 100 countries, boasting over 60,000 students, and recently added Kenya to its list by introducing a virtual academy.
Although the tech learning platform has primarily operated in Nigeria and Uganda, it has now chosen to speed its wings into Kenya after a year’s worth of planning.
“Kenya is AltSchool’s second largest market. On Coursera, too, Kenya is doing better numbers in learning than Nigeria on the ranking. That’s to show you how much learning is going on in that country and how receptive they are to online learning,” Oluwanifemi Akinwamide, the Head of Growth and Partnerships, said.
Moniepoint processed over 5 billion transactions in 2023
One of Nigeria’s largest payments firms, Moniepoint, was revealed to have fostered 5 billion transactions in 2023.
Despite the many issues that affected Nigeria’s financial services sector, Moniepoint scaled through in the industry, making roughly 430 million monthly transactions across all its payment platforms: card, mobile, in-person, and web.
According to a report from TechCabal, the value of transactions made on Moniepoint was about $150 billion, roughly translating to a growth of 205% compared to 2022’s result.
Founder of Chaka, Tosin Osinbodu, departs the company after the Rise merger
Tosin Osibodu, the founder of Chaka, a Nigerian startup firm aimed at enabling retail investors to buy shares from multiple stock exchange platforms, has officially exited his company five months after Rise acquired it.
The Chaka company now belongs to Eke Urum, the CEO of both companies since the merger.
According to Tosin Osibodu’s updated LinkedIn profile, he has now joined the Alpaca team, a firm that creates APIs for trading stocks and crypto.
4IRTA lists ten startups to receive ₦10 million grant
The Ministry of Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy has announced ten Nigerian startups eligible for its Fourth Industrial Revolution Technology Application (4IRTA) in Agriculture Program.
The Minister overseeing the program, Dr Bosun Tijani, announced his social media platform X (formerly Twitter); he stated the program is in support of President Bola Tinubu’s mandate to cultivate 500,000 hectares of land across the country for improvement of food security.
The application process began in November 2023 and recorded applications from over 2000 start-ups, now leading to ten shortlisted applicants.
The ten startups are Agri-Wing, Ranch.ID LivestockPro, Precision Farm Management, Automated IoT-Based Irrigation System, Geospatial Intelligence model for enhanced prediction of crop yield and crop stress assessment, AgriTrust Solutions, Alfor Livestock diseases and health reporting, loT Climate-Smart Device, Smart Pond (SP), and Future Fish Farms.
Ayomitide Adeyinka is a content writer, crypto journalist and editor with a Bsc in Political Science. He is also an egalitarian.
