Salut,
Victoria from Techpoint here,
Here's what I've got for you today:
- Nigeria's Hope PSB targets ₦6.5B fraud recovery
- Intron Health’s $1.6 million pre-seed
- Africa Data Centres ramps up operations in Cape Town
Nigeria's Hope PSB targets ₦6.5B fraud recovery
Hope Payment Service Bank, Nigeria’s digital bank ;is going after ₦6.5 billion that was stolen from its platform by unknown individuals.
According to a motion filed in a Lagos high court, the breach happened around July 15, 2024. Massive amounts of money were transferred from Hope PSB's platform to various accounts without authorisation.
The stolen funds were sent to hundreds of accounts in commercial banks and neobanks. Some banks have started recovering parts of the money, but exact amounts haven’t been disclosed yet.
Per TechCabal, Hope PSB has stayed silent on the incident, refusing to comment. They reported the breach to the police on July 18 but didn’t say how the fraud happened.
An insider mentioned it was a cyberattack but didn’t give more details. To counter the attack, Hope PSB shut down its banking infrastructure. "Better to have downtime than to lose money," said one source.
A person close to the company noted that this was their first attack in five years and assured that customer deposits are safe due to their strong risk and compliance framework.
Give it a try, you can unsubscribe anytime. Privacy Policy.
It’s not news that fraud is a growing problem for fintechs and financial institutions in Nigeria. Per the Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System's (NIBSS) 2023 Annual Fraud Landscape report, the latter lost ₦17.6 billion ($11.2 million) to fraud in 2023.
What's even more alarming is that the amount lost to fraud has been rising every year over the past five years, with significant jumps each year.
Intron Health’s $1.6 million pre-seed
Intron Health, a Nigerian healthtech startup, has disclosed $1.6 million in pre-seed funding from Microtraction and several other investors.
The clinical speech recognition startup wants to use the new score to boost its AI technology, including perfecting noise cancellation and handling multi-speaker conversations.
Founded in 2020, Intron Health aims to tackle the speech recognition challenge for African accents and medical terms. The company says its technology is already used in 30 hospitals across Kenya and Nigeria, helping to speed up processes like radiology results, which went from 48 hours to just 20 minutes in one case.
Founder Tobi Olatunji’s background in medicine and tech led him to address the inefficiencies he saw in Nigerian healthcare. After training in medical informatics and computer science and working at tech firms like Enlitic and AWS, he launched Intron Health to digitise hospital operations in Africa.
Intron Health is now focusing on integrating its tools with existing Electronic Medical Records (EMR) systems and developing decision support tools to help doctors reduce errors and improve patient care.
The company is also involved in speech research, partnering with organisations like Google Research and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to evaluate large language models and ensure they’re fair and effective.
Africa Data Centres ramps up operations in Cape Town
Africa Data Centres (ADC), a part of Cassava Technologies, is ramping up its operations in Cape Town’s CPT1 facility. They're adding three new halls and another 6MW of IT capacity, effectively doubling the facility's current size.
This expansion is supported by a substantial $300 million (R5.5 billion) loan from the US International Development Finance Corporation. In June, ADC also secured R2 billion for further growth, thanks to a financing deal with Rand Merchant Bank.
South Africa's strategic location makes it a crucial hub for both regional and global connectivity. The local market is expected to grow rapidly, with projections estimating a rise to 828.93MW by 2029.
The South African data centre scene is becoming increasingly competitive, with major players like Teraco, Vantage Data Centres, Open Access Data Centres, Equinix, and hyperscalers like AWS and Microsoft Azure expanding their presence. Alibaba has also entered the market through a partnership with Telkom’s BCX.
ADC operates several data centres across Africa and is about to launch its fourth in South Africa this year. The CPT1 expansion will add 1,000 racks, including two new co-location data halls and one hyperscale hall. The new spaces are modular, scalable, and feature advanced cooling technologies.
The CPT1 facility is powered by renewable energy, thanks to a 20-year agreement for wheeled solar power. This ensures a reliable power supply and supports sustainable operations, which is crucial given Africa's often unreliable power supply.
The facility’s integration with the Cape Town Internet Exchange enhances data flow efficiency and reduces latency, improving online experiences for users. This expansion is part of ADC’s broader strategy to roll out more African data facilities.
In case you missed it
- Nigerian startup Awarri leverages 500 3MTT fellows for AI development
- ACDT warns Ghanaian banks of cyberattack risks amid global IT failure
What I'm watching
- China Rewrites the Bible | Christian World News - July 19, 2024
Opportunities
- Are you a tech professional in Africa? Take a few minutes to fill this questionnaire about your job among others. You also stand a chance at winning 100 Euros.
- Ventures Platform has over 100 job openings across its portfolio companies. Apply here.
- Bubusplug is organising a one-day hybrid event for jobseekers in collaboration with the Young African Leaders Initiative(YALI) Lagos Network July 27, 2024. Apply here.
Have a fun weekend!
Victoria Fakiya for Techpoint Africa.
