Shalom,
Victoria from Techpoint here,
Here’s what I’ve got for you today:
- Uganda launches CBDC pilot in $5.5B tokenised economy
- Swipe right for a job? Meet Tinder for jobs
- Flutterwave UK posts £2.27m loss despite rising revenue
Uganda launches CBDC pilot in $5.5B tokenised economy
Uganda has just launched its first Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC), kicking off what could be one of the biggest shake-ups in the country’s financial world. Working with Global Settlement Network (GSN) and Diacente Group, the government is rolling out a $5.5 billion tokenised economy with real infrastructure and industries getting digitised, not just financial experiments.
The platform is being piloted on GSN’s permissioned blockchain, where every unit of the digital shilling will be backed by treasury bonds. That means the digital currency isn’t floating on speculation; it has real assets behind it. Key sectors like mining, agriculture, renewable energy, and logistics are part of the plan.
It’s all anchored around Uganda’s Karamoja Green Industrial & Special Economic Zone (GISEZ), managed by Diacente. Think solar power plants, agro-processing hubs, smart infrastructure, everything you’d expect in a zone built to symbolise industrial modernisation. The idea is to tokenise not just money, but infrastructure, trade flows, and value across physical and economic systems.
On the inclusion front, this could matter a lot. The permissioned blockchain setup gives the Central Bank and authorised partners control over who’s in, ensuring regulation (KYC, AML) is respected. Uganda aims to make the CBDC usable via smartphones and USSD, which helps bridge gaps for people without fancy devices.
There are serious ambitions behind the numbers: more than one million jobs projected, up to $10 billion in annual exports, and alignment with Uganda’s long-term plans like Vision 2040 and continental goals under the AU’s Agenda 2063. This is being positioned not as a tech fad but as a foundational piece of industrial and financial transformation.
Of course, no rollout is without challenges. Technical capacity, public understanding, ensuring fairness (so people without smartphones aren’t left behind), and regulatory clarity will all need attention. But Uganda’s pilot provides a real test case for how digital currency + tokenisation can be used for real economic change, not just digital currency hype.
Swipe right for a job? Meet Tinder for jobs
I saw the news this week about a company, dubbed, “Tinder for Jobs,” getting into Y Combinator, and of course, Bolu already has the gist for you. The startup, Sorce, was founded by three Nigerians — Oluwapelumi Dada, David Alade, and Daniel Ajayi — and it’s changing the way people find jobs online.
Their big break came when they got an unexpected email from David Lieb, the man behind Google Photos and now a General Partner at YC. On a quick call, Lieb told them they’d just been accepted into the accelerator even though they had applied after the deadline. It was the kind of moment every founder dreams of, but in their case, it wasn’t exactly a surprise.
Sorce, which started as Swype in August 2024, had already gone viral online, gaining users in nearly every country in the world except North Korea and three others. The app makes job-hunting as simple as swiping right, powered by AI that auto-fills applications and matches users with companies based on skills and preferences. Dada calls it “Tinder for jobs,” and people seem to love it. The platform has logged over 20 million swipes and nearly 500,000 users.
Before Sorce, Dada built a simpler version called One Click Apply while interning at Tesla and Dell. That caught the attention of Sam Parr, founder of The Hustle, who shared Dada’s story with his 1.7 million followers on X. Parr’s post went viral, describing Dada as the kind of young founder you bet on early. Soon after, Founders Inc wrote the first cheque that allowed him to chase his dream full-time.
To bring Sorce to life, Dada teamed up with Ajayi, an MIT-trained AI engineer who had interned at Nvidia, and Alade, an iOS developer he met on X. In just seven weeks, they launched Sorce and hit 1.5 million views on their announcement post. The team has since grown to six people, including Matthew, a Canadian intern who joined through the platform and rebuilt their AI search feature, doubling user engagement.
Today, users have landed interviews at over 150 companies, including OpenAI, Visa, Coca-Cola, Samsung, and Nvidia. Not bad for a startup that began as a side project and missed the YC deadline. Bolu gives you more on their journey and what’s next for Sorce in his latest for Techpoint Africa.
Flutterwave UK posts £2.27m loss despite rising revenue
Flutterwave UK’s 2024 numbers are in and they’re not pretty. The British arm of Africa’s most valuable fintech reported a net loss of £2.27 million, up sharply from £485,000 in 2023, despite growing its turnover by 21% to £6.6 million.
The company’s operating profit plunged 89%, falling from £1.25 million to just £142,299. A big part of that slide came from ballooning administrative costs, up from £4.2 million to £6.4 million, as the company expanded its headcount from 22 to 31 people.
Adding to the financial hit, Flutterwave UK also recorded a £2.6 million loss from the disposal of an undisclosed investment. The company hasn’t shared details about what was sold, but that one-off event wiped out what could have been a much stronger year.
The filings also show a worrying cash position. Flutterwave UK’s reserves dropped from nearly £15 million in 2023 to just £743,000 by the end of 2024. Meanwhile, retained earnings flipped from +£1 million to -£1.25 million, and amounts owed to the company plummeted from £4.5 million to £10,000, hinting at possible internal or customer-side adjustments.
In response, the company told Techpoint Africa that “a one-off item from strategic investment disposals impacted the year-end result but not the underlying strength of the business.” Flutterwave added that its 2025 half-year results show stronger momentum, with margins doubling, enterprise payments up 20% year-on-year, and new regulatory approvals across key markets.
Flutterwave isn’t the only Nigerian fintech facing tough early returns in the UK. Moniepoint UK also posted a $1.2 million loss in its first year of operations, generating no revenue between February and December 2024. For both companies, the message seems clear, building a sustainable UK fintech business takes more than just brand strength.
In case you missed it
- Nigeria’s lower house eyes tighter oversight of POS and crypto, cites rising fraud and cybercrime
What I’m watching
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- OpenAI just made your entire tech stack obsolete…
Opportunities
- Join Africa’s top female founders, investors & innovators at AWFS 2025. Register here.
- Airtel is hiring Enterprise Key Account Manager. Apply here.
- Financial Times is recruiting a West African Correspondent. Apply here.
- Moove is hiring a Marketing Manager. Apply here.
- Standard Bank is looking for a Data Engineer. Apply here.
- Food Court is looking for a Marketing Coordinator. Apply here.
- FairMoney is recruiting Head of Business Banking Product. Apply here.
- Max.ng is looking for a Platform Support Intern. Apply here.
- Businessfront, the parent company of Techpoint Africa, is hiring a Sales Associate. Apply here.
- Businessfront, the parent company of Techpoint Africa, is looking for a Managing Editor (FMCG). Apply here.
- Flutterwave is hiring for several roles. Apply here.
- Paystack is recruiting a performance marketing specialist in Nigeria. Apply here.
- Paga is recruiting for several positions. Apply here.
- Moniepoint is hiring for several positions. Apply here.
- Are you building a startup can feel isolating, but with Equity Merchants CommunityConnect, you can network with fellow founders, experts, and investors, gaining valuable insights and exclusive resources to help you grow your business. Click here to join.
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Have a fun weekend!
Victoria Fakiya for Techpoint Africa
