• Email Us: [email protected]
  • Contact Us: +1 718 874 1545
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Medical Market Report

  • Home
  • All Reports
  • About Us
  • Contact Us

Google to invest $1 billion in Africa over five years

October 7, 2021 by David Barret Leave a Comment

October 7, 2021

LAGOS (Reuters) -Google plans to invest $1 billion in Africa over the next five years to ensure access to fast and cheaper internet and will back startups to support the continent’s digital transformation, it said on Wednesday.

The unit of U.S. tech company Alphabet Inc made the announcement at a virtual event where it launched an Africa Investment Fund, through which it will invest $50 million in startups, providing them with access to its employees, network and technologies.

Nitin Gajria, managing director for Google in Africa told Reuters in a virtual interview that the company would among others, target startups focusing on fintech, e-commerce and local language content.

“We are looking at areas that may have some strategic overlap with Google and where Google could potentially add value in partnering with some of these startups,” Gajria said.

In collaboration with not-for-profit organisation Kiva, Google will also provide $10 million in low interest loans to help small businesses and entrepreneurs in Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa so they can get through the economic hardship created by COVID-19.

Small businesses in Africa often struggle to get capital because they lack the necessary collateral required by banks in case they default. When credit is available, interest rates are usually too high.

Google said a programme pioneered last year in Kenya in partnership with Safaricom that allows customers to pay for 4G-enabled phones in instalments would be expanded across the continent with mobile operators such as MTN, Orange and Vodacom.

Gajria said an undersea cable being built by Google to link Africa and Europe should come into service in the second half of next year and is expected to increase internet speeds by five times and lower data costs by up to 21% in countries like South Africa and Nigeria.

(Reporting by MacDonald Dzirutwe; editing by Jason Neely, Kirsten Donovan)

Source Link Google to invest $1 billion in Africa over five years

David Barret
David Barret

Related posts:

  1. Federer-backed shoemaker ON prices IPO above range, valued at over $6 billion
  2. Index leads $12.2M seed in Sourceful, a data play to make supply chains greener
  3. RunX announces $4.1M seed to simplify cloud infrastructure deployment for developers
  4. Ford says U.S. salaried employees required to disclose COVID-19 vaccination status

Filed Under: News

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

  • “On My Participation In The Atomic Bomb Project”: Einstein’s Powerful Letter Goes Up For Auction For $150,000
  • Watch Friendly Dolphins Help Lead A Lost Humpback Whale Into Deeper Waters
  • World’s Largest Digital Camera Snaps 2,104 New Asteroids And Millions Of Galaxies Within A Few Hours
  • Cat Or Otter? The Jaguarundi Looks Like Both
  • “The Sea Shall Flow To Jackdaw’s Well”: Old English Mermaid Legend Traced Back Centuries
  • The Fungus Blamed For “Tutankhamun’s Curse” Could Make A Potent Anti-Cancer Drug
  • Space Might Be A Byproduct Of Three-Dimensional Time
  • “Jigsaw”-Like Fresco Made Of Thousands Of Fragments Reveals Artistic Traits Not Seen In Roman Britain Before
  • Frequent Nightmares Are A Worrying Sign Of Early Death And Accelerated Aging, Says New Study
  • UK To DNA Test All Newborn Babies In Plan To Predict And Prevent Disease
  • IFLScience We Have Questions: Why Does Snow Sometimes Look Blue?
  • New Nimbus COVID Variant Present In The UK, Infections Could Spread This Summer
  • Scientists Have Finally Measured How Fast Quantum Entanglement Happens
  • Why Earth’s Magnetic Pole Reversals Are So Fascinating
  • World First Artificial Solar Eclipse Created, The “Closest Thing” To HIV Vaccine Gets FDA Approval, And Much More This Week
  • “Remarkable” Pattern Discovered Behind Prime Numbers, Math’s Most Unpredictable Objects
  • People Are Only Just Learning What The World’s Most Expensive Cheese Is Made Of
  • The Physics Behind Iron: Why It’s The Most Stable Element
  • What Is The Reason Some People Keep Waking Up At 3am Every Night?
  • Michigan Bear Finally Free After 2 Years With Plastic Lid Stuck Around Its Neck
  • Business
  • Health
  • News
  • Science
  • Technology
  • +1 718 874 1545
  • +91 78878 22626
  • [email protected]
Office Address
Prudour Pvt. Ltd. 420 Lexington Avenue Suite 300 New York City, NY 10170.

Powered by Prudour Network

Copyrights © 2025 · Medical Market Report. All Rights Reserved.

Go to mobile version