The BIG5D Podcast

We are excited to return this week with the BIG5D Podcast. Our latest guest is Brenton Naicker , who is the Director of Capital Formation and Growth at CV VC , which is a Swiss blockchain-focused venture capital firm that is now actively investing in Africa. We reached out to Brenton to discuss two broad topics. The first was to understand what the heck is going on in crypto, notably in the wake o...

South African Andrew Katzwinkel , our latest guest on the BIG5D Podcast, is trying to shake up buy now, pay later with a relatively new alternative payments model called “save now, buy later” or SNBL for those fond of acronyms. For those few of you not yet in the know, BNPL lets consumers take immediate possession of goods they will pay for later through installments. SNBL is BNPL’s stern, respons...

We are excited to return this week with the BIG5D Podcast. We apologize for the unplanned hiatus we have taken over the past few months with the podcast and newsletter. The pause was due to a health challenge on our team that required taking extensive time off to recover. We are now back to creating unique content about B2B tech in Africa and the Middle East. We are also well into planning our 202...

This episode of the BIG5D Podcast is brought to you by Matchcraft Jason Sive is lumped in with the buy now, pay later space via his company, Mobicred. But he resists this grouping, noting that what his company really offers is a virtual credit facility. And this bears more similarity to traditional revolving credit than the no interest, no fees “pay in four” structure that most of us associate wit...

This episode of the BIG5D Podcast is brought to you by Matchcraft Vinny Lingham is currently CEO of the video conferencing startup Waitroom. But he is best known for his side gig as a Shark on South Africa’s version of the reality show Shark Tank. For the uninitiated, Shark Tank is the show where entrepreneurs try to convince a panel of hard-nosed investors like Vinny to put money into their busin...

This episode of the BIG5D Podcast is brought to you by Matchcraft Our latest podcast guest Gideon Greaves is MD, Africa for CV Vc, a Swiss investment firm that is all blockchain, all the time. Greaves, who joined the firm last year, is charged with finding and investing in blockchain-based startups in Africa. But in order to achieve that objective, his Swiss-based firm CV VC, also sees its role as...

This episode of the BIG5D Podcast is brought to you by Matchcraft Guy Futi is a born entrepreneur. The Congolese founder of food tech SaaS platform Orda was born in Gabon and raised in Canada, and educated at some of the world’s finest schools. He later honed his management chops at Jumia, one of Africa’s tech unicorns. One of Guy’s many childhood business ventures involved burning CDs off Napster...

Episode 25 of the BIG5D Podcast features a conversation with Mike Smits , who is co-founder and CFO of Ukheshe , a South African fintech that operates largely in the background of Africa’s financial services ecosystem. Ukheshe was founded in 2018 as a B2C digital banking application with a mission to promote small business financial inclusions in Africa. But the Johannesburg-based company quickly...

Episode 24 of the BIG5D Podcast features Ezana Raswork , founder and CEO of Africa 118, an East African local search platform, and of Taskmoby , an on-demand home services marketplace platform based in Ethiopia. Taskmoby connects consumers with vetted service providers, including domestic workers, plumbers, electricians, with more categories coming. Taskmoby made news recently when it was named as...

Episode 23 of the BIG5D Podcast features Tariq Sheikh , founder and CEO of Postpay , A Dubai-based buy now, pay later platform. This is a branch of eCommerce and fintech that allows consumers to pay for purchases in installments, often interest-free. The model is popular worldwide, in particular among younger consumers. Postpay was formed in 2019 by Sheikh, a former management consultant, and his...

Episode 22 of the BIG5D Podcast features Deepankar Rustagi , CEO of Omnibiz Africa . Deepankar founded Lagos-based Omnibiz in 2020 to help small FMCG (fast-moving consumer goods) retailers run their businesses more efficiently. Omnibiz has a solution for each link in the local FMCG value chain — retailers, field agents, suppliers, and drivers. Omnibiz offers agents, suppliers, and drives revenue o...

Episode 21 of the BIG5D Podcast features an interview with Kune Food Managing Director Kennedy Kamau . Kune Food is an interesting company in many ways. The Kenyan food tech startup’s model sits at the intersection of cloud kitchens, delivery apps, virtual restaurants, home meal kits, and more. Following a pilot in Nairobi earlier this year, Kune is now gearing up to fully roll out a concept where...

This episode is supported by Matchcraft , a global martech company powering local search, social, and display campaigns. Matchcraft has introduced “ Powered By ”, a solution that productizes its suite of APIs, giving third-party platforms access to the technology behind its flagship AdVantage platform. Visit Matchcraft.com for more. Episode 20 of the BIG5D Podcast features an interview with  Sky....

In its latest episode, the  Big5D Podcast features Simon Ellis, the Co-founder and CEO of  SmartWage . We asked Simon detailed questions about his company, which fits broadly into the financial inclusion space. SmartWage was founded in 2019 as an earned wage access platform for South African employers and workers. Essentially it allows workers to tap into wages they have already earned for a small...

This week the BIG5D Podcast welcomes grubtech Co-founder and CEO  Mohamed Al Fayed . Grubtech is emerging as a key infrastructure player in the UAE’s exploding ghost kitchen scene . Dubai-based  grubtech  (founded in 2019) doesn’t operate virtual restaurants. The company has built an  operating system  to address the friction points arising from running a high-volume food delivery business. Its so...

This week’s podcast features an interview with Tori Samples . She is the co-founder and CTO of Leaf Global Fintech . Founded in 2017, Leaf is leveraging blockchain technology to offer a digital wallet to underserved populations in Africa. Notably, refugees, migrant workers, and small traders operating across borders.  The company is based in Kigali and operates in Kenya, Rwanda, and Uganda.  We go...

This week’s podcast features an interview originally aired at our virtual BigFive Small Business Fintech Summit.  Firas Ahmad is the Co-founder and Group CEO of AzamPay , a payments platform based in East Africa that is a division of Azam Group, a major East African industrial conglomerate. Firas is a deep thinker about fintech in Africa and our conversation centered around his views on mobile mon...

This week The BIG5D Podcast talks to Katharine Budd about NOW Money , the Dubai-based company she co-founded in 2016. Kat, a former data analyst and banking executive, launched NOW Money in 2016 with her former university classmate Ian Dillon, who was working as an investment banker in Dubai. Kat and Ian saw a huge opportunity in helping the overwhelming number of migrant workers in the Gulf regio...

We engage Zapper CEO Brett White on the state of small business in South Africa one year into the pandemic. We also discuss innovation, fintechs vs banks, and the technologies that will drive the payments space in the years to come. Here are some excerpts from the episode. On banks v fintechs “There are regulations and there are limitation in terms of what the systems allow for. And the fintechs a...

Dana Buys is a longtime software entrepreneur who had a vision for creating a technology that allows restaurant owners to manage their businesses through a mobile device. Cloudone's TallOrder point of sale solution is designed for a mobile-first present and self-service future in the retail, dining, and hospitality industries. His company's newest product VerPay, adds a needed trust layer to take...

This is the first in the BIG5D Podcast's Fintech Founders Series, This episode features OZÉ CEO Meghan McCormick. Meghan explains her journey from American Peace Corp veteran and management consultant to founding a small-business fintech based in Ghana that helps SMMEs get organized with SaaS tools and get access to capital on fair terms. Meghan comes to everything with a core mission of creating...

The pandemic has created challenges for the region’s logistics players — ride-hailing services, food delivery apps, and others. But there is also a tremendous emerging opportunity to offer an ever-widening array of services. We will explore this landscape with Uber’s Kartik Taneja. Episode sponsored by MatchCraft ( www.matchcraft.com ) This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with o...

This episode of BIG5D.TV features an interview with Samantha Naidu, CEO of Volt Africa. We discuss the optimal digital solution set for African SMEs, particularly in times of crisis. This episode was sponsored by Duda: https://www.duda.co/ This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ctlaughlin.substack.com/subscribe

Today’s guest is Colin Timmis, the South Africa country manager for Xero -- the global cloud accounting platform. We had a great conversation about what it takes to get SMMEs to overcome their anxiety about technology and use it to their advantage. This episode is sponsored by Duda This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit...

Cape Town entrepreneur Grant Greeff shares his experience of trying to save one company, EHire, while launching another, OpenRoute, in the midst of a global pandemic. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ctlaughlin.substack.com/subscribe