0:00

How do FinTech's in Africa

0:02

share information between each other? And

0:04

how is the African ecosystem

0:06

growing? This week, we're bringing you

0:08

back to one of our favorite

0:10

episodes from season three, with

0:13

Alfred Makuto from Amazon Web

0:15

Services in South Africa. Next

0:17

week, we'll be bringing you our final

0:19

episode of season four. So stay

0:21

tuned for that and enjoy this

0:23

episode. If

0:27

you make the cloud as accessible as possible, you're

0:29

going to get more creative ideas, and it'll

0:31

create this fly-well effect of cool ideas being

0:33

built on the cloud, and those cool ideas

0:35

attracting more people and more people building more.

0:37

So we think it's going to pay off,

0:39

and it's one of those areas that I'm

0:41

really excited about, actually. That's Alfred Makuto.

0:43

Financial Services, Go to Market

0:46

Lead at Amazon Web Services,

0:48

South Africa, and an advisor

0:50

on Financial Services and Cloud

0:52

Transformation Transformation Transformation. Alfred brings

0:54

a wealth of expertise on

0:56

navigating the complexities and challenges

0:58

of Africa's diverse market landscape,

1:00

comprising of over 50 countries

1:02

in about 42 different currencies

1:04

with high fluctuations. In ANECA's

1:06

conversation with Alfred, we delve

1:08

into the critical role of

1:10

interoperability in Africa's financial services

1:12

sector, where seamless collaboration is

1:15

essential for driving digital innovation

1:17

and financial inclusion. From breaking

1:20

down the concept of interoperability

1:22

to sharing success stories like

1:25

Kenyas and Pessa, Alford provides

1:27

insights into how technology, particularly

1:30

cloud-based solutions, is making financial

1:32

services more accessible and scalable

1:34

in Africa. So stay tuned

1:37

as we explore the impact

1:39

of skills development programs, infrastructure

1:42

investments, managed services and

1:44

emerging technologies on Africa's

1:46

economic growth and digital

1:48

transformation. Africa

1:53

is known for its diverse

1:55

market landscape, with over 50

1:57

countries and about 42 different

1:59

currencies. fluctuations. Could you elaborate on

2:01

the complexities and challenges that arise

2:03

from this diversity in terms of

2:06

technology adoption and financial services? Sure.

2:08

As you mentioned, right? You've got

2:10

multiple currencies. We've got close to

2:12

800 banks, over 40 central banks.

2:14

So you get a large variation

2:16

in terms of requirements, in terms

2:18

of regulations, in terms of standards.

2:20

And as such, you realize that

2:22

across the continent, you're going to

2:24

have a... different opinions in terms

2:26

of how people believe technology should

2:28

be implemented, which segments they need

2:30

to target it for, and what

2:32

problems they're solving for. So just

2:34

to illustrate this, for example, if

2:36

you consider, let's say someone who

2:39

works in South Africa and they

2:41

want to send money home to

2:43

Nigeria for some family member who

2:45

wants to buy a good from

2:47

Kenya, this hop across three countries

2:49

is a very atypical transaction journey,

2:51

but you won't be able to

2:53

do this because you're going to

2:55

do this because you're going to

2:57

do this. cross from real-time payments,

2:59

pay shop in South Africa to

3:01

nibs in Nigeria to IPSO in

3:03

Kenya, and that transaction would probably

3:05

take five days. You probably would

3:07

have lost 10% of transaction values

3:09

you hop across each country. So

3:12

it's a super complicated environment. And

3:14

real-time payments is quite far away.

3:16

And it's a challenge. So I

3:18

think when we talk of complexity

3:20

across the continent, it's from that

3:22

diversity. I mean, obviously there's opportunity

3:24

there as well, where you can

3:26

solve for... specific challenges for a

3:28

specific niche, but by and large,

3:30

if you're trying to have technology

3:32

scale across multiple countries, that level

3:34

of diversity is going to be

3:36

a bit of a problem. Agree

3:38

here. One term that always comes

3:40

into consideration when talking about this

3:42

complexity is basically the term of

3:45

interoperability. And since here on FinTech

3:47

Files we'd like to break down

3:49

complex technology in an easy to

3:51

understand way, how would you explain

3:53

interoperability to your grandma? That's a

3:55

good question. I probably wouldn't use

3:57

the word interoperability to my grandma.

3:59

But a simple explanation would be

4:01

the ability for different systems or

4:03

processes to talk to each other

4:05

and exchange information. I think that's

4:07

the simplest way I can explain

4:09

interoperability. Which is then at the

4:11

same time the foundation where basically

4:13

Fintex are built in Africa, correct?

4:15

Exactly. Could you share some examples

4:17

of successful interoperability initiatives in Africa?

4:20

And for instance, how they have

4:22

contributed to financial inclusion and cross-border

4:24

payments. So I food, for example,

4:26

of MPSA in Kenya, but I

4:28

would assume there are also other

4:30

success stories, correct? Yeah, so MPSA

4:32

is a really good example in

4:34

terms of simplifying, I think, the

4:36

entry point. But I think it

4:38

still also suffers from those interoperability

4:40

challenges you find. when trying to

4:42

go beyond the borders of Kenya,

4:44

right? So you can't use you

4:46

and pay some wallet in Zambia,

4:48

for example. There might be a

4:50

different incarnation of that. I don't

4:53

have many successes, I think, at

4:55

the moment on an application level,

4:57

but we're starting to see some

4:59

green shoots. And I'd like to

5:01

maybe highlight an example in open

5:03

finance, right, which is something that

5:05

has been quite successful in the

5:07

UK and for the EU from

5:09

an open banking perspective, but we're

5:11

starting to see African countries starting

5:13

to... put forward guidelines and regulations

5:15

around open finance. Open finance facilitates

5:17

the secure sharing of financial information

5:19

between institutions and third-party providers via

5:21

APIs. This allows customers to access

5:23

a wider array of financial services

5:26

and products from different providers within

5:28

a single platform or app. By

5:30

opening up traditional banking to new

5:32

players, it fosters competition, innovation and

5:34

ultimately better choices for consumers. If

5:36

you're curious about how open banking

5:38

is reshaping financial services elsewhere, don't

5:40

miss our episode revolutionizing the future.

5:42

of finance in the Middle East

5:44

through open banking with Amir Ishik

5:46

from Taribud Gateway, linked in our

5:48

show notes. Now back to Alfred.

5:50

So there's open finance regulations in

5:52

Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, Egypt, South Africa

5:54

is taking more of a market-led

5:56

approach to open finance and it's

5:59

opening up discussions around how to

6:01

build the financial system. in such

6:03

a way that big enterprises as

6:05

well as Fintex can participate jointly.

6:07

A good example of maybe at

6:09

a policy level from an interoperability

6:11

perspective would be the Africa Free

6:13

Trade Agreement, which looks to enable

6:15

free trade across most of the

6:17

African countries, almost all of them.

6:19

And so you've been getting announcements

6:21

from the bigger economies over the

6:23

past two years of their participation

6:25

in this, and I think it

6:27

represents real opportunity for growth in

6:29

trade. So there's an agreement. to

6:32

allow free movement of goods across

6:34

these borders, which is great. And

6:36

that will spark in itself, at

6:38

a technology level, discussions about the

6:40

kinds of data we're allowed to

6:42

exchange, how we secure that data

6:44

from a privacy perspective. The next

6:46

layer after that is how we

6:48

transact with each other across these

6:50

borders. And that's really innovative. since

6:52

digital innovation in general plays a

6:54

quite significant role in driving financial

6:56

inclusion, can you provide more insights

6:58

how technology, and since you're from

7:00

AWS, maybe specifically cloud-based solutions, are

7:02

making financial services more accessible and

7:05

also more scalable? Sure. I get

7:07

quite excited about this because as

7:09

we mentioned at the beginning, right?

7:11

complexity in Africa is from the

7:13

way everything is quite different as

7:15

you move within borders and across

7:17

borders, right? We're seeing a lot

7:19

of innovation across AWS customers in

7:21

terms of really novel solutions to

7:23

regional problems, right? So I'll give

7:25

you a few examples. For example,

7:27

in Nigeria, right, there's a company

7:29

called IELA Credit. They do microloans.

7:31

small loans to people, and they

7:33

were trying to solve for identity

7:35

verification during the loan process. Now,

7:38

in a country where, you know,

7:40

less than 50% of the population

7:42

would have like a formal ID,

7:44

identity verification is a big problem.

7:46

The other side of that is

7:48

from a custom experience perspective. identity

7:50

verification by traditional banks is done,

7:52

you know, you either know the

7:54

bank manager, you bring your documentation,

7:56

or you sign a few documents

7:58

just to get to the process

8:00

of qualifying, and then eventually signing

8:02

contracts to get the loan out,

8:04

which takes, you know, easily a

8:06

few days. And if you're in

8:08

a really remote area, this could

8:10

even involve like a bus trip

8:13

or a taxi trip to go

8:15

get a small loan. And so

8:17

what I allocated did is they

8:19

looked at machine learning, so they

8:21

used something called Amazon recognition, and

8:23

you can take a picture of

8:25

the person applying for a loan

8:27

and if you are a repeat

8:29

applicant they'll match your current picture

8:31

to a picture they have on

8:33

file and where you've got a

8:35

picture with the government they can

8:37

check an API to do that

8:39

additional biometric verification. Is it connected

8:41

to any government databases? They aren't

8:43

any existing APIs but I do

8:46

know they they had to build

8:48

in a way to start building

8:50

out that database and and validating

8:52

it with existing sources. So for

8:54

me it's a very clever way

8:56

of... Because if you think about

8:58

it, right, when most of the

9:00

population is excluded simply because they

9:02

don't have an ID, things like

9:04

facial recognition become super important. But

9:06

maybe that's not the same problem

9:08

that they would need to solve

9:10

for further down in sub-Saharan Africa,

9:12

right? So another example could be,

9:14

if I look at in the

9:16

payment space, there's people who've been

9:19

trying to solve for cryptocurrency exchanges,

9:21

so you've got yellow card. They're

9:23

a big user of AWS. You've

9:25

also got people who are solving

9:27

for how to pay and get

9:29

paid as a small merchant in

9:31

Africa. And so you've got big

9:33

unicons like Flatterwave all the way

9:35

in Nigeria as well, who are

9:37

doing really, really great work around

9:39

solving for that friction that comes

9:41

with making a payment across different

9:43

payment methods. So those are some

9:45

of the opportunities I think that

9:47

excite me the most in terms

9:49

of how. people apply this take.

9:52

And so it's a super promising

9:54

for advancing financial inclusion. Exactly. That's

9:56

really cool. Are there any other

9:58

specific trends worth mentioning besides the

10:00

the blockchain one you already mentioned

10:02

here? Yeah I think look six

10:04

out of seven Fintex that we've

10:06

seen in our data in Africa

10:08

are building for financial services which

10:10

I think is a is an

10:12

indicate of where the priorities lie

10:14

from a community perspective. it's driving

10:16

a lot of investment in terms

10:18

of how do we get cheaper

10:20

banking products to customers. So across

10:22

these sort of 800 odd banks

10:25

in Africa, the vast majority of

10:27

the customers they service, they service

10:29

them on transactional banking. So checking

10:31

account, wiping your card, paying for

10:33

services. But there's this big untapped

10:35

opportunity to try and bring a

10:37

lot of those people into formal

10:39

lending, right? So what we're seeing

10:41

there is a lot of investment

10:43

across customer experience is one. but

10:45

also data and analytics. So on

10:47

the custom experience side, it's these

10:49

Amazon recognitions, machine learning, for getting

10:51

past things like identity verification. We

10:53

also see investments in more mobile

10:55

channels, because a lot of the

10:58

continent is mobile first. And we're

11:00

seeing a lot of investments from

11:02

a data and analytics site to

11:04

say, look, can we come up

11:06

with alternative ways to score customers?

11:08

Because with traditional banking environments. the

11:10

credit scoring is done using traditional

11:12

scoring models. So it takes you

11:14

know how much income have you

11:16

earned, where do you live, do

11:18

you have a payment history, have

11:20

you ever had a credit card

11:22

before, those kinds of variables are

11:24

called in an advanced financial economy,

11:26

but if you've never had a

11:28

bank account before and your first

11:31

bank account is from a mobile

11:33

wallet, then the scorecard that needs

11:35

to apply for lending needs to

11:37

be better and then the cost

11:39

of offering you this lending needs

11:41

to be lowered to make it

11:43

viable for any financial institution. And

11:45

so the data and analytics side

11:47

has become a really important space

11:49

where Fintex, as well as traditional

11:51

players, large enterprises, looking at this

11:53

and saying, can we use alternative

11:55

data? So can we use, for

11:57

example, your history of buying a

11:59

time for your mobile phone as

12:01

an indicate of how you manage

12:04

your money and what your cash

12:06

flow could be? Can we partner

12:08

with retailers to come up with

12:10

alternative scorecards in alternative data stores?

12:12

And so it's those kinds of

12:14

innovations. And what's also quite exciting

12:16

is a lot of this is

12:18

being done in partnership. So I

12:20

get the sense that there's less.

12:22

competition per se and more partnerships

12:24

between sort of large enterprises and

12:26

traditional Fintex. So it's a lot

12:28

of good innovation and it's bearing

12:30

a lot of investment that we're

12:32

seeing at least from an AWS

12:34

perspective in terms of where people

12:36

are prioritizing the investments. What about

12:39

the investment in the infrastructure itself,

12:41

especially in cloud services? I would

12:43

assume this has also been a

12:45

focus now in Africa, correct? Yeah,

12:47

it is. It is. I did

12:49

a innovation course and we talked

12:51

about the concept of what we

12:53

call institutional voids. which is essentially

12:55

the idea that in some economies,

12:57

and Africa is a good candidate

12:59

on this, you get services that

13:01

you would typically expect there to

13:03

be provided, whether it's by government

13:05

or large enterprises, that just aren't

13:07

there. And so you have to

13:09

find ways to get around it.

13:12

So in Africa, we talk about

13:14

cloud a lot, but... you still

13:16

need to have an internet connection

13:18

for the concept of cloud to

13:20

work out. You still need to

13:22

have good coverage. Even if you

13:24

talk about e-commerce and retail, you

13:26

still need good roads. And so

13:28

when we looked at cloud specifically,

13:30

we've looked at where we can

13:32

extend the footprint of the cloud

13:34

and try and stretch that cloud

13:36

as far out as possible into

13:38

as many countries as possible. at

13:40

an optimal investment. And so for

13:42

AWS, we've got a fully fledged

13:45

cloud region in Cape Town, and

13:47

that region supports a slightly smaller

13:49

region that we call a local

13:51

zone. So there's one in Legos,

13:53

and then there's one announced for

13:55

Johannesburg and one announced for Nairobi.

13:57

And then further to that, we've

13:59

got physical hardware that we can

14:01

send out to customers in those

14:03

areas. So we call those outposts,

14:05

and those outposts are available in

14:07

Nairobi, Egypt as well. And so

14:09

what we're trying to do is

14:11

take a look at the investment

14:13

of putting in a region is

14:15

significant, and we have to start

14:18

somewhere. And I'm sure we'll invest

14:20

in future regions in the future.

14:22

But in the meantime, how do

14:24

we stretch the edge of that

14:26

cloud as close as possible to

14:28

where the customers are? And it's

14:30

also been nice to see that

14:32

from an industry-wide perspective, there's a

14:34

lot of investment in data centers,

14:36

right? So you've got providers like

14:38

your liquids, your vantage equinix. They're

14:40

putting down massive, massive investments across

14:42

the continent, where there'll be data

14:44

center footprints. And I think that

14:46

works well for our overall goal

14:48

to advance FinTech investment, because there'll

14:51

be more options, I think, across

14:53

all customers. Yeah, I can imagine.

14:55

Maybe one question that came to

14:57

my mind when we were talking

14:59

about the internet connection. So I

15:01

read last year that around 30%

15:03

of South Africans have no internet

15:05

connectivity. The stat comes from a

15:07

report by data reportals digital 2023.

15:09

At the start of 2023, only

15:11

about 28% of South Africans were

15:13

internet users. This means that approximately

15:15

60 million people remained offline. highlighting

15:17

significant gaps in digital access. While

15:19

there have been improvements in internet

15:21

speeds, there's so much work to

15:24

be done to ensure equitable access

15:26

to digital resources and opportunities. Neighbouring

15:28

countries like Namibia, Zambia, and Zimbabwe

15:30

are also grappling with similar challenges.

15:32

To learn more about these findings,

15:34

you can check out the full

15:36

report on Data's reporter website linked

15:38

in our show notes. How

15:42

does it impact the overall FinTech development?

15:44

Because I would assume for these 30%

15:46

it's then like nearly impossible to get

15:49

access to these innovations. Are there any

15:51

plans to work around these? If I

15:53

look at the the pattern of the

15:56

way innovation is rolling out particularly in...

15:58

in South Africa, you'll find it leads

16:00

to a concentration, I suppose. So there'll

16:03

be urban centers, or let's call them

16:05

connectivity centers, where people would need to

16:07

go to be able to access those

16:10

services. And so some of the innovation

16:12

requires internet connections, but we still find

16:14

a large portion of the population that's

16:17

serviced through channels like USSD, right, and

16:19

SMS, because for that reason that there's

16:21

limited connectivity way they may be. I

16:24

think mobile connectivity is quite good across

16:26

South Africa, and the primary mode for

16:28

people accessing the internet will probably through

16:31

a mobile connection. And so if we're

16:33

able to concentrate some of those points

16:35

of connectivity or reduce the cost of

16:38

connecting, because sometimes it's a data cost

16:40

issue, then I foresee there being a

16:42

lot more adoption on FinTech products. When

16:45

Christian that also came to my mind,

16:47

I know that EWS is super committed

16:49

to skill development in Africa. Can you

16:52

elaborate a little bit on the impact

16:54

of such programs and initiatives that are

16:56

empowering local talent while directly fostering the

16:59

local economic growth here? Sure. Skills-wise, it's

17:01

one of those areas that we take

17:03

very seriously. So if you think about

17:06

the impact we're trying to make across

17:08

the continent, right? It's very difficult to

17:10

make that impact without a equivalent or

17:13

more investment in the people who carry

17:15

that impact. And so from a skills

17:17

perspective... We've launched an AWS skill center

17:20

back in 2023. It's based out of

17:22

Cape Town and it's the first one

17:24

outside of the US. And it's been

17:27

wonderful to see the adoption of that.

17:29

So it's free. People can go in

17:31

any time. Hopefully, Annica, the next time

17:34

you're in Johannesburg, you can maybe take

17:36

a trip to Cape Town and check

17:38

it out. Looking forward to it. But

17:40

it's designed for... you to go and

17:43

explore what AWS is about, explore the

17:45

different types of services, and it's really

17:47

meant to appeal to curious builders. The

17:50

other thing is we've got a very

17:52

big audacious target to upskill 29 million

17:54

people by 2025 and we're on track

17:57

to meet that target. And so a

17:59

large number of those people will be

18:01

in Africa and that's what these skills

18:04

centers are meant to do. We also

18:06

do direct training. That's quite impressive. Yeah,

18:08

it's a fantastic initiative. The other area

18:11

is where we invest in skills and

18:13

people within our own organization and those

18:15

people will help bring the market up

18:18

as well. So we've always had a

18:20

development center in Cape Town that supports

18:22

the broader Amazon. We've also then launched

18:25

another development center in Nairobi and that

18:27

was launched late last year as well.

18:29

The president of Nairobi was there cutting

18:32

ribbons. It was wonderful. And we've started

18:34

looking at skills in terms of enabling

18:36

people who are already building people with

18:39

bright ideas. So we launched something called

18:41

a Fintec, Africa Accelerator. The first cohort

18:43

of 25 Fintex was onboarded last year

18:46

as well. It covered people across seven

18:48

countries and we're hoping to have a

18:50

repeat of that and start getting more

18:53

of those people through. And so what

18:55

those FinTech builders will find is, you

18:57

know, you join and accelerate at where

19:00

AWS is brought together, VC funds, coaches

19:02

as well, who can help you on

19:04

your journey, help you think about product

19:07

market fit and how to grow. and

19:09

they cover across the spectrum, whether it's

19:11

a fresh idea, seed funding, series A,

19:14

we welcome all types of intics. And

19:16

then the last area around skills is

19:18

more supporting our large enterprise customers. So

19:21

we've got customers like Apsibank, Standardbank, who

19:23

are really leaning into building AWS skills,

19:25

certifications, as well as ways of work.

19:28

such as the engineers and product managers.

19:30

And they've been making really good advances

19:32

in this regard. So APSA, for example,

19:35

has the excess of a thousand five

19:37

hundred engineers certified. And that's a good

19:39

thing. They get to do work for

19:42

APSA today, which is wonderful. But if

19:44

they move on with their careers, they'll

19:46

still remain within the ecosystem. And over

19:49

time, we foresee this growth, contributing to

19:51

way more than the 29 million people

19:53

we're going to have globally, who are

19:56

skilled in AWS. And the idea really

19:58

is just, if you make the cloud

20:00

as accessible as possible, you're going to

20:03

get more creative ideas. And it'll create

20:05

this fly will effect of cool ideas

20:07

being built on the cloud. And those

20:10

cool ideas attracting more people and more

20:12

people building more. So we think it's

20:14

going to pay off. And it's one

20:17

of those areas that I'm really excited

20:19

about, actually. You quickly mentioned already the

20:21

role machine learning is sometimes providing when

20:24

it comes to the recognition of, for

20:26

instance, applicants for a loan. How about

20:28

the world of managed service and other

20:31

AI-driven solutions? Can you share some more

20:33

examples how these technologies are simplifying the

20:35

technology adoption for businesses? Yeah, absolutely. When

20:38

we talk of managed services, right, what

20:40

we are effectively talking about is removing

20:42

the undifferentiated heavy lifting from any particular

20:44

task. And so that's something that's been

20:47

baked into the way we work. is

20:49

AWS and some of the goals we

20:51

have across our major services. So even

20:54

if you look at the announcements made

20:56

at our big conference at the end

20:58

of the year reinvent, a lot of

21:01

them have to do around making lives

21:03

easier for builders. So what that looks

21:05

like in a machine learning AI, generative

21:08

AI spaces, we've looked at across the

21:10

stack from a machine learning perspective to

21:12

say look end to end. Where are

21:15

the tasks that typically chew up time

21:17

from a engineer, a developer, a builder

21:19

perspective. And how can we solve for

21:22

some of those things that take away

21:24

time? And so you'll find we've looked

21:26

at things like, for example, we announced

21:29

zero ETL, which is kind of our

21:31

way of building in native integrations between

21:33

databases and the frontends where you need

21:36

to do the analytics so that you

21:38

don't have to spend time building. ETL

21:40

processes, right? Patch jobs and SQL scripts

21:43

just to pull out data before you

21:45

can report on it. Beyond just managing

21:47

the data from a machine learning and

21:50

AI model development perspective, we've come up

21:52

with services such as Amazon Bedrock, which

21:54

is our managed service for how you

21:57

pull in large language models. So if

21:59

you are a FinTech today wanting to

22:01

experiment with large language models, you can

22:04

either choose to go look at the

22:06

billions of parameters and build your own

22:08

models, you know, try and go head

22:11

to head with leading model developers in

22:13

this space. Or you can simply say,

22:15

look, I'm focused on my customer need.

22:18

So I'm going to go into bedrock.

22:20

And it'll give you a library of

22:22

existing large language models. You select one

22:25

of those, import it sits in your

22:27

account. and then it leverages your data

22:29

to produce some of those outputs such

22:31

as a jackpot or whatever it is

22:33

you're building. And so by removing the

22:36

heavy lifting of figuring out how to

22:38

deploy a model, how to manage data

22:40

pipes to feed the model, how to

22:42

train the model, all of that is

22:44

kind of removed by using a managed

22:46

service such as bedrock. We're starting to

22:48

verticalize them by sub industries, so health

22:50

care will have health scribe as an

22:52

example, or in financial services you might

22:54

find customers like Bloomberg building their own

22:56

Bloomberg GPT, that you can consume as

22:58

a service. Those types of initiatives are

23:00

starting to come through, and my

23:02

hope is the more undifferentiated heavy

23:04

lifting we take away from people

23:07

for things like building models and

23:09

wrangling data all over the place.

23:11

building dashboards, the faster we can

23:13

start to get innovations that really

23:15

impact people's lives. One topic that

23:17

mostly comes to our listeners

23:19

mind when talking about cloud

23:21

is this time also the

23:23

potential of quantum computing. Are

23:25

there any examples how advanced

23:27

technologies like quantum computing might

23:30

address complex African challenges, such

23:32

as, for instance, optimizing supply

23:34

chains for agricultural products? I see

23:36

a lot of potential for using quantum

23:38

computing as well as blockchain to solve

23:40

for things like supply chain integrity rate.

23:42

So for example, there's a lot of

23:45

strife at the moment across the Congo.

23:47

There's concerns about where the lithium that

23:49

powers our electric cars comes from and

23:51

how is it mined or where coffee

23:53

beans are coming from. Is it being

23:55

ethically farmed? Those types of questions. You

23:58

can start to look at ways of...

24:00

using quantum technology and its potential

24:02

for fast calculations to be able

24:04

to validate contracts that have been

24:07

added onto a blockchain. So it's

24:09

high potential but nothing of production

24:12

yet. And from our perspective we're

24:14

seeing a lot of experimentation from

24:16

that side. Innovations in quantum computing

24:19

and blockchain are transforming supply chain

24:21

integrity, ensuring transparency from farm to

24:23

cup. Quantum Encryption keeps data secure,

24:26

while blockchain records every step. Smart

24:28

contracts automate payments upon delivery confirmation.

24:31

Using quantum computing, stakeholders quickly verify

24:33

authenticity and ethical practices. Consumers trust

24:35

products more with transparent information accessible

24:38

through a simple scan, boosting demand

24:40

for ethically sourced goods. This collaboration

24:43

between quantum computing and blockchain revolutionizes

24:45

how we track and trust the

24:47

products we buy. Looking ahead, what

24:50

do you envision as the key

24:52

milestones in the future of interoperability,

24:54

cloud technology, and also digital innovation

24:57

in Africa? What would be your

24:59

big bet here? I think the

25:02

first is interoperability from a data

25:04

exchange perspective. So for us to

25:06

get some... clarity in terms of

25:09

what protocols can we build and

25:11

services and APIs, that will make

25:14

it easier for us to exchange

25:16

data across countries, across jurisdiction, across

25:18

industries even. But the more important

25:21

aspect of that ability to exchange

25:23

data is the regulations that govern

25:26

the exchange of data. So at

25:28

the moment, there's a lot of

25:30

debate and discussion around data protection

25:33

and privacy, as we see a

25:35

spike in cyber instances across the

25:37

continent. there's also questions about data

25:40

localization. So should citizens' data leave

25:42

a particular jurisdiction? And it's those

25:45

areas where, because we've got such

25:47

a diverse and disparate... instead of

25:49

regulatory controls and regimes across the

25:52

continent, it's taking a better time

25:54

to get to regulatory clarity. And

25:57

so we've got a bit of

25:59

a chicken and egg, I think,

26:01

where for builders, you might ask,

26:04

you know, what does the regulation

26:06

say? And then for regulators, maybe

26:09

the question is, how do you

26:11

guys want to be regulated? Or

26:13

what are you building that we

26:16

should think about regulating? And I

26:18

think in those two areas, if

26:20

we can solve for both, hopefully

26:23

at the same time. that will

26:25

unlock a lot more conversation around

26:28

the level of innovation we need

26:30

to be able to have interoperability

26:32

across different types of ideas. What

26:35

are you most excited about talking

26:37

about the future? I think in

26:40

the short to medium term, I'm

26:42

super excited about machine learning and

26:44

the potential for generative AI. Longer

26:47

term, I'm looking forward to the

26:49

confluence of a few technologies. I'm

26:51

still holding out a candle for

26:54

a... the metaverse, and I know

26:56

people will talk about it less

26:59

now, but the combination of spatial

27:01

computing plus generative AI, plus machine

27:03

learning, I think is going to

27:06

result in that leapfrog effect. Africa

27:08

has a history of sort of

27:11

leapfrogging tech, right? We skipped landlines

27:13

and went straight to cell phones,

27:15

and I'm hoping as, you know,

27:18

the technology matures and gets cheaper,

27:20

things like spatial computing in combination

27:23

with air and machine learning is

27:25

probably going to result in some

27:27

really special use cases. looking forward

27:30

to that. This sounds very promising.

27:32

Thanks a lot for your time,

27:34

Alfred. It was a pleasure having

27:37

you here. No, thank you for

27:39

having me. And look, if you've

27:42

got any other questions, you're welcome.

27:44

Just give me a shot. So

27:46

one thing that I was actually

27:49

thinking of, the topic overall, was

27:51

that how cloud technology actually accelerates

27:54

the growth opportunities in emerging markets

27:56

because compared to traditional banks who

27:58

used to invest heavily in infrastructure

28:01

and everything to even start being

28:03

able to offer their digital services

28:06

now using the cloud, you can

28:08

just like skip that step. You

28:10

don't have to like invest heavily

28:13

and then modernize and lift and

28:15

shift it to the cloud, but

28:17

you can directly. built your company

28:20

in the cloud? Well, Nora, everything

28:22

that you said there to me,

28:25

I think it's something we've seen

28:27

and lived throughout different foundational changes

28:29

that technologies like cloud have enabled.

28:32

When you look at Brazil, or

28:34

when you look at Africa, or

28:37

when you look at India, the

28:39

ability to leapfrog. years ahead of

28:41

what you said, traditional banking or

28:44

other industries that have been built

28:46

on Kabul and God knows what

28:48

else, between mainframe and what they

28:51

have today. Then the big conversations

28:53

become in these places, how do

28:56

we attract the talent or how

28:58

do we retain the talent there?

29:00

And then how do we also

29:03

invest? So that talent has access

29:05

not only to this infrastructure technology,

29:08

but access to the capital. And

29:10

how do we foster collaboration? through

29:12

that and even the ability then

29:15

to process data and understand brings

29:17

a lot of the issues that

29:20

you know I share with Alfred

29:22

that is super exciting around interoperability.

29:24

We do have a very heterogeneous

29:27

complex market if we even want

29:29

to say so it's actually multiple

29:31

different markets and we somehow have

29:34

to enable interoperability between them to

29:36

really unlock value for the market

29:39

participants for the customers in the

29:41

end. And you could start with

29:43

every single market player of FinTech

29:46

conquering that complexity alone, but that

29:48

doesn't really work in the end,

29:51

because you would need to be

29:53

actually like a big player. anyways

29:55

and that would typically be not

29:58

a local company but be a

30:00

big investor from abroad. But if

30:03

you now take this challenge into

30:05

operability and turn it into an

30:07

opportunity, make a business model out

30:10

of it, like there can be

30:12

new values created from companies offering

30:14

this interoperability as a service. A

30:17

huge foundation of it is a

30:19

lot of my work, Nora, so

30:22

like its identity. If you kind

30:24

of just think about it as

30:26

a human, for starters, like if

30:29

we want to interact digitally and

30:31

we're all using different ways of

30:34

identifying ourselves, that system starts with

30:36

a pretty big challenge in a

30:38

foundational one and one that not

30:41

only cloud technology can and will

30:43

change but also requires communication across

30:45

regulators across institutions and the opportunity

30:48

continues is not only just Africa

30:50

is a continent but if you

30:53

look at connecting the diaspora this

30:55

problem is in Caribbean and Latin

30:57

America and it's not just a

31:00

problem of connectivity and access, but

31:02

it's actually a problem of transparency

31:05

and opportunity. When you talk about

31:07

creating value through the value chain,

31:09

that's what digital transformation and technology

31:12

can do, can break those barriers.

31:14

So interoperability is much more than

31:17

just an exercise of policy or

31:19

an exercise of working groups. So

31:21

for me is like super high

31:24

on the importance and one that

31:26

is the technology answer. Technology has

31:28

no borders. should see no different.

31:31

This has been Fintec files, a

31:33

podcast from BCG Plattinian. This season

31:36

we will deep dive into groundbreaking

31:38

ideas shaping the future of Fintec

31:40

and we want to hear from

31:43

you, our listeners. What topic would

31:45

you like us to cover and

31:48

who are your dream guests? Drop

31:50

us a line any time at

31:52

Fintec dash podcast at BCD plattinian.com.

31:55

We'd love to hear from you.

31:57

Thank you so much for listening.