Business
African Entrepreuners Going Online to Boost Business
But doing business in Africa can be daunting for a first-time entrepreneur from outside the continent. Red tape and poorly-trained staff are some of the challenges an entrepreneur might face. And then there’s inertia.
Richard Pembroke, a British entrepreneur who started his first African business in South Africa and has done business in Nigeria, says he did not anticipate the challenge of dealing with government officials.
“Government employees and state officials. They are quite transient. They change regularly. They change with the personnel at the top. Therefore they will look at a 10-year agricultural project and it is difficult for them to get excited because the chances are, they are not going to be there,” says Pembroke, who runs MatchDeck, an online platform that connects African entrepreneurs to western investors.
Still, Pembroke sees opportunities in consumer-focused businesses and those which operate in the agricultural sector.
“With the pressure of food production and growth in the population, I suspect that agricultural and food production will be the main sectors that run most dramatically in the right direction over the next few years,” he adds.
His optimism is shared by Jehiel Oliver, an entrepreneur who started Hello Tractor, a company that allows small farmers in sub-Saharan Africa to rent affordable tractors through their mobile phones.
When Oliver launched the company in Nigeria this year, his biggest problem was finding business partners who shared his long-term approach. He had to bypass partnerships with state governments which were more focused on making a quick profit than on the interests of farmers.
Doing business in Africa is easier if the entrepreneur takes a long term approach, he says.
“A lot of times people prioritize things like a government relationship or a relationship with a well-capitalized entrepreneur. For us, our biggest investors are our customers and we think we have a product that is affordable and attractive to small farmers…That insulates us from a lot of the challenges.”
