Ex-Africa Launches
Ex-Africa is an Israeli start-up that is building a sophisticated financial site for African companies. After lots of work in the “garage” they are now working in their office and officially launching.
When thinking of web startups, Africa doesn’t really come to mind. Israelis doing business in Africa? The first association that comes to my mind is weapons. Not this time.
Well, these Israeli guys are into IT rather than destructive arms. Ex-Africa fills a gap that exists in the African business scene: information. Their new website aims to become the primary financial service provider. This venture will serve both African companies that want to communicate and find business opportunities and also a gate to foreign investments.
Modern Business Intelligence capabilities currently don’t exist in Africa. Ex-Africa wants to make happen and make it affordable. Such tools will enable managers to examine companies, create forecasts and make comparisons. The data will be exposed in a flexible manner, according to the companies’ choices.
Their planned products are wide: from free information and news to tailored reports. This wide appeal will help them attract different players inside and outside Africa.
You can learn more on their site.
The company resides in Hertzeliya and officially launches on February 23rd. It was founded by Amijai Saragovi, Alon Peer, and Tom Bigelajzen. They have extensive experience in building web sites and in the African business scene.
The Challenge
Ex-Africa has a noble cause – getting more transparent information in a continent that suffers from various problems. They don’t come to feed Africans as many philanthropic organizations do. This temporarily aids some people but doesn’t solve their problems. They don’t come to exploit the continent’s resources as some multinational companies do.
They mean business, fair business – this is highly appreciable.
As aforementioned, Africa suffers from many problems: unimaginable corruption, ruthless dictators, civil wars, border conflicts, post-colonialist control by foreign companies, illiteracy, poverty and AIDS. You name it. There’s a whole BBC series asking the simple question: Why is Africa poor? One simple question, many answers.
This makes their challenge huge. They start in Ethiopia, a country that has a rich culture, the only African original alphabet and pride for for never being colonized. The capital, Addis Ababa is a political hub in Africa. Let’s hope that it will serve as a good start for Ex-Africa.
More posts by Yohay Elam »
Author: YohayElam
Yohay Elam is a problogger, with Forex Crunch being his primary site. Yohay belongs to the founding generation of Israeli political group blog Black Labor, a writer in the The Networking Blog and maintains his personal bi-lingual blog. Before becoming a problogger, Yohay worked as a programmer in various Israeli startups such as Metacafe.
3 Comments
2010-03-01
13:52:55
@thewadi wrote about us: http://www.thewadi.com/ex-africa-launches/
This comment was originally posted on Twitter
2010-03-27
16:14:11
[...] (via The Wadi) – An Israeli startup that aims to bring financial transparency to Africa and give Western [...]
2010-04-11
23:27:33
[...] is a financial software and data company focused on African markets. The Wadi covered Ex Africa’s launch last [...]
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