Africa's first electronic bill of exchange under Mauritian law completed

Trade finance transactions can take days. In Mauritius, one was completed in less than an hour.

Mauritius Commercial Bank and Export Trading Group (ETG), a Mauritian agribusiness company, said they completed Africa's first electronic Bill of Exchange transaction under Mauritian law. The transaction replaced paper documents that would have been transported by courier with digital documents that moved in minutes.

A bill of exchange is a written order used in trade finance, in which one party commits to paying another a specified sum, usually on a fixed date. Paper versions have traditionally moved between banks and trading partners by courier, which is one reason cross-border deals can stretch over days.

The transaction was small, but it could have broader implications for how African businesses move money and goods across borders. The announcement was reported in Trade Treasury Payments.

Pepco considers African production hubs

Pepco, a Polish discount retailer, is considering expanding into Africa as geopolitical tensions and disrupted shipping routes make its distribution network more expensive and less predictable.

Pepco sells €3 ($5.44) T-shirts and low-cost toys across Europe. Its business depends on scale: the company buys large volumes of goods at low prices, mainly from China, India, and Bangladesh, and distributes them through more than 4,000 stores in 18 European countries. Its global sourcing operation works with more than 375 vendors and 1,200 factories.

That model has come under pressure as geopolitical tensions have disrupted shipping routes between Asia and Europe, forcing some vessels to take longer routes around Africa. Freight costs and delivery times have also become less predictable.

Pepco told Bloomberg that it was shielded from some of the initial disruption because it generally sources products with longer lead times. However, it is still looking for ways to make its supply chain less dependent on one part of the world. Africa is one option, according to Bloomberg.

The attraction is not simply lower labour costs. If cheap labour alone were sufficient, factories would have moved to Africa in much larger numbers years ago. Geography is a more important consideration. North Africa is close to Pepco's largest market, Europe.

Tunisia sends 73% of its exports to the European Union (EU), with textiles and machinery among its biggest exports. Egypt also has a free-trade area with the EU that removes tariffs on industrial goods. These conditions could allow African manufacturers to produce goods closer to European customers than Asian suppliers can.

Pepco would still need to keep prices low. The retailer's business is built around offering families budget-friendly products, and its sourcing scale is a major part of how it maintains those prices.

Africa would have to demonstrate that it can offer more than lower production costs. China's manufacturing advantage includes a large network of factories, suppliers, skilled workers, ports, and logistics companies that operate together at scale. Reuters reported on September 14 that some companies that moved production out of China to avoid tariffs have struggled to reproduce that ecosystem elsewhere. Higher costs and operational problems have led some orders back to Chinese suppliers. The report is available here.

Pepco's potential move into Africa would therefore test whether an African production hub can be close enough to Europe and efficient enough to compete with an Asian manufacturing ecosystem that has spent decades developing the capacity to produce low-cost goods.

Africa has some of the required advantages, including proximity to Europe and existing textile and manufacturing clusters. But reliable electricity, ports, suppliers, trade agreements, customs systems, and the ability to produce consistently at Pepco's scale would determine whether those advantages result in cheaper goods.

Pepco has not named the African countries it is considering. If the company moves production to the continent, its strategy could extend beyond using Africa as a distribution and routing hub. It could also compete for retail market share within Africa, where discount retailers such as Pepkor could be watching its plans.

WIOCC to receive up to $155 million from the US DFC

The West Indian Ocean Cable Company (WIOCC) Group, an Africa-focused data-centre operator, is set to receive up to $155 million from the US International Development Finance Corporation (DFC), the US government's development-finance arm.

The investment is the DFC's largest-ever equity investment and is intended to help WIOCC expand digital infrastructure across Africa. WIOCC operates fibre networks, subsea cables, and data centres in more than 30 African countries, including Nigeria, South Africa, Kenya, and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

The company has raised significant capital in recent years. On September 1, WIOCC announced a $300 million investment from Africa Finance Corporation (AFC), a pan-African development finance institution (DFI), and Saudi investment company Vision Invest. In 2021, it raised $200 million in combined debt and equity funding. It also raised more than $400 million across separate rounds in 2025.

The US has an interest in expanding the infrastructure available to American technology companies operating in Africa, particularly as those companies develop cloud and artificial-intelligence businesses on the continent.

In 2024, Microsoft and G42 announced a $1 billion digital ecosystem investment in Kenya. The initiative includes a data centre that will run Microsoft Azure, alongside connectivity and cloud infrastructure. The DFC also invested $50 million in pan-African infrastructure company Cassava Technologies in 2022. The investment underscored the DFC's role in helping American hyperscalers expand across Africa. Further details on the DFC's digital-economy investments are available here.

Digital infrastructure supports services ranging from WhatsApp messages and bank transfers to Netflix streams and AI prompts. As more businesses use cloud and AI services, demand for data centres, fibre networks, subsea cables, and related infrastructure is expected to grow alongside them.

How WIOCC deploys the new capital across its fibre networks, subsea cables, and data centres in more than 30 African countries will be the next detail to watch as demand for cloud and AI services grows.

BRVM suspends three Ivorian companies

The Bourse Régionale des Valeurs Mobilières (BRVM), the regional stock exchange serving Francophone West Africa, has suspended trading in three Ivorian companies: sugar producer Sucrivoire, metal-packaging manufacturer SONOCO Metal Packaging, and coconut-products company SICOR.

SONOCO and SICOR failed to publish required financial information, including their first-half 2026 results. Sucrivoire had not published information that could materially affect its share price. Trading was halted on Wednesday, and the companies will remain suspended until they resolve the disclosure issues. Ecofin Agency reported the suspensions.

The BRVM is shared by eight West African countries: Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d'Ivoire, Guinea-Bissau, Mali, Niger, Senegal, and Togo. It had 47 listed companies and approximately CFA21.13 trillion ($37 billion) in equity-market capitalisation as of Thursday evening, according to BRVM data.

The three suspended companies are relatively small by BRVM standards. Sucrivoire had a market value of about CFA60.47 billion ($105.8 million), SONOCO was valued at approximately CFA37.65 billion ($65.9 million), and SICOR was worth about CFA5.04 billion ($8.8 million). Together, they represented roughly 0.5% of the exchange's equity value.

Their combined size was not the main issue. Investors require regular and current information to assess the value of listed shares. Missing results or undisclosed material information can leave investors making decisions without a complete view of a company's position.

The suspensions also highlight the disclosure obligations that come with listing on a public exchange. Going public gives companies access to capital and investors, but it requires them to keep the market informed. SONOCO also faced a suspension in 2025 over delayed financial results.

Whether the three companies publish their outstanding disclosures and have trading restored is the next development for investors on the eight-country exchange to follow.

Funding tracker

Synapse Analytics, an Egyptian AI-infrastructure company, raised $13 million in a Series A round led by Partech, with follow-on participation from Algebra Ventures and Silicon Badia. (September 14)

Watu, a pan-African fintech startup, secured a $7 million debt facility from AHL Venture Partners. (September 11)

Niteon Capital, a Nigerian fintech startup, secured a $400,000 grand prize from the UN Sustainable Enterprise Accelerator Fund. (September 15)

Charikaty, a Moroccan legaltech startup, secured $3.5 million in pre-seed funding from Dubai-based Red Tape Ventures, Mastercard Kuwait executive Faris Al-Obaid, Saudi footballer Faris Abdi, and other undisclosed investors. (September 15)

Talenteo, an Algerian HR-software startup, secured $200,000 in funding from Madica. (September 15)

Paysika, a Cameroonian fintech startup, secured $200,000 in funding from Madica. (September 15)

ChipMango, a Nigerian DeepTech startup, secured $200,000 in funding from Madica. (September 15)

Delta Oil, an Egyptian cleantech startup, secured $200,000 in funding from Madica. (September 15)

Bekia, an Egyptian cleantech startup, raised $765,000 in a seed round led by Madica, with participation from Catalyst Fund and Jambaar Capital. (September 15)

Biochar Industrial Group (BIG), a Nigerian climate-tech startup, raised $1.5 million in pre-seed funding led by BREEGA, with participation from the Catalyst Fund. (September 17)

African startups raised $2.10 billion in eight months, according to TechCabal Insights.

Crypto tracker

The World Wide Web3 tracker reported the following percentage changes, with data recorded at 06:43 AM WAT on September 18, 2026:

• Day: +1.64%
• Month: +20.68%
• Day: +1.93%
• Month: +30.01%
• Day: –9.58%
• Month: +643.88%
• Day: +6.02%
• Month: +37.34%

The source provided no coin names or current-value figures for the listed entries.

Opportunity

The Citi Foundation is offering $500,000 in grants to 50 organisations that help low-income young people develop AI and other job skills. Eligible programmes can teach skills such as prompt engineering and digital-content creation, help young people find jobs, provide access to devices and software, or add AI tools to existing employment.

Applications close on October 6, 2026, at 5 p.m. Lagos time. Application information is available from the Citi Foundation.

Other stories highlighted by the publication included Nigeria's data-localisation deadline and its effect on financial infrastructure; the potential role of AI in everyday life; resistance to American data centres in South Africa; developments in AI safety; and Kenya's Central Bank saying that the Middle East crisis was frustrating efforts to lower borrowing costs.

Written by Emmanuel Nwosu, Yemi Kareem, and Success Sotonwa. Edited by Emmanuel Nwosu and Ganiu Oloruntade.

Source: TechCabal.