👨🏿‍🚀TechCabal Daily – For better or for bourse

Feranmi Ajetomobi has spent the better part of a decade in the quiet trenches of Nigerian fintech and consumer markets. He cut his teeth leading growth at Cowrywise, where he helped build saving habits in a place where saving is anything but habitual. He then joined Flutterwave to drive lifecycle marketing during its explosive phase, learning firsthand how rapid scale amplifies the opportunities and complexities of human behaviour around payments and money movement.

• Explain what you do to a 5-year-old.

• The toys that you get require money for payment. I am the guy who ensures your parents can afford that payment by getting customers to buy what their companies sell. I spend a bulk of my day finding new ways to get those customers, ensuring they buy, and nurturing them so they come back to buy again. 

  • What is the most unconventional thing about your career in Growth?

  I have never taken a professional course on marketing or growth. However, I have created course outlines to teach professionals how to market products. Does this mean courses aren’t needed? Absolutely not! I read the most random little things that cover for not taking those courses. Also, I plan to do my PhD in behavioural psychology, so please take courses.

  • What’s one growth win you’re proud of that most people would consider “boring”—but you know was everything?

  Building product education flows at Cowrywise and every other place I have worked. I have seen customers who have never ever transacted, after an email or push notification, respond and start transacting.

  In one of many cases, the customer had signed up over a year ago, but only decided to become active after receiving a product email from a marketing flow we did. It was funny, but it reminded me of one simple thing I learnt, “There is no silver bullet for growth, what wins every time is consistency with the good stuff.”

The Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE), the agency responsible for providing a trading platform for listed securities, is planning to establish a dedicated technology board designed to woo venture-backed startups onto public markets. 

The exchange has long been dominated by banks and telecom firms; now, it wants companies like M-KOPA, BasiGo, and other high-growth venture-backed startups on its board. The proposed board would sit within NSE’s current structure but be tailored to fast-scaling companies that don’t yet look like blue-chip companies.

Why now? Kenya has built a reputation as East Africa’s tech capital, but very little of that startup energy shows up on the trading board. In 2018, the NSE launched Ibuka, a programme designed to prepare companies for listing by improving financial reporting and investor readiness. While Ibuka strengthened corporate discipline, its uptake has been slow, and it hasn’t translated into any listings. This time, the NSE wants to change the perception that only mature companies belong on its bourse.

Will startups bite? In 2022, the Nigerian Exchange Group (NGX) created a dedicated technology board to attract high-growth tech companies; however, it has yet to attract any listings. Analysts have pointed to governance readiness gaps, valuation mismatches, and concerns around initial public offering (IPO) liquidity. But Nairobi insists liquidity isn’t the problem in the Kenyan market, but mobilisation is.

Why this matters: Public markets offer startups long-term capital and local retail ownership, yet it still comes with heavy public scrutiny. 

For VC-backed companies, listing on the public market can give a sort of reprieve to investors seeking liquidity events to exit the business. Still, startups will only list if rules, valuations, reporting demands, and liquidity realities align with or surpass the comfort of their VC realities.

When big acquisitions happen, employees get nervous about potential layoffs. Well, not for IHS employees.

As part of its move to fully absorb IHS Towers, MTN Group, the telecom giant, is offering at least 12 months of guaranteed pay and core benefits for IHS staff once the estimated $2.2 billion deal closes.

Under MTN’s safety net: According to documents filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), IHS employees are guaranteed at least 12 months of pay and core benefits, which they currently receive. That means their base salaries stay intact, and short-term incentive structures would not be tampered with. 

Their health and retirement benefits will also remain unchanged, and employees will not lose their tenure during the transition period. Also, share awards are being turned into cash or retention bonuses, so employees don’t lose out when the company changes hands.

Why so many job promises? In February, Nedbank Group, South Africa’s fourth-largest commercial bank by assets, promised to retain all current NCBA employees following the acquisition. Big African acquisitions are increasingly coming with public reassurances because ripping out teams immediately can be more expensive than keeping them.

Is this pure generosity? Not quite. A part of acquiring a new company is restructuring, and that is easier when the engineers stay put. Offering a 12-month cushion reduces the risk of high talent turnover or operational disruption.

Written by: Success Sotonwa, Opeyemi Kareemm and Emmanuel Nwosu

Edited by: Emmanuel Nwosu & Ganiu Oloruntade