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Financing AI Transformation in LMICs: What Multilateral Development Banks Must Do Differently
Multilateral development banks have spent the last decade building the foundations of digital economies across low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), and the broadband networks, digital ID systems and other priorities they've financed are helping to make AI deployments in these markets possible. But as Kunal Walia at Dalberg Advisors explains, this funding often goes toward piloting individual use cases, expanding digital infrastructure or creating an enabling environment, rather than uniting these different components into holistic AI systems that aim to scale. He argues that multilateral development banks must rethink their approach to ensure that the infrastructure they've helped build can actually enable AI transformation.
- Categories
- Investing, Technology
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Cyberattack Hits Angola’s Biggest Telecom Hours Before Landmark $329 Million Stock Market Debut
While there is no indication that the cyberattack affected the IPO process or trading infrastructure, the timing places fresh attention on cybersecurity risks facing companies undergoing major market events.
- Categories
- Technology, Telecommunications
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Analysis: The AI Sustainability Paradox
AI is being sold as a tool to solve sustainability’s hardest data problems, from Scope 3 emissions to climate-risk intelligence. But the infrastructure behind that intelligence — data centers, water use, energy demand, chips, grids, and community consent — is becoming its own sustainability test. Drawing on conversations at Trellis Impact 26, Ming Wong explores what AI’s physical footprint means for impact investors, corporate sustainability leaders, and the communities being asked to host the next generation of digital infrastructure.
- Categories
- Energy, Investing, Technology
- Region
- Global
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Equity, AfricaNenda and Gates Foundation Partner to Advance Digital Public Infrastructure Across Africa
The collaboration will combine AfricaNenda’s technical expertise, policy expertise, and ecosystem leadership with Equity Group’s extensive regional footprint, digital payments capabilities, and implementation experience to accelerate the adoption of Digital Public Infrastructure across Africa.
- Categories
- Finance, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Analysis: Beyond the Signal: Why Africa’s Next Telecom Era Will Be Built Beneath the Surface
The subsea cable buildout underway represents the most significant transformation in the continent’s digital infrastructure since mobile telephony arrived in the 1990s. But capacity without distribution remains an abstraction; redundancy without policy coordination remains a vulnerability.
- Categories
- Technology, Telecommunications
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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MTN Leads Bid to Share African Digital Infrastructure Costs
The GSMA, the industry’s main lobby group, has reinforced the message, calling for “urgent, coordinated action” between governments, regulators and companies to treat telecoms as infrastructure and adopt a “shared responsibility.
- Categories
- Technology, Telecommunications
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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‘Deep Pockets’ vs. ‘Long Pockets’ in DPI: What Instant Payments and Open Finance Tell Us About Sustainable Funding for Digital Public Infrastructure
Digital public infrastructure (DPI) is gaining traction in emerging markets around the world. But as David Porteous at Integral: Governance Solutions and Rafe Mazer at Fair Finance Consulting explain, while the financial cost of building DPI may be modest, operating it at scale requires ongoing costs to be allocated across the ecosystem over time, making DPI sustainability fundamentally a governance issue centered on pricing policies. They explore how two of the three broadly accepted categories of DPI, instant payment systems and open finance, can develop credible mechanisms to finance long-term costs — while maintaining incentives for participants and trust among users.
- Categories
- Finance, Technology
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IFC Discloses Proposed $25 Million Investment in Admaius’ Virunga Africa Fund II
The fund is targeting $500 million to invest in mid- to large-cap African companies.
- Categories
- Investing
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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