The Good, The Bad and The Ugly: A Tale of Three Ecosystem Reports
Disrupt Africa in a new report “The High Tech Health: Exploring the E-health Startup Ecosystem Report 2020”
presents good news in the E-health sector. According to the report, the
number of startups active in the health-tech space on the continent has
grown by 56.5% over the last three years, with 180 ventures currently
in operation.
This, however, does not represent the reality of other sectors in African tech ecosystems.
According to StartupBlink’s 2020 report on global ecosystems,
Africa ecosystems occupy the bottom half of the ranking with South
Africa at 52, Kenya at ten places from last year’s ratings to 62 and
Rwanda displacing Nigeria as Africa’s third-best startup ecosystem at
number 65. For the city startup ecosystem rankings, no African cities
were ranked in the top 100.
One of the ugly impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic as documented by the recent 2020 Global Startup Ecosystem Report by Startup Genome,
is that about 56% of African startups are in danger of collapsing.
According to the report, these startups have less than 3 months of
operating capital left.
In the spirit of counting our losses and wins, taking lessons and
planning for the future, African ecosystems are in reflection season,
yet we must act swiftly and sustainably to turn the tides. We must look
inwards for solutions by building more effective innovation systems
and exploring the continent’s innate ability to solve its own
challenges.
