Issue 13 : Ethiopia Loves Telegram

Hello, Welcome to this week's edition of Shega Weekly Newsletter ( Issue # 13 ) If you are here because someone forwarded you or found the link from the web, subscribe to get future newsletters. 

Ethiopia Loves TelegramTelegram is undoubtedly the biggest messaging platform in Ethiopia and loved by millions. Unlike other African countries, where Messenger or WhatsApp dominates, Ethiopians prefer Telegram. While many reasons can be put for Telegram growth in Ethiopia, It's essential to realize Telegram is also growing very fast worldwide. Telegram, which is expected to pass 500M users globally, had only 200M users in March 2018.Telegram use case is far more than peer to peer messaging ( part of the reason for the growth). Many businesses use it as their marketing channel. In Ethiopia, Telegram is a go-to place for local/international music, and movies. Job listing, restaurant finders, and e-commerce channels in Telegram are now a key part of many Ethiopians daily life. TikVah Ethiopia, the biggest channel in the country with 1.2M subscribers, is now one of the main news sites in the media space. The founder, Pavel Durov, has been bootstrapping the company without any external investment or Telegram being monetized so far.  But now Telegram is going to start earning revenue for the first time starting this year.  This revenue is going to come from premium subscriptions by businesses for upcoming new features and advertisements on Telegram channels through soon to be launched Telegram Ad platform. This is expected to benefit Telegram Channel owners together with Telegram, opening more monetization avenues for many Ethiopians. More Love to Telegram then. 

Are you an investor interested in meeting or learning about Ethiopian startups?Would you like to expand your pipeline with startups that match your priorities? If yes,  sign up here and express your interest as we have started matching Investors with Startups. Sign Up Here

Ethiopian Airlines- DHL and African Electronic Trade Group Teams Up as AfCFTA is Launched 

Ethiopian Airlines-DHL partners with AeTrade is to transport historical parcels under the AfCFTA market and operations of the African E-commerce Platform in the continent. The eCommerce platform that participated in the parcel is Sokokuu Africa. AeTrade Group provides transport services to fragile trophies to various African countries as African Continental free trade area commerce. The partnership expects to boost Intra Africa trade to pave the way for a better Africa. More

Reading SuggestionsCollateralizing Movable Properties The Next Frontier of Transport, Logistics: Digitisation of Services 

If you are here because someone forwarded you this email, you can subscribe here to get future newsletters.