»» Mobile phones are part and parcel of African life today. Despite high poverty levels, cellphone usage is extraordinarily widespread, giving telecoms access to people in the remotest of areas and replacing the need for fixed-line infrastructure in rural and even urban settings.

It’s an exciting time. Mobi-tech innovators are riding high with solutions that improve health, streamline daily-life activities and support financial inclusion and money movement. They are radically transforming people’s lives.

So what else can the continent’s bright young minds come up with through one of the world’s most exciting mobi-tech competitions? What happens when a bank like Citi decides to give young startups a platform to present new mobile phone applications with a view to potential investment, mentoring and launching their apps into the market?

The Citi Mobile Challenge is a worldwide call for innovation and disruption, drawing out young developers and startups to innovate around new applications in the financial tech space. The competition, run in cities across the globe, launched its EMEA (Europe, Middle East & Africa) leg in Nairobi in 2015, and IT’S AFRICA’S TIME was there to check it out.

Join us in Kenya as we experience the event, and step into the crazily impressive world of one of its entrants, a fin-tech startup called Umati Capital who, in just eighteen months, has radically transformed the face of SMEs and rural farmers with their exciting cash flow and data sourcing agri-app.