04 JUN 2026

Africa must be the architect of its digital future

Africa must shape its digital future by creating technology, setting AI rules and designing inclusion into the economy.

Africa should create, not just consume, products; and must write the rules of AI governance and ethics, not live by standards set elsewhere

Economic inclusion must be the design principle for the digital economy; digital platforms are economic shock absorbers

African technology innovation, local solutions to local problems, is attracting investment and being exported to the world.

Decisions made by African government and business leaders over the next decade will determine whether the continent is an architect of the global digital economy or merely a market for products developed elsewhere.

Africa’s technology sector is one of the fastest growing in the world, with African tech startups raising a record $1.42 billion in the first half of 2025, 78% growth over the previous year,¹ and Africa's digital economy projected to reach $712 billion by 2050.²

As the continent marks Africa Day [25 May 2026], Stellenbosch Business School advisory board member and honorary professor Phuti Mahanyele-Dabengwa says the question is no longer whether Africa can participate in a digital future.

Mahanyele-Dabengwa said Africa had already proved capable of technology development and innovation, but the defining challenge of the next decade was for Africa to not only create and consume products, but to write the rules.

“In a world where old certainties are fracturing, global supply chains that once seemed permanent are being redrawn, technology is not neutral. It is the new terrain on which power is being claimed. The nations and regions that master it will shape the coming century.”

“Africa cannot afford to be a consumer in this new order. We must be creators: not just of products, but of the frameworks, the ethics, the governance structures that will determine how these technologies serve our people.”

“Rather than adopting standards set elsewhere, Africa should be setting standards – particularly around data sovereignty, algorithmic accountability, and AI labour transitions,” she said.

She said that “the next chapter of global technology will not be written without Africa”.

“Our markets are too large, our talent too abundant, our potential too significant to ignore. However, Africa’s digital future will not be fulfilled in isolation. It will require intentional global partnerships – on capital, on standards, on talent, on trade. Not partnerships of dependency, but partnerships of mutual ambition and value.”

Mahanyele-Dabengwa emphasised that digitalisation, spanning sectors from manufacturing and energy to banking and healthcare, was not just about convenience, and not only a concern of the tech sector.

“We need to reframe digitalisation as a strategy for economic inclusion. Inclusion isn’t a byproduct of digitalisation, it must be the design principle.

“When I look at programmes like the Takealot Township Economy Initiative, which is targeting 20 000 new jobs by 2028, I see digital platforms acting as economic shock absorbers, turning local businesses into national competitors,” she said.

The Mapungubwe Institute for Strategic Reflection (MISTRA) projects that South Africa’s digital economy will contribute R91.4 billion to GDP, with a potential of 341,000 jobs in the pipeline, by 2035.

“Following the formation of the Government of National Unity (GNU), we are seeing the green shoots of stability – inflation moderating, a stabilised energy grid, and an improved credit outlook.

“But stability is merely the platform. The engine of growth is the digital economy.”

“While many African economies, including South Africa, were built on extraction of minerals and raw materials exported for processing abroad, our future prosperity will be defined by what the continent builds on a platform of digital infrastructure,” she said.

Mahanyele-Dabengwa said the nature of African tech innovation, dominated by the fintech and telecoms sectors, as well as digital solutions in energy and water, healthcare, housing and education, was not only about scale but about developing local solutions that were exportable to the rest of the world.

African “unicorns” such as Flutterwave, Interswitch, Opay and GoTyme Bank have attracted global funding, been targeted for mergers and acquisitions, and several have expanded beyond Africa.

Africa has four times the mobile money accounts of any other region, with market leader M-Pesa covering more than 60m customers and processing transactions worth over $1billion daily.³

“M-Pesa wasn’t invented in a research lab in Silicon Valley. Safaricom developed it in Kenya from watching how Kenyans actually moved money, actually lived their economic lives.

“This is innovation and digitalisation designed for Africa, by Africa. We didn’t just adopt technology, we adapted it. We took tools designed for different contexts and bent them to our realities.”

Mahanyele-Dabengwa said realising the opportunities of the digital economy in Africa demanded urgency.

“The window for Africa to claim its place in the technological future is open, but it will not stay open forever. The decisions made in the next decade, by governments and businesses, will determine whether we lead or follow, whether we write the rules or live by rules written elsewhere.”

References:

TechCabal Insights. July 2025. https://insights.techcabal.com/the-state-of-tech-in-africa-h1-2025-1-42b-raised-amid-record-ma-activity/
TechCabal Insights. January 2026. https://insights.techcabal.com/report/2025-moonshot-roundtable-report-unlocking-africas-712b-digital-trade-future/
https://www.m-pesa.africa/

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