INFRASTRUCTURE
NCBA and BasiGo strike deal to finance 1,000 electric matatus
NCBA becomes BasiGo's first local financing partner, offering PSV SACCOs up to 90% asset finance over 60 months (80% over 48 for individual members) at a discounted 1.5% processing fee, alongside BasiGo's Pay-As-You-Drive lease. The deal backs BasiGo's target of 1,000 electric buses on Kenyan roads by 2027 — 53 assembled locally so far, 27 in production — helped by zero-rated VAT on e-buses under February's National Electric Mobility Policy.
TechCabal
INFRASTRUCTURE
SUN Mobility launches an open battery-swap network from Nairobi
India's SUN Mobility switched on an open-architecture battery-swapping network in Nairobi and Mombasa — 35 stations live, with 10+ vehicle makers including Piaggio and VMoto on the platform. A Vivo Energy partnership opens the door to 4,200+ Shell and Engen forecourts across 29 African countries, with a five-year target of 2,500 stations and 160,000 vehicles, and claimed running-cost savings of 20-35% over petrol.
TechArena
FINTECH
HFCB posts record half-year profit as its capital raise pays off
Three months after rebranding from HF Group, HFCB reported pre-tax profit of KSh 1.23 billion for H1 2026 — up 74.3% and past the KSh 1 billion half-year mark for the first time — with deposits up 29.7% to KSh 68 billion. The December 2024 rights issue that raised KSh 6.38 billion funded the technology upgrades and expansion now feeding the rebound.
Khusoko
STARTUPS
4G Capital crosses $1 billion in loans to Kenya's market traders
The Nairobi-based lender founded by ex-British Army officer Wayne Hennessy-Barrett has now disbursed over $1 billion across 7 million-plus unsecured working-capital loans, averaging $120-130 each, with a roughly 95% repayment rate. Its Eva credit algorithm scores repayment behaviour instead of collateral — reaching some 800,000 of Kenya's 7.2 million MSMEs in a region with a $19.3 billion small-business financing gap.
TechCabal
GADGETS
Samsung's Galaxy S26 FE lands in Kenya at KES 103,100
The 8GB/256GB Galaxy S26 FE goes on sale from 4 September with a 6.7-inch 120Hz AMOLED, 4,900mAh battery with 45W charging and a 50MP triple camera, promising seven years of OS and security updates. Local buyers get Samsung Care+ and a six-month Google AI Pro trial bundled — Samsung pitching AI productivity as the reason to go premium.
TechArena
