Amid global economic crisis challenging all economies in the world, new ideas are sprouting from Africa through African entrepreneurs like purple hibiscus and lilies to bring positive change and open another portal to a brighter future.
New businesses are being set-up by African entrepreneurs to boost the ecosystem, and governments are showing great support despite the corrupt political climate.
ZUVA, Blue Power, Dawa Group, and Nord among others are putting a dent on planet Earth to be part of this transformation connecting international markets to Africa. And what’s most fascinating is that they’re all headed by African entrepreneurs.
TOP COMPANIES RUN BY AFRICAN ENTREPRENEURS
1.) ZUVA
Amatheon Food GmbH is the mother company of ZUVA. ZUVA was founded by Carl Heinrich Bruhn, the current CEO. The company was lauched in late 2020 as a result of the current state of the European market due to high rise of heathy superfoods, snacking culture, and the adventurous culinary consumers.
ZUVA is making waves high waves in the food industry manufacturing all-natural food grown and produced in Africa.
The food company is exporting bulk of products from its farms in Uganda and Zambia where crops are cultivated crops innovatively processing and storing foods with sophisticated machines. Some of the products include the African-grown quinoa and chia, chermoula and bobotie, teff-based porridge bowls, and quinoa-based convenient snack bowls with African flavour profiles of chakalaka.
ZUVA will start processing 10,000 tonnes of chilli from Zambia in 2021. The founder, Carl Heinrich Bruhn, grew up on a farm in North of Germany and worked in a food company. ZUVA headquarters is currently in Berlin, and besides extended operations in Zambia and Uganda, the company is looking towards Zimbabwe and also the processing of moringa (one of the most nutritious plants on Earth).
2.) Blue Power
Men isn’t what comes to mind at the mention of the word “entrepreneur”. Women are playing big role in business and affecting the ecosystem formally and informally at large.
Salma Okonkwo, one of the top female African entrepreneurs, is from Kaneshie, Ghana, is the founder of is the founder of Blue Power Energy, an alternative energy conglomerate raising a solar farm in the North of Ghana (a project that worth over $200 million). That’s to begin with, the company is also building the veru first 40 megawatts of solar capacity in Bui.
Prior to founding Blue Power, Salma built Ubi Group, worth a billion-dollar in the energy sector. Ubi is the only company that has successfully and fully integrated its operations across the value chain of the downstream petroleum sector till date.
Salma Okonkwo is currently the managing director of Ubi Petroleum and has founded other companies such as Puma Energy Ghana where she sits as the Chairwoman, and BlueStar Exploration as a board member. She also holds the position of Director in Sahara Energy.
Taking a walk from the energy sector, Salma established Mother’s Heart Foundation to provide food, clothing, accommodation, education, and healthcare for the less privileged.
Image credit: Emmanuel Bonney
3.) Dawa Group
Dawa Group is indeed breaking grounds in the business of Pharmaceuticals with more than a thousand product lines, and supply capacity of over hundred million packs of medication.
Dawa Group is led by Raju Mohindra and Dr. Ajay Patel. The company is the first in East and Central Africa to have implement SAP-ERP.
With uninterrupted product demand and effective management by a team of about 600 professionals, Dawa has expanded over the years expanded to about 11 countries and diversified into manufacturing of industrial chemicals and fertilizers in East Africa.
As a group, the company is made up of four companies:Dawa Limited, Medisel Kenya Limited, Forest Road Development Limited, and Kel Chemicals Limited.
4.) Nord
When the Nigerian government made the NAIDP (Nigerian Automotive Industry Development Plan) eight years ago, the blueprint for Nord was handed to Oluwatobi Ajayi.
Three years after the announcement of NAIDP, naira bowed to dollar once again and the importation of vehicles from overseas was affected due to currency exchange skyrocketing.
With six years experience working with automobile companies: Mercedes-Benz Van and Jetvan in the capacity of CEO, Ajayi reached out to a company in Germany to look into his brilliant car design. Supplies from Japan, China, Germany, and France met his dream design and Nord was born. And three years ago the first Nord car rolled in.
It has been like the game of Scrabble placing tiles where it would count big. Nord is indeed counting big. The name “Nord” was also inspired by the game of Scrabble starting with Nora, Norb, Norc, Nork, and then to Nord with the letter “N” pointing to the country of birth.
Watch A Short Video Of The Made-In-Nigeria “Nord Tank”
By Elijah Christopher
Elijah Christopher is a journalist at A New Touch Of Africa, is also a creative writer, a poet, and an IT enthusiast. He contributed to the collaborative poem written in celebration of Edwin Morgan Centenary, the first Glasgow poet laureate and Scottish national poet from the University of Glasgow. He loves meeting people and learning about new places, cultures, events, and lifestyles.
