Standard Bank incubators provide small businesses with working space, capacity building and business development support services, access to mentoring and coaching, access to market opportunities in the Standard Bank value chain and the value chains of our business and commercial clients, and access to finance, either directly from the bank, or with the bank acting as a facilitator.
We have incubators in Ghana, Mozambique and South Africa, and an entrepreneurship centre in Nigeria, together supporting approximately 12 000 entrepreneurs.
Stanbic Bank Ghana’s Business Incubator was
launched in January 2018. It aims to provide funding and
support to 1 500 SMEs. It targets businesses that have been operating for less than
three years. Areas of support
include helping SMEs to differentiate themselves, helping them grow their
profitability and helping them to
access corporate supply chains.
In 2018 we:
Partnered with the National Board for Small Scale Industries (NBSSI) to support the Women Entrepreneurship One Roundtable Programme, which aims to improve business management, benefiting 200 women business owners
87
people received
mentorship
over
900
women
directly
impacted
1 870
youth impacted
620
people impacted
from networking
events
32
training
programmes
4
access to
finance master
classes
Standard Bank Mozambique’s Incubator was
launched in August 2017. It focuses on youth employment,
female economic empowerment and local content development.
In Nigeria, Stanbic IBTC
has partnered with the Kaduna State government to establish the IBTC Entrepreneurship Centre (KADSEC).
The centre serves as an incubator to nurture entrepreneurs and SMEs.
Services include capacity building programmes, mentorship, on-site business
management counselling, market
development assistance, networking opportunities, export assistance, and access
to loans from Stanbic IBTC Bank. The
Kaduna Tech Accelerator programme, a start-up ecosystem for tech entrepreneurs,
and the Agro-business Incubation
programme, will also be run from the centre. In addition, Stanbic IBTC organises
annual enterprise workshops in cities
across Nigeria. The workshops provide participants with marketing, financial and
management skills. In 2018, over 8 000
business owners participated in the workshops.
Standard Bank South Africa has run a variety of
successful training programmes and events through our
dedicated Small Enterprise Incubators. Going forward, we will focus on reaching
a larger number of enterprises
through incubation initiatives that won’t necessarily be tied to a specific
place.
The financial services industry is evolving in response to changing client behaviour, increased expectations, channel proliferation and the adoption of new technologies. Ongoing digitisation improves ease of access and convenience for customers, while boosting process efficiency, mitigating risk, reducing costs and increasing competition. Staying true to our African journey, Standard Bank is working to support and develop Africa’s fintech entrepreneurs, recognising their potential as future partners in our business.
We established the Standard Bank Moonshots division in 2017, with the objective of starting new businesses for Standard Bank which focus on creating jobs across Africa while generating material new revenue streams for the bank. The team develops its own ideas and partners with innovative local and international businesses to solve complex challenges faced by our clients. Current initiatives include disruptive new technology platforms and solutions to drive trade in Africa, and a product which solves industry-wide challenges in business lending. We’ve also invested in Founders Factory Africa to build and grow 100 disruptive tech companies across Africa in the next five years. Through these initiatives, Moonshots will provide new innovative services and products to our clients across Africa, while simultaneously generating revenues for the bank.
In Nigeria,
Stanbic IBTC Bank’s Innovation Challenge aims to leverage
digital technology, innovation and
expertise outside traditional financial service providers, to improve
service offerings and delivery for our customers.
It’s open to technology start-ups and product development teams across
Nigeria. 2018’s winner was Yochaa, a start-up with
a stockbroking mobile platform. Yochaa received USD12 500 and workspace in
the Stanbic IBTC Blue Lab, with access to IT
infrastructure for testing and development.
In South Africa, we sponsored 20
start-ups and SMEs in the information and communications technologies
(ICT)
sector to showcase their businesses at ITU Telecom World, an annual
event organised by the UN, which brings
together digital start-ups and SMEs, governments, regulators, industry
leaders and experts from around the world. We
provided them with training and financial support in preparation for the
event, and ongoing mentoring for six months
following the event. Three of the four ITU category awards, which are
independently adjudicated by a global panel,
were awarded to SMEs from the Standard Bank pavilion, including the
overall ITU SME category winner, Pulego
Communications.
We also had five cash prize-winners for the Standard Bank SME award for innovation, fourth industrial revolution capability, and taking South African entrepreneurs to the ‘next level’.