Cape town: Mauritian startup Black Swan has emerged victorious in the MEST Africa Challenge 2025, following a high-energy Grand Finale at Innovation City, Cape Town on November 26, 2025. The event was organized by the Meltwater Entrepreneurial School of Technology (MEST Africa) and powered by Absa Group, offering a platform for early-stage startups to secure critical funding, mentorship, and global exposure.
According to African Press Organization, the 2025 edition of the challenge focused on FinTech, highlighting startups and embedded financial solutions that drive financial inclusion, enable smarter payments, and facilitate digital transformation across Africa’s economies. Black Swan, co-founded by Derick Kazimoto, aims to “Make Africa Bankable” by transforming fragmented data into instant credit intelligence, which allows for precise affordability assessments and inclusive lending at scale.
Kazimoto emphasized the gap in Africa’s financial system, where millions of consumers and Micro, Small, and Medium-
sized Enterprises (MSMEs) remain invisible to traditional lenders due to fragmented and informal data. “This invisibility locks out capable borrowers, limits credit growth, and slows economic mobility,” he said. “Our mission is to make Africa bankable.”
The MEST Africa Challenge received hundreds of applications from Absa priority markets, including Ghana, Kenya, Uganda, Zambia, Botswana, Mozambique, Seychelles, and Mauritius. Following a rigorous selection process, ten startups reached the Cape Town finale, where they pitched their solutions to a panel of judges including investors, Absa executives, and industry leaders.
Black Swan’s solution was praised for meeting a clear need and showing potential to complement services across various markets. The Grand Finale celebrated Africa’s ingenuity, with founders presenting scalable solutions addressing challenges in payments, credit, insurance, and trade finance.
Ashwin Ravichandran, Portfolio Advisor at MEST Africa, congratulated Black Swan and the finalists,
noting a shift toward building for scale and prioritizing compliance, interoperability, and cross-border readiness. As the 2025 winner, Black Swan will receive US $50,000 in equity investment, entry into the MEST Portfolio, and the opportunity to pilot commercial solutions with Absa business units across Africa.
Tawanda Chatikobo, Head of Digital for Absa Regional Operations, commented on the importance of innovation in enhancing customer experiences and the potential Black Swan’s solution holds for complementing existing services. The MEST Africa Challenge continues to serve as a bridge between emerging startups and established industry players.
Tamu Dutuma, Head of Strategy and Transformation for Technology at Absa Regional Operations, praised Black Swan’s technical discipline and clarity in their approach to scaling, reflecting the Challenge’s role in expanding Absa’s view of the technology landscape.
Since its inception in 2008, MEST Africa has trained and supported over 2,000 entrepreneurs and investe
d in over 90 startups, with the MEST Africa Challenge serving as its flagship pan-African pitch competition.