BongoHive

BongoHive Zambia's Technology and Innovation Hub! BongoHive is Zambia’s first technology and innovation hub.
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We assist scalable startups of any background by enhancing skills, accelerating growth, strengthening networks, increasing collaboration, providing a forum for ideas exchange and reducing the barriers to entrepreneurship. We provide a wide range of startup/entrepreneurship programmes, tech programmes, workshops and events all focused on making Zambia Africa’s next hotbed of innovation. Read more about us on our website http://bongohive.co.zm/about/

Most start-up programmes hand over a short-term grant, run a few workshops, and wish you the best. This one is different...
26/05/2026

Most start-up programmes hand over a short-term grant, run a few workshops, and wish you the best. This one is different.

BongoHive, in partnership with AUG10FORD Training, has launched Move your Start-up to the Next Level — a Swiss-Foundation-backed sponsorship programme designed to help Zambian youth-led businesses move from proof of concept to investor-ready.

Over 24 months, selected founders will receive hands-on support in financial management, business systems, governance, compliance, marketing, and operational growth because building a successful business takes more than capital. It takes structure, capability, and the right support system.

If you’re a founder already building, validating, or generating traction and ready to scale, this opportunity could be your next step. 🚀

Applications close on 20 June 2026.

Apply here: https://ideaspring.co.zm/aug10ford/move-your-start-up-to-the-next-level

Zanga Musakuzi was not a medical professional. He was a developer who had spent years noticing the same gap from the out...
26/05/2026

Zanga Musakuzi was not a medical professional. He was a developer who had spent years noticing the same gap from the outside: in Zambia, finding the right clinic, the right specialist, or an open pharmacy required knowing the right people.

If you were new to a city, or your regular doctor wasn’t available, or you needed a type of care you’d never needed before, you were largely navigating alone. There was no searchable directory. No way to check which clinics were within reach. No way to read a review of a doctor before you walked through their door. He built MedSearch Zambia — a digital health directory making Zambia’s healthcare system navigable from a phone: hospitals, clinics, pharmacies and specialists, searchable, filterable, accompanied by an AI-powered skin scanning tool that could flag dermatological conditions from a photograph.

When BongoHive and IHM Southern Africa hosted Zambia’s first Digital Health Hackathon in December 2023, seven teams competed for ZMW 180,000 in prize funding. MedSearch Zambia won first place.

What could change in just 3 months?The Women in AI Initiative is opening doors for female founders across Africa to turn...
26/05/2026

What could change in just 3 months?

The Women in AI Initiative is opening doors for female founders across Africa to turn bold ideas into real AI-powered solutions.

Selected participants will receive:
✨ $5,000 grant funding
💻 Dedicated developer support
🤝 Expert mentorship
📈 Hands-on support for ex*****on and growth

Building in healthcare, education, agriculture, finance, retail, logistics, or beyond? This is your moment.

Africa has the ideas. Let’s build the future.

Applications are now open:
https://www.hytel.io/aiinnovators_africa

Tag a founder who needs to see this 👇

Africa Day 2026 | BongoHiveAs we commemorate Africa Day under the theme, “Assuring Sustainable Water Availability and Sa...
25/05/2026

Africa Day 2026 | BongoHive

As we commemorate Africa Day under the theme, “Assuring Sustainable Water Availability and Safe Sanitation Systems to Achieve the Goals of Agenda 2063,” we reaffirm the role of innovation, entrepreneurship, and collaboration in building sustainable communities across Africa.

Together, let’s create solutions that drive lasting impact. 🌍💧

In January 2022, seventy developers and entrepreneurs came to BongoHive for the MTN MoMo Hackathon, co-hosted with MTN Z...
22/05/2026

In January 2022, seventy developers and entrepreneurs came to BongoHive for the MTN MoMo Hackathon, co-hosted with MTN Zambia and Channel VAS. Fourteen were selected for the intensive build phase. Ten reached Pitch Day. Their products, built in days using MTN’s MoMo API, spanned agriculture, education, digital health, e-commerce, finance, gaming, transport and philanthropy. Mobile money as infrastructure for an entire economy: that was the thesis, and ten teams proved it could be built on.

The quality of the Pitch Day output reflected years of ecosystem-building. These weren’t first-time coders finding their feet, but developers who had been sharpened by years of BongoHive events, mentorship and community, and who now had a serious platform to show what they could do.

The same year, The Hive Coworking ZM Space launched formally as a standalone brand: a premium, permanent workspace for Lusaka’s most ambitious builders, and the Zambian base for regional and global companies. BongoHive was becoming infrastructure.

Yesterday, the FACE NDC Innovation Challenge reached its highly anticipated climax: Pitch Day, where three outstanding g...
22/05/2026

Yesterday, the FACE NDC Innovation Challenge reached its highly anticipated climax: Pitch Day, where three outstanding green innovations emerged as winners, each securing a $2,000 cash prize to accelerate their growth and impact.

The winning innovations were:

-Kutola Software Systems – digitising waste collection to make it easier to track, manage, and deliver services across communities.
-Green Gold Social – enabling communities to grow their own trees while creating income and green jobs.
-Umodoro Energy – helping urban markets reduce charcoal use while supporting women-led businesses with accessible energy solutions.

The winners were announced after a gruelling round of presentations and intense deliberation by the judging panel. While all ten participants demonstrated exceptional creativity and innovation, these three solutions stood out for their potential to drive meaningful impact within the green economy.

The event brought together a dynamic mix of stakeholders, industry leaders, and judges, all united by a shared passion for sustainable development and green innovation. Unlike traditional pitch competitions, the session adopted a fast-paced speed-dating format, with stakeholders and judges stationed across the room while innovators rotated between them. Each participant had a brief but high-stakes opportunity to present their solution, answer questions, and demonstrate how their innovation could create tangible environmental and economic impact.

The $2,000 cash prize marks only the beginning for these eco-pioneers. To help transform these innovations into sustainable, scalable businesses, all three winners will continue to receive dedicated mentorship and ongoing support from BongoHive.

As the event concluded, one message resonated clearly throughout the room: the FACE NDC Innovation Challenge is not just a competition, but a vital launchpad for the green solutions of tomorrow.

In June 2021, BongoHive and UNCDF published the Regulatory Playbook for Zambian FinTechs, and for the first time, a fint...
21/05/2026

In June 2021, BongoHive and UNCDF published the Regulatory Playbook for Zambian FinTechs, and for the first time, a fintech founder in Zambia could open a single document and understand the regulatory landscape they were operating in. Which body governed them: the Bank of Zambia, the Securities and Exchange Commission, ZICTA, or some combination? What licences were required? What did a compliant operation actually look like?

These questions had been quietly killing fintech companies for years, not through market failure, but through regulatory ambiguity that paralysed founders who couldn’t afford expensive legal counsel. The Playbook answered them, directly, in plain language, compiled from the lessons of the FinTech4U programme and multiple co-hosted webinars with Zambia’s actual regulators.

The founders who used it restructured their compliance frameworks, opened conversations with regulators they had never known how to approach, and raised institutional investment from partners who needed to know that regulatory risk had been taken seriously. For every fintech BongoHive supported in the years ahead, the Playbook was the foundation.

Watch the Regulatory Playbook webinar here: https://www.youtube.com/live/mp0LLb2zFFM?si=YRbAOt9nALgc0T8D

Today, participants of the FACE NDC Innovation Challenge step forward to pitch ventures designed to tackle climate chall...
21/05/2026

Today, participants of the FACE NDC Innovation Challenge step forward to pitch ventures designed to tackle climate challenges and shape a more sustainable future. From innovation to impact, these founders are turning ideas into action.

We’re excited to witness the creativity, passion, and solutions that will emerge from today’s Pitch Day.

Founded in 2019 by Chilufya Mutale and her co-founder Eugene Mwila, PremierCredit was built on a bold mandate to dismant...
20/05/2026

Founded in 2019 by Chilufya Mutale and her co-founder Eugene Mwila, PremierCredit was built on a bold mandate to dismantle the institutional financial barriers throttling underserved entrepreneurs and women-led MSMEs across Africa. Operating early on with lean, localized infrastructure, a major catalyst arrived when the co-founders entered BongoHive’s FinTech4U Cohort 2 accelerator program, backed by the United Nations Capital Development Fund. This critical ecosystem exposure provided invaluable regulatory alignment with the Bank of Zambia, refined their product architecture, and yielded a $5,000 grant that validated their early peer-to-peer (P2P) lending frameworks. Leveraging this technical validation, the startup secured a landmark $650,000 seed investment from gender-lens venture capital fund Enygma Ventures in late 2020, giving the co-founders the critical runway to fully digitize their ecosystem.

Propelled by this robust foundation, the enterprise underwent a strategic group rebrand to eShandi, cementing its evolution into a credit-first, pan-African challenger bank. This digital pivot unlocked unprecedented commercial scales, culminating in a massive $10 million financing facility partnership with Yango Group to drive asset and fleet financing across Zambia, Angola, DR Congo, Namibia, and Ethiopia. Today, the fintech ecosystem spans multi-country operations including Zambia, Zimbabwe, South Africa, and Kenya, having disbursed over $12 million in loans to empower more than 1.5 million users, an impact that earned Mutale the prestigious African Woman in Finance Award at the Africa Financial Industry Summit. To explore this world-class financial ecosystem, visit the official PremierCredit Website and eShandi Website.

Premier Credit: https://www.premiercredit.co.zm
eShandi: https://www.eshandi.com

⏰ Applications for Women in Tech: Zambia Cohort 6 close TODAY!If you’ve been thinking about applying, this is your sign ...
20/05/2026

⏰ Applications for Women in Tech: Zambia Cohort 6 close TODAY!

If you’ve been thinking about applying, this is your sign to take the leap into tech, innovation, and leadership. Don’t miss the opportunity to grow your skills, connect with industry leaders, and be part of a powerful community of women shaping the future.

Submit your application before the deadline tonight!

Apply now: Scan the QR code in the image or click the link below.

🔗:https://tinyurl.com/SC-WITZM-
Cohort6

Over 70 fintech companies applied for five spots. That was the opening signal of FinTech4U - Zambia’s first dedicated fi...
19/05/2026

Over 70 fintech companies applied for five spots. That was the opening signal of FinTech4U - Zambia’s first dedicated fintech accelerator, launched in 2019 in partnership with the United Nations Capital Development Fund (UNCDF).

The level of demand confirmed what BongoHive had long suspected: Zambia’s fintech ecosystem was deep, energetic, and radically underserved by existing support infrastructure. Each selected company received structured capacity building, expert mentorship and up to $3,000 in pilot funding. Among the graduates was OnyxConnect: a fintech platform built around a specific and underserved reality - rural women farmers who needed bicycles and productive assets to run their businesses, but could only afford them incrementally, using the mobile money infrastructure already in their hands.

OnyxConnect wasn’t a sophisticated consumer finance play. It was a product designed precisely for the user that Zambian finance had always passed over.the question FinTech4U was asking is who does Zambian finance actually serve? The companies that came through the programme were its answer.

Address

6th Floor, ZEP-RE Business Park Alick Nkhata Road
Livingstone
10101

Opening Hours

Monday 08:00 - 17:00
Tuesday 08:00 - 17:00
Wednesday 08:00 - 17:00
Thursday 08:00 - 17:00
Friday 08:00 - 17:00

Telephone

+260953017526

Website

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