African SMEs Chest Thumping on $33 Million Capital Increase
January 9th, 2020 – African Guarantee Fund (AGF) has received an additional USD 33M financing from German lender KfW Development Bank , in a move that will catapult AGF’s efforts to enable African SMEs continue to play their critical role in drivi...
January 2020 Global Economic Prospects: Slow growth, policy challenges
January 8th, 2020 – Following its weakest performance since the global financial crisis, the world economy is poised for a modest rebound this year– if everything goes just right. Hanging over this lethargic recovery are two other trends that rais...
Why upskilling and legal formalisation is key to a stronger SME economy
January 7th, 2020 – JOHANNESBURG – Trying economic times in South Africa over the past decade have made doing business across the country particularly difficult for SMEs and entrepreneurs. According to official figures, 60 percent of South African...
EU’s AMable initiative secures 3D printing innovation with blockchain
December 17th, 2019 – The European Commission-funded AMable initiative announced its fourth open call to grant €450,000 for SMEs in the Additive Manufacturing field, otherwise known as 3-D printing. One of the Amable solutions is to help inventors...
Chubb launches online trading platform for cyber
December 19th, 2019 – Chubb‘s new Marketplace online trading platform has launched in Australia with cyber risk protection for small and medium enterprises. The platform can be accessed directly as well as through Ebix-owned Sunrise Exchange, and ...
Green Deal: Lights and Shadows for SMEs
The overarching strategy clearly offers opportunities, nevertheless some key actions very likely not SME-friendly December 11th, 2019 – SMEunited supports the efforts of the Green Deal to push for equal engagement of the EU’s international partner...
LinkedIn launches ‘Open for Business’ feature globally for SMEs
November 11th, 2019 – LinkedIn has announced the launch of Open for Business, a feature that allows freelancers and small business owners to add their services to their LinkedIn profiles, making them discoverable from a search. Following an initial ...
Bank of China Issues $2.8B in Blockchain-Based Bonds
December 8th, 2019 – One of the four major commercial banks in China, Bank of China, announced in a statement on Friday that it has released 20 billion Yuan in blockchain-based bonds for small businesses that own blockchain platforms. The Beijing-ba...
EY links with Australian start-up, creating blockchain solutions for SMEs
November 11th, 2019 – Professional services firm (EY) has provided software and services support through its OpsChain Tesseract platform, to Block2, an Australian automotive industry peer-to-peer (P2P) resource management start-up. The product of th...
FinDev Canada Invests in Gender-lens Fund to Bolster Women-owned SMEs in Africa
Johannesburg (SOUTH AFRICA)- November 12th, 2019 – FinDev Canada has announced an investment of $7.5 million to Alitheia IDF, a fund supporting women-owned and led businesses, to boost women’s economic empowerment and access to finance in Sub-...
