31 research outputs found
Platform Politics and Silicon Savannahs: Fintech and the platformed motorcycle: speculating on ordinary mobility economies in urban Africa
No full textDespite the economic challenges caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, venture capital (VC) investments in African startups have remained resilient, surpassing $5 billion in 2021 and experiencing a staggering 264% growth compared to the previous year. Notably, more than 60% of these investments were directed towards fintech companies.
The surge in fintech investments in Africa is driven by several factors that make the continent an attractive market. Africa still has a large unbanked population, presenting an opportunity for financial services that offer alternatives to traditional banking methods. The rise of mobile money and cryptocurrencies has brought accessible financial solutions to individuals and informal businesses without access to traditional banking systems. Furthermore, Africa has emerged as a significant market for cryptocurrency trading, providing alternative options in volatile monetary climates and facilitating cross-border transactions.
The report draws on empirical research in three case-study cities – Cape Town (South Africa), Kigali (Rwanda), and Nairobi (Kenya) – to showcase some important trends at the interface of fintech and the platformisation of motorcycle economies in urban Africa.
It builds on the insight that fintech is not ‘just’ facilitated by digital platforms, but it deploys the same business logics of intermediation and, in doing so, is often part of platformisation itself (Langley and Leyshon, 2021). More specifically, the report shows the importance of the financial-inclusion thrust in linking fintech to two-wheel paratransit, as well as the multiple ways in which digital platforms create new financial pathways in rapport to the physical commodity of the motorcycle; the crucial importance of payment gateways as infrastructures of additional data-driven financial innovation; the promises of risk-management through data and the pilot-based experimental practices through which these promises are given effect; and linkages to the decarbonisation of mobility systems in African cities.
For each of these points, the report highlights key policy implications that will require careful attention by researchers, regulators, and private actors in the field
Fintech and the platformed motorcycle: speculating on ordinary mobility economies in urban Africa
No full textThe Fortuin–Kasteleyn polynomial as a bialgebra morphism and applications to the Tutte polynomial
No full textWe compute an explicit formula for the antipode of the double bialgebra of graphs in terms of totally acyclic partial orientations, using some general results on double bialgebras. In analogy to what was already proven in Hopf-algebraic terms for the chromatic polynomial of a graph, we show that the Fortuin–Kasteleyn polynomial (a variant of the Tutte polynomial) is a morphism of the double algebra of graphs into that of polynomials, which generalizes the chromatic polynomial. When specialized at particular values, we give combinatorial interpretations of the Tutte polynomial of a graph, via covering graphs and covering forests, and of the Fortuin–Kasteleyn polynomial, via pairs of vertex-edge colorings. Finally we show that the map associating to a graph all its orientations is a Hopf morphism from the double bialgebra of graphs into the one of oriented graphs, allowing to give interpretations of the Fortuin–Kasteleyn polynomial when computed at negative values. © The copyright of this article is retained by the Author(s)
Fintech ‘frontiers’ and the platformed motorcycle: Emergent infrastructures of value creation in African cities
No full textConcerned with financialized extraction, the exploitation of precarious workers and racialized violence, critical scholars call for greater attention to the coloniality of financial technology (fintech) expansion in Africa. In this article, we echo the utility in foregrounding coloniality, but argue that it should be read as one among multiple, specific, and entangled ways in which fintech is creating new forms of value in the context of Africa’s urbanization. To make this case, we focus on the nexus between platforms, motorcycle taxis and fintech. In three different African cities, we observe how fintech maps onto the impulses and desires of the private sector and the state alike to use fintech to enact various forms of value creation. In Nairobi, the motorcycle has become the testbed of assetization experiments that seek to create data-rich and less fuel-dependent economies; in Kigali, the state-led and platform-enabled standardization of motorcycle services intends to create fiscal, planning, and regulatory values; and in Cape Town, legacy supermarket chains enroll motorcycles and fintech offerings to algorithmically integrate urban economies of laborand retail. Tracing these processes illuminates the different rationalities, ingenuities, and technological entanglements that, beyond the endurance of coloniality, shape Africa’s fintech moment
Deciphering spaces of and for participation: The subversion of community participation and rights in the urban land restitution process of District Six
No full textThe Land Restitution Act 22 of 1994 affords historically dispossessed person to return areas from which they were forcibly removed. With a focus on urban restitution this dissertation looks at why the restitution of land in District Six has been slow and fraught with frustrations and delays. This dissertation assess the participatory planning processes in the restitution and redevelopment of land in order to gain nuanced and deeper understanding of why, the state's ideal of restorative justice has not been realised. Through a qualitative research approach, the study focuses on the case of District Six, studying the spaces of participation from 1994 -2013. Findings reveal that many want a stake in District Six, none more so than the community themselves. The findings reveal how state-led spaces of participation remain tokenistic in nature and on the other hand community led spaces of participation offers historically marginalised groups an opportunity to realise their rights. Recommendations are aimed at how planners can intervene to improve these spaces and contribute to making more inclusionary spaces
Superconducting phenomena near the transition temperature in single-crystalline aluminum nanostructures
No full textApplied Science
Schema van een D.D.T. fabriek
No full textDocument(en) uit de collectie Chemische ProcestechnologieDelftChemTechApplied Science
Het verder ontwikkelen en testen van een optische vierpuntssensor voor het meten van gasbelgrootten, snelheden en locale gasfracties in vloeistoffen
No full textKramers Laboratorium voor Fysische TechnologieApplied Science
