Stakeholders Move to Address Challenges in Mobility Business

Emma Okonji

Industry stakeholders that attended the Global Tech Africa 2024 conference in Lagos last week, have proffered solutions on how best to address the challenges of mobility business in Nigeria and Africa.

They identified some of the challenges in the mobility business, which include poor road infrastructure, lack of investments, insufficient electric powered vehicles and electric power stations among others.

Speaking at a panel session that discussed the theme: ‘Shaping the Future of Mobility-Innovations, Challenges and Opportunities for Africa’, the Co-founder, MAX, Mr. Chinedu Azodoh, said Nigeria has been ranked as the country with the highest number of poor road networks in Africa, a development he said, had adversely affected mobility businesses in the country.

“As a business, we are solving mobility challenges by making vehicles available to drivers on a rental basis for a specified duration of time. We have introduced electric vehicles on our roads to reduce carbon emission and its associated health hazards. We have partnered organisations like Oando to roll out sub-stations where the batteries of available electric vehicles could be charged.,” Azodoh said.   

COO, Gokada, Mr. Oluwaseun Omotoso, who was also on the panel, spoke about the effect of fuel subsidy removal on the mobility sector, which he said resulted in hike in transportation system that affected the supply chain system of the mobility sector, because customers had to stop placing orders, while others reduced their orders drastically.

Director, Operations at Shuttlers, Aderonke Olubowale, who spoke on the need for Africa to leverage emerging technologies like Artificial Intelligence (AI), Blockchain technologies, said such technologies wiould further enhance mobility business in Africa, and make life a lot easier and safer for Africans.