Two Tech Leaders Weigh In

Digital transformation across Africa is often talked about in broad strokes. But what does it actually look like from inside the boardroom, the server room and the customer experience desk?

We sat down with two senior technology leaders, Nirvani Dhevcharran, CTO: Platforms and Operations at TFG (The Foschini Group), and Mandla Mbasane , Acting Chief Information Officer at National Housing Finance Corporation Ltd, to find out where the real progress is happening, what's holding the continent back, and what needs to happen next.

Where's the real digital transformation happening right now?

For both leaders, the answer starts in the same place: fintech.

Nirvani Dhevcharran, points to fintech and cloud adoption as the twin engines of change.

"Fintech remains one of Africa's most compelling digital transformation success stories," she says. "Mobile payments, digital wallets, and embedded financial services have fundamentally changed how millions of people transact, save, and access financial services."

She sees cloud playing a similar role at enterprise level, "enabling organisations to scale with greater agility and without the constraints of heavy upfront infrastructure investment," while SaaS platforms "standardise operations, enhance customer experiences, and provide leaders with real-time visibility across the enterprise." AI, she adds, "is starting to gain traction as meaningful business cases are being formed from back-end productivity to business process improvements and driving innovation."

Mandla Mbasane, frames the same shift through the lens of financial inclusion. "Financial institutions are taking advantage of the proliferation of smart phones which are used by end users to consume financial services," he says. "In Africa, this is particularly critical because of the need for financial inclusion." The result, he notes, is that "it is becoming cheaper to service customers whom it would have been hard to reach without the use of technology."

What's the biggest blocker?

Infrastructure gets a mention from both leaders, but the deeper blockers they identify are human and organisational.

Dhevcharran acknowledges that "affordability, infrastructure and connectivity challenges in many markets" remain real, spanning "water, power and data centres." But she is clear on where she thinks the bigger problem lies: "my view is that availability of skills and change management gap are biggest blockers." She points to a wave of failed transformation projects as evidence. "Some of the largest AI initiatives and ERP implementations have failed due to poor business process re-engineering." Compounding this is a skills drain, as "a number of global companies" recruit South African talent for international roles, "getting paid in Euros/dollars and British Pounds" while living at home. "With the poor exchange rate conversions it is becoming increasingly difficult to retain skills."

Mbasane's blocker is more structural: legacy systems that simply have not kept pace.

"The biggest blocker pertains to over reliance on legacy infrastructure that has not kept up with the innovations," he says. Institutions running unsupported systems struggle to modernise, "because old applications are not compatible with new technologies or because the existing employees do not possess skills required to support new platforms." As he puts it, "innovation is outpacing the skillset of the existing employees."

What's a win worth celebrating?

Both leaders point to tangible, homegrown results.

For Dhevcharran, it's the strength and scale of African fintech innovation.

"The innovation that has come out of the Fintech space is noteworthy," she says. "It demonstrates how Africa can lead globally when innovation is designed around local challenges and opportunities." She cites "Nigeria's OPay, Moniepoint, and Flutterwave, Egypt's MNT-Halan and others" as proof points, alongside "Pan-African efforts like PAPSS/PAPSSCARD."

Mbasane's win is closer to home: a full cloud migration at National Housing Finance Corporation. "We moved the infrastructure into the cloud," he says. "This resulted in improved stability of the environment, stronger resilience, and better customer service." Beyond the operational gains, he highlights a reduction in technical debt and a major leap in resilience: "We are now able to restore services in a matter of minutes as our disaster recovery environment is readily available and is kept up to date in line with business changes."

What conversations need to happen next?

Looking ahead, both leaders want to see Africa move from adoption to ownership, and from hype to substance.

Dhevcharran wants to see African-built solutions compete on the world stage. "It would be wonderful to see Africa solutions being developed locally and sold globally," she says, pointing to "fantastic innovation coming from the growing entrepreneurial talent" as evidence of what's possible. What's missing is capital: "We need to be able to attract investment in order to scale and market the solutions sustainably." She also flags a widening gap between AI adoption and AI governance. "As AI adoption rises it would be great to see responsible and ethical AI solutions being developed. Further, AI policy and regulations need to be formalised quite quickly as adoption is occurring without the necessary guardrails in place."

Mbasane's call is for discipline over buzzwords.

"We need to move away from the hype and focus on real and tangible deliverables that make a positive difference in companies' operations," he says. Technology, in his view, should be in service of sound business fundamentals, not a shortcut around them: "Where necessary, fundamental business processes must be reviewed, so that digital transformation does not make bad processes more efficient."

Ultimately, he wants transformation measured by reach, not just efficiency: "The new technologies must support business to reach new markets as opposed to being used for marginal growths."

Continuing the Conversation

From fintech innovation to cloud-first infrastructure, these two perspectives make one thing clear: Africa's digital transformation story is being written by its own leaders, on its own terms. But the conversation doesn't end here.

Join Nirvani, Mandla and hundreds of other technology leaders shaping Africa's digital future at Africa Tech Festival, taking place 17 to 19 November 2026 at the CTICC in Cape Town. Be part of the conversations driving real change across the continent. Learn More.