![\"Ethiopia\u2019s](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Addis-Ababa-forced-eviction.jpg?fit=780%2C780&ssl=1\")
\nEthiopia, a country of about 105 million people and one of Africa\u2019s larger economies, spent mid-2019 trying to present itself as a startup hub. Founders, angel investors, and officials gathered in Addis Ababa for the first Startup Ethiopia event. Ride-hailing firms Ride and ZayRide were already moving passengers in the capital. ZayRide\u2019s chief executive, Habtamu Tadesse, said the company would expand to Liberia in August. Ride, founded by Samrawit Fikru, was taking cash payment from a phone app. Payments firm YenaPay had signed more than 500 merchants, co-founder Nur Mensur said. Deamat, pitched by Kisanet Haile, was linking small farmers to buyers who could order and pay by phone.<\/p>\n\n
Hubs and early money sat around those firms. Gebeya was training developers in Addis Ababa and in offices abroad. BlueMoon, led by Eleni Gabre-Madhin, was backing agriculture technology and helped convene the event. iCog Labs worked on artificial intelligence, and IceAddis, founded in 2011, ran an accelerator whose chief executive, Markos Lemma, said 40 ventures had come through. Tomi Davies and Shem Asefaw used the gathering to announce an Addis Ababa angel network. Ethiopians in Tech brought diaspora founders, including Bernard Laurendeau and Yonas Beshawred, into the same rooms.<\/p>\n
The hard limit was the network. Mobile and internet service ran through state-owned Ethio Telecom, and the government of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and President Sahle-Work Zewde had said it would privatise the company. State Minister Jemal Beker promised better quality, access, and choice within a year, with Innovation and Technology Minister Getahun Mekuria seated in the hall. Wi-Fi at the event itself did not work, a failure visitors pointed out in the question period. Soon after those pledges, authorities shut the national internet. Press reports and a background source tied the stoppage to national exams. Founders told TechCrunch, once the line flickered back, that the cutoff had frozen payments, client work, and product launches. The government then said it would break the telecom monopoly and issue licences by the end of 2019. Without that change, the new firms had customers and ideas, and a connection that could vanish overnight.<\/p>\n