In the sprawling electronic market of Lagos’ Computer Village, an item is flying off the shelves: the Starlink kit.

These satellite dishes, with their distinctive white faces and plug-and-play simplicity, represent more than just easy internet availability in Nigeria. They symbolize a technological coup in Africa’s most populous nation, where terrestrial broadband or wireless options are unreliable or inaccessible.

“I have about 20 pieces in the store, but I’m sure they will go before today ends or at the latest tomorrow morning,” Quadri AbdulFatai, a local electronics vendor who claims to have sold more than a thousand units in just 13 months, told Rest of World. “Starlink is very hot now.”

In January 2023, Nigeria became the first African market that Starlink entered. Two years later, it now ranks second among internet service providers, which are classified separately from large telecom players by the Nigerian authorities. With over 65,500 users at the end of the third quarter last year, Starlink is second only to 16-year-old Lagos-based ISP Spectranet, according to data from the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), the country’s telecom regulator. 

At current growth rates, analysts predict Starlink will become Nigeria’s top internet service provider by mid-2026.

The secret to Starlink’s meteoric rise lies in a simple market reality: Nigerians are desperate for reliable, high-speed internet, which local providers have consistently failed to deliver, according to Temidayo Oniosun, managing director at Space in Africa, a market intelligence company focusing on the continent’s space and satellite industry.

Telecom companies and traditional ISPs in Nigeria suffer from frequent outages, sluggish speeds, and spotty coverage, especially in rural areas where terrestrial infrastructure is limited or nonexistent.

“Nigerians want high-speed and reliable internet, and Starlink’s technology offers that better than anyone else,” Oniosun told Rest of World. “That’s why it is growing at an incredible speed. While the services aren’t the cheapest, launching with different pricing in different African markets shows that Starlink understands the markets.”

Starlink has made investments in building infrastructure in Nigeria. It has built a base station in Lagos and plans to add facilities in neighboring Abeokuta and Port Harcourt, Nigeria’s oil hub. These stations will enable the company to beam low-latency internet directly to its rapidly growing user base throughout the country. Low latency is the ability of a network to respond with minimal delay.

Starlink’s success has unsettled competitors. When the company increased subscription prices last October, local operators cried foul, accusing regulator NCC of applying double standards by ignoring their requests for tariff reviews.

The regulator eventually granted local providers a 50% tariff increase in January, but customer perception had been damaged. 

The regulator has fostered a fair and enabling environment that empowers all licensed operators, including Starlink, “to compete, innovate, and grow in response to market needs,” an NCC spokesperson told Rest of World.

The regulator has licensed over 27 satellite-based communications services providers and issued over 90 landing rights to space segment operators, which include established providers like Eutelsat, SES, Viasat, and YahClick.

“In recent times, the commission has observed growing interest from both established global players and new entrants (especially those providing emerging satellite services) seeking to enter the Nigerian market,” the spokesperson said. “This level of engagement reflects growing investor confidence in Nigeria’s digital economy and the enabling environment provided by the commission.”

Nigeria has 241 licensed ISPs, of which only 124 had active users as of the third quarter of 2024, collectively serving more than 300,000 subscribers, according to NCC data.

Starlink’s arrival has been nothing short of catastrophic for incumbents. Market leader Spectranet lost 8,428 subscribers between the last quarter of 2023 and the third quarter of 2024, while Tizeti lost about 700 in the same period.

While the losses appear modest, they are significant in the context of the small size of the market served by Nigeria’s ISPs. The internet landscape is more dominated by mobile network operators MTN, Airtel, Globacom, and 9mobile, which collectively serve 132.4 million subscribers, providing both internet access as well as traditional phone services.

The playing field is fundamentally uneven, said Temitope Osunrinde, chief marketing officer at Tizeti. The challenges for local operators include buying spectrum and building local capacity, hiring talent, and paying multiple taxes. If digging for fiber, they have to contend with multiple local government right-of-way permits and also area goons.

“You can’t compare Starlink with local companies because they don’t have to set up local capacity, nor hire and set up an office,” Osunrinde told Rest of World.

Gbenga Adebayo, chairman of the Association of Licensed Telecommunications Operators of Nigeria (ALTON), believes Starlink’s success reflects not a failure of local providers but “a challenging operating environment, which includes issues such as multiple taxes, multiple regulations, high right-of-way charges, infrastructure vandalism, and the rising cost of foreign exchange.”

Yet for ordinary Nigerians, these industry complaints hold little water compared with the tangible benefits of reliable connectivity. “For me, it was less speed and more concern about constant internet blackouts during meetings,” Olumide Lewis, a Lagos-based tech worker who recently installed Starlink, told Rest of World. “Since we bought our Starlink, we have had some peace of mind. We don’t spend our time thinking about the bad internet again because everything just works.”

Starlink’s march appears unstoppable. Besides direct distribution via its website, the company distributed its kits through Jumia, Africa’s largest e-commerce platform. By late 2024, it had reached full capacity in major Nigerian cities, including Lagos, Abuja, and Port Harcourt, creating a flourishing secondary market of resellers who continue to import the coveted hardware at premium prices.

Starlink’s rapid growth has raised national security concerns.

“It’s very concerning if we allow a foreign company, knowing who owns it, to have that much power over critical communication infrastructure,” Oniosun said. “If Starlink continues at this pace, and, in a couple of years, they become the leading ISP, servicing hundreds of thousands of people and businesses, what happens when they decide to cut access?”

Starlink did not respond to Rest of World’s request for comment.

Nigerian officials appear cognizant of these risks, and critical institutions avoid using Starlink’s network, Yoosuf Temitope, technical adviser at state-owned Nigeria Communications Satellite Limited, told Rest of World. NigCommSat provides satellite internet to major government agencies and also serves private individuals and businesses.

“The military is not meant to ride on Starlink because its data would go to the United States, which can easily mine and cook the data,” he said. “Starlink has its business model and strategy, and we have ours.”

Nevertheless, Nigeria’s “open skies” policies continue to welcome foreign rivals. And as Starlink’s dishes enter more African homes, local providers face an existential choice: adapt or perish. Tizeti is responding by adding fiber internet to its wireless offering, which had been its mainstay for 11 of its 12 years of existence, joining other wireless brands like Spectranet that are pushing their fiber services more aggressively. Others may be forced to merge or exit the market entirely, Oniosun said.

Meta is in trouble in Nigeria.

Local authorities have fined Meta $290 million for regulatory breaches, prompting the social media giant to threaten pulling Facebook and Instagram from the country.

The Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) said on May 3 that quitting Nigeria won’t absolve Meta of its liability.

The showdown is the latest development in a year-long regulatory battle between the social media behemoth and Africa’s most populous nation.

Why is Meta being fined?

The dispute began in 2021 when Nigeria’s FCCPC started a probe into WhatsApp’s new privacy policy.

The commission said Meta committed multiple and repeated infringements of the country’s Nigerian rules, including “denying Nigerians the right to control their data, transferring and sharing Nigerian user data without authorization, discriminating against Nigerian users compared to users in other jurisdictions, and abusing their dominant market position by forcing unfair privacy policies.”

After remediation efforts failed, the FCCPC issued its final order in July 2024, imposing a $220 million fine along with penalties from other agencies that took the total amount to $290 million. Meta appealed the decision, but the plea was overturned in April, prompting the company’s threat to withdraw its services from Nigeria.

How significant is this fine for Meta?

This isn’t Meta’s first regulatory breach. The company has faced similar sanctions worldwide, including a much larger $1.3 billion fine in Europe. It has also been penalized in India, South Korea, France, and Australia. It even faces a $1.5 billion fine in Texas.

While the amount of Nigerian fine may not be significant for the company that clocked a revenue of $164 billion in 2024,  Meta isn’t making enough money in the country to justify paying such an amount, according to Cheta Nwaneze, partner at SBM Intelligence, an Africa-focused consulting firm.

“I don’t think they will follow up on the threat, but the possibility exists if Nigeria chooses to be obstinate,” Nwaneze told Rest of World.

Nigeria represents only a miniscule percentage of its global revenue, sales Meta can afford to forgo if the stress of remaining in the country outweighs the benefits, he said.

What’s at stake for Nigerian users?

The potential withdrawal of Meta’s platforms may have significant implications for Nigeria’s digital ecosystem. 

According to social media performance tracker Napoleoncat, Meta has a massive presence in the country, with Facebook alone reaching about 51.2 million users as of May 2024, more than a fifth of the population. Instagram had 12.6 million Nigerian users as of November 2023, while WhatsApp had about 51 million users, making Nigeria the 10th largest market globally for the messaging app.

Many experts believe Nigerian users, who depend heavily on these platforms, might pressure regulators to pardon Meta. If Meta follows through on its threat, Nwaneze predicts more Nigerians will take to VPNs for access, similar to what happened during the country’s Twitter ban in 2021, when even officials of the government who banned X were using VPNs to access the platform.

“Nigerian users, on average, aren’t concerned about data privacy… they’re more concerned about stuff such as conversions,” Nwaneze said.

What led to the clash?

The conflict centers on data privacy concerns, with Nigeria insisting Meta must follow local laws regardless of its global status.

The regulator characterized Meta’s withdrawal threat as “a calculated move aimed at inducing negative public reaction” to pressure regulators into reconsidering their decision. With millions of Nigerian users across Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp at stake, the standoff raises important questions about corporate accountability and digital sovereignty in emerging markets.

Nigeria is determined to assert regulatory authority over powerful global tech companies operating within its borders. The verdict marks an important precedent for how African nations manage relationships with multinational tech companies.

The FCCPC’s investigation highlights both legal breaches by Meta and the government’s commitment to ensuring that multinationals adhere to domestic regulations, Nwaneze said. Meta’s unsuccessful appeal further validates the FCCPC’s procedures and its interpretation of data rights under Nigerian law.

What are Meta’s options?

Seye Ayinla, a partner at Nigerian law firm Duale, Ovia & Alex-Adedipe, said it wouldn’t be prudent for Meta to exit Nigeria, which is one of its largest markets in Africa.

Meta should present its case to the Court of Appeal and apply for a stay of execution pending the submission of the appeal, Ayinla told Rest of World. This would allow Meta to prevent the regulator from enforcing its order before the appeal verdict and give Meta space to explore other avenues, like arriving at a settlement.

While Meta’s social platform users remain divided, the key issue is whether the commission can maintain its position through to the end. The outcome will set an important precedent for how global tech companies interact with regulatory authorities across Africa and other emerging markets.

Tech professionals around the world are on the edge as President Donald Trump and his administration impose a series of radical immigration measures.

From attempting to deport foreign nationals who are permanent legal residents to barring visitors from entering the country for expressing views on U.S. foreign policy, immigrants have seen a tumultuous couple of months.

Last week, reports said the U.S. government is considering placing travel restrictions on citizens from 43 countries. The plan would completely ban travel from 11 nations, impose heavy curbs on 10 others, and give 22 countries a 60-day ultimatum to address perceived deficiencies or risk moving to one of the other categories.

While workers from the targeted nations make up a relatively small percentage of the tech workforce, industry professionals outside the purview of the measures, too, have been increasingly concerned about being impacted by the shifting visa policies and anti-immigration rhetoric.

They are particularly worried about increased scrutiny of the H-1B visa, which is sought after by tech companies.

Immigration attorneys are now advising clients on temporary U.S. visas to avoid leaving the country, warning they may encounter difficulties when attempting to return.

“There has been a surge in audits and enforcement actions against employers hiring foreign workers, creating job insecurity for legal immigrant employees,” Poorvi Chothani, managing partner at immigration law firm LawQuest, told Rest of World. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers have been increasingly visiting employees’ homes to “check if they are legally working from home,” she said in a statement. Chothani’s firm represents hundreds of individual and corporate clients.

Rest of World spoke with tech workers across several countries to record their concerns. Several of them asked to remain anonymous, fearing backlash from the U.S. visa authorities.

A manager at a Chinese tech company, China

I have a 10-year visa, so I do not think this will affect me. But I want to get my husband a visa, too, and I am worried that his application will be rejected. I heard it is hard to get even a tourist visa right now — people seem to be getting rejected for no reason. 

I own property in the U.S. and if I am there to travel and visit friends, I would surely like to go with my husband. But given the situation, we wouldn’t dare to apply right now because if there is a record of him getting rejected once, it would be harder to get a visa in the future.

Atal Aggarwal, founder of immigration-focused software development firm OpenSphere, India

I lived in the U.S. on H-1B for seven years. I wanted to build my own company and realized that the immigration system would always be a noose around my neck. I wanted the freedom to do what I wanted but it felt like it was a system where I kept pumping cash to get the right legal status. It just wasn’t working out for me.

Around November last year, I thought I should take control of my life and work on achieving my dreams instead of waiting for the U.S. government’s help.

I returned to India, and since then, I have seen a lot of community news about the struggles Indians are facing with the immigration system without a proper way forward. People are realizing it’s not worth the stress and that it’s not going to get better for the next four years until Trump is out of power. So they are moving ahead — either returning home or shifting to other countries where they can have a better life without the worries about immigration systems.

A Nigerian entrepreneur who lives with his family in Austin, Texas

One of my friends who lives in the U.S. got fired last weekend. Now, he has just 30 days to find another job or leave the country. He relocated from Nigeria to the U.S. with his wife and children last year. They sold everything they owned back in Nigeria before moving.

There are several immigration changes already affecting business or will make it harder to do business in the U.S. in the future. For example, the U.S. “Gold Card,” which everyone is talking about, is hard for any entrepreneur to get because of global taxation norms.

Even though I am on a green card right now and the recent visa changes have not affected me, the truth is that I need to rethink my future. I will definitely relocate out of the U.S. and I’m planning to start looking for another country.

An Indian tech worker employed at a big tech firm in California

I hold a green card but my family back in India is worried that if I travel to meet them, I might face difficulty reentering the U.S. My family is even worried about anything I post on my social media.

I had a son six months ago and we wanted to take him to meet his grandparents in India. Typically, our parents would be excited about it but this time, given the fears around visas and layoffs in Silicon Valley, they asked if they should come to the U.S. because “what if you guys come here and they never let you back in?”

I am finally traveling back later this week, and my dad is constantly calling me to ask me not to take anything lightly, to stay safe, to carry my old green card and visa paperwork, and not leave anything to chance. It’s not advice I am used to hearing from my father. I am used to him saying, “Come on. Life will be good.”

I don’t even know if I want to live in the U.S. for the rest of my life. My personal bias towards the American Dream is at risk.

An Indian tech worker at a tech firm in the U.S.

I am on an H-1B and I’ve reached a stage where I feel like if this doesn’t work out, I’ll just go back to India. My sister’s visa to visit me was rejected last week, which is something I had never heard of happening before.

I don’t know if it’s about the last two months as much as it is about the past 10 years. Being stuck in the H-1B loop for an Indian is always bad. What Trump can do is make certain things harder. But he is not the one who introduced the deathly 18- or 20-year waits for green cards. That has always been the reality of H-1B workers. But how much harder can they make it for someone stuck in the 18-year timeline for a green card?

An Indian tech consultant with a large consulting firm, U.S.

It is a strange situation. I know of people making hundreds of thousands of dollars but they know that they will have to move to Canada next June because their visa won’t be extended. In any other situation, if you made that kind of money, it would be wild to imagine that you can’t even stay where you want to stay.

It restricts how you make your life decisions or travel or see your family. People can’t get married or fly to attend a funeral.

The correct term to describe my status in the U.S. is “a non-resident alien.” I am not an illegal alien, but I am an alien nonetheless. I am not a citizen so I don’t have a voice in how things function. It may seem unfair but you voluntarily sign up for it and most of us don’t really think it through in the hope of a better life.

Mastercard Foundation has pulled out of a commitment to invest $100 million in a leading African venture capital firm at a time when tech startups on the continent are struggling to woo Western funders.

54 Collective, the most active investor in Africa in 2024, and Mastercard Foundation, an international nongovernmental organization, “will be pursuing different strategies moving forward, and the partnership will end on 30 April 2025,” the VC firm told Rest of World in an email. 

During an internal meeting on February 20, the leadership team of 54 Collective (formerly Founders Factory Africa) told staff this would result in layoffs as the firm will disband its entire venture studio team, which includes staff that supports its portfolio companies on product, technology, marketing and growth, human resources, and business development, three senior company officials who attended the meeting told Rest of World, seeking anonymity as they were not authorized to talk to the media.

“Startups currently in the program will continue receiving technical support from the 54 Collective Venture Studio until April 30, 2025,” Daniel Hailu, executive director of pan-African programs at the Mastercard Foundation, told Rest of World in a statement. “The Mastercard Foundation remains committed to its Young Africa Works strategy to see 30 million young people, especially young women, access dignified and fulfilling work by 2030.”

Startup funding in Africa has been declining since 2022, and entrepreneurs and investors worry this development could further hurt the overall investment sentiment.

Besides its immediate impact on the team at 54 Collective, a development like this leaves a big vacuum in the ecosystem, Alim Ladha, founder and CEO of South African edtech company Instill Education, told Rest of World.

“I think the short-term effect of a development like this is obviously that there will be value destructions,” Ladha said. “Most of the ventures [built or supported by this fund] may not be at a stage where they’re self-sustaining. From an ecosystem perspective, we are left with a bit of a vacuum and who plays that role of coming in and stimulating in the absence of such a deal?”

Iyinoluwa Aboyeji, managing partner at startup accelerator Accelerate Africa and co-founder of fintech unicorn Flutterwave, told Rest of World it was “time for our ecosystem to stop building on the broken promises and broken mandates of globalist institutions and foundations who would rather keep African founders broke and broken.” 

Several international investors pulled out of Africa during the 2022 funding crunch and have since never returned to the continent. For instance, Tiger Global invested in five African startups in 2022 but has not announced any further bets on the continent.

In 2024, investment in African startups fell 25% year on year to $2.2 billion.

Founded in 2018, 54 Collective is headquartered in South Africa and has invested in over 70 startups.

The firm combines venture studio and venture capital models by providing investment as well as mentorship to early-stage founders in Africa. It partners with large corporate organizations and impact investment firms to deliver its services. The company’s partners include South Africa’s Standard Bank, South African health-care company Netcare, and the Dublin-headquartered Small Foundation, among others.

In August 2023, 54 Collective secured its largest funding when Mastercard Foundation and Johnson & Johnson Impact Ventures committed to investing $114 million into the VC firm to scale its “unconventional VC model” and better serve founders across Africa. Under the agreement, 54 Collective would receive $20 million per year from the Mastercard Foundation over five years.

In its email to Rest of World, 54 Collective said the Mastercard Foundation funding was pivotal to its business. While senior executives said the company is likely to reduce its core investment team across its offices in Kenya, Nigeria, and South Africa, the firm said it will continue to invest as usual. 

Mastercard and Mastercard Foundation have extensively invested in tech ventures in Africa in recent years. Last year, Rest of World reported how Mastercard invested in at least three big African companies including Jumia, Airtel Africa, and MTN Mobile Money. 

Victor Asemota, partner at VC firm AnD Ventures, told Rest of World last year that Mastercard and its rival Visa opened Africa to the world and improved how business is done on the continent. “Before them, there was a lot of chaos,” Asemota said. “I remember when Interswitch launched their failed magstripe cards without EMV [Europay, Mastercard, and Visa] standards. It was chaotic. Visa and Mastercard brought sanity.”

Mastercard Foundation runs Africa Growth Fund — a fund of funds through which it supports small and medium enterprises on the continent “with the goal of enabling dignified and fulfilling work for young people, particularly young women,” according to its website. Besides 54 Collective, Mastercard Foundation has invested in at least five other investment vehicles in Africa, including Nigeria’s VestedWorld and Aruwa Capital Management, and Kenya’s Chui Ventures.

Ladha said this development should remind Africans to “stop building businesses that are dependent on the whims of philanthropies around the continent.”

“A few years ago, maybe before Covid[-19], the most important thing that all these philanthropist funders talked about was education and youth employment. And then it was food security driven by the food crises during Covid[-19]. Then it was agritech, then it was climate tech,” he said. “And I think the reality of it is all of us have just realized that building a business, relying on philanthropy to be the reason we sustain is not a sustainable model for our continent.”