Latest / Connecting the Dots / Cognitive AI, Embedded Platforms, and Fintech Convergence

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Cognitive AI, Embedded Platforms, and Fintech Convergence · Connecting the Dots

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  Today's tech news moves fast, but understanding
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  it shouldn't be hard. That's why Snarfl Solutions
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  Group brings you Connecting the Dots, where we
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  break down what's happening in tech and why it
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  matters to you. Now, let's dive in with your
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  hosts. Welcome to Connecting the Dots. I'm Alex.
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  And I'm Morgan. It is Monday, January 5th, 2026,
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  and we're here to break down what's happening
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  in the world of tech. That's right. And before
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  we jump into our main stories, let's get a quick
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  snapshot of the day, starting with the weather.
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  Absolutely. So right here in our backyard, Sacramento,
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  it's pretty gloomy. We've got rain and a high
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  of about 55 degrees. A classic start to a January
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  week. And nationally, it's a real mixed bag.
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  Yeah, it really is. The West Coast and parts
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  of the Intermountain West are still getting hit
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  with heavy rain and snow thanks to all that Pacific
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  moisture. And if you're traveling, just be careful.
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  Especially up in the northern plains and the
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  upper Midwest. There's a wintry mix that's making
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  for some pretty hazardous road conditions. Definitely.
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  And on the other end of the spectrum, it's dry
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  and gusty down in the south and central high
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  plains, which is creating some critical fire
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  weather concerns. It's something we really need
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  to watch. It is. OK, shifting over to the markets
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  is a pretty decent day to kick off the week.
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  A positive start, for sure. The Dow Jones closed
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  up at $48 ,766 .88. That's a nice little bump
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  of 0 .6 % for the day. The S &P 500 was a lot
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  quieter. It finished at 6 ,897 .06, up just a
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  tiny bit, 0 .07%. Right, but the real story,
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  I think, continues to be Bitcoin. Oh, absolutely.
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  I had a really strong day, closed over $92 ,000.
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  It's up more than 6 % for the week. That momentum
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  is just not slowing down. It really isn't. Now,
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  before we get to our main stories, we want to
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  give a shout out to our sponsor, Old Glory. They
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  have some fantastic music and sports fan merch.
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  I mean, if you've got a techie friend, it's great
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  % off your entire purchase. Just go to oldglory
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  .com. All right, let's get into it. We've got
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  three really fascinating stories from the Morningstar
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  report today. We're going from high -level AI
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  philosophy all the way to African financial infrastructure.
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  It's a great lineup. It really shows how technology
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  is just, you know, reshaping everything from
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  big ideas to how money actually moves. So where
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  should we start? Let's start with a big idea.
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  Our first story is about Microsoft CEO Satya
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  Nadella. He's really trying to reframe the entire
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  conversation around AI. He is. He's basically
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  saying the industry needs to get past this slop
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  versus sophistication argument. And that term
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  slop is so key, isn't it? I mean, Merriam -Webster
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  literally made it their word of the year for
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  2025. Exactly. It perfectly captures that feeling
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  of being flooded with, you know, low quality,
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  high quantity AI junk. People were getting tired
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  of it. So Nadella's point is that the initial
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  spectacle phase is ending. Right. We're moving
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  from just discovery to what he calls widespread
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  diffusion, and that means we have to start separating
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  the spectacle from real actual substance. He
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  wants us to see AI as a cognitive amplifier.
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  I love that term. It builds on Steve Jobs's old
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  idea of the computer as a bicycle for the mind.
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  Yeah, but this is this is a step beyond that.
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  He calls it scaffolding for human potential.
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  It's not about replacing us. It's about building
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  on what we can do. And that totally changes the
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  design question, doesn't it? It's not. Can an
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  AI do this job? No, it's how do we as humans
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  use these new tools to get better? It's about
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  creating a new equilibrium in our theory of mind.
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  Which is a fascinating idea. But, you know, you
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  have to ask, is this just a really convenient
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  way for Microsoft to frame their massive spending?
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  That's the billion dollar question. And this
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  is where it moves from philosophy to a really
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  serious engineering problem. It does. Because
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  he says to get to that substance, the industry
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  has to evolve. We need to go from single, powerful
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  models to integrated, robust, Systems exactly
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  building that rich scaffold as he calls it. It's
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  not just about training a bigger model anymore
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  So what does that scaffold actually look like
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  under the hood? Well, it's about orchestrating
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  multiple agents and models together and it has
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  to account for things like memory So the system
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  actually remembers your previous conversations
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  So you don't have to start from scratch every
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  single time right and it also has to manage entitlements
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  You know who has permission to see what data
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  and ensure what he calls safe tools use which
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  sounds like corporate guardrails That's pretty
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  much what it is. It's the safety net that turns
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  a powerful but sometimes unpredictable tool into
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  something you can actually rely on in a business
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  setting. And building that kind of system, that
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  costs a fortune. Which Nadella admits, he compared
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  this economic reboot to their shift to cloud
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  computing 15 years ago. And that's why he brought
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  back Rolf Harms. This is the guy who wrote the
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  2010 white paper, economics of the cloud, which
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  was basically the blueprint for Azure success.
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  Wow. So bringing him back is a huge signal. It
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  is. Nadella says this is way more capital and
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  knowledge intensive than anything before. And
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  to justify that cost, he says AI needs societal
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  permission and to show a real world evil impact.
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  The philosophy and the economics have to connect.
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  Speaking of the real world, if AI is changing
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  the boardroom, it is absolutely about to change
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  the living room. Let's talk about Google TV.
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  Yeah, moving from the abstract to the very practical,
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  Google is rolling out some huge Gemini updates,
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  and I think the biggest win is just pure convenience.
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  Oh, for sure. The voice control for settings.
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  How many times have you been fumbling with a
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  remote, digging through menus just to brighten
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  the screen? Way too many. It's a huge pain point.
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  Now you can just say, the screen is too dim.
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  Or, I can't hear the dialogue, and Gemini just...
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  fixes it, it understands what you actually mean.
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  That's a game changer, especially for, you know,
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  family members who aren't super techie, but it
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  goes beyond just convenience. They're also adding
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  generative AI tools. All right, this is rolling
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  out on some TCL devices first. Yeah. Gemina is
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  going to support tools like, and I love these
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  names, Nano, Banana, and Veo. Okay, we have to
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  explain those names. They sound like characters
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  from a cartoon. They really do. So Nano Banana
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  is their text to image model. And VO is for text
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  to video. So your TV isn't just a screen for
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  consumption anymore. It can actually help you
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  create stuff. Now, the sources we looked at were
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  a little skeptical here. I mean, why would you
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  create AI images on your TV when your phone is
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  right there? That's a fair point if you're thinking
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  about it like a work tool. But I think Google
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  is betting on a different use case. The shared
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  family experience. Exactly. You're all on the
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  couch looking at photos. You could say, Gemini,
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  turn these holiday pictures into a cinematic
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  slideshow. Or something silly like, use Nano
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  Banana to put our dog's face on a superhero.
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  Ah, okay. So it's about interactive entertainment.
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  Less about productivity, more about making memories
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  together on the biggest screen in the house.
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  Precisely. And the integration with Google Photos
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  is really deep. You can use something called
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  Photos Remix. to apply all sorts of artistic
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  styles instantly. And Gemini's general responses
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  are getting a big upgrade too. They're calling
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  it a visually rich framework. Yeah, no more boring
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  text boxes. We're talking high -res images, video
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  clips, real -time sports updates, and there's
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  an option to dive deeper on a topic, which gives
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  you this narrated, simplified overview for the
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  whole family. It's turning the TV into a real
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  information hub. And this is going to expand.
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  beyond TCL TVs, right? To other brands, even
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  projectors? That's the plan. The whole home theater
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  is becoming an AI -powered system. That focus
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  on systems and infrastructure is a perfect transition
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  to our last story, which takes us to African
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  fintech. It is. Flutterwave, which is Africa's
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  largest fintech company, has just acquired a
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  Nigerian open banking startup called Mono. This
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  is a huge deal. The valuation is somewhere between
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  25 and 40 million dollars all stock. And it tells
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  us so much about the future of digital finance
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  there. Absolutely. So Flutterwave is the giant,
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  right? They have this huge payments network in
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  over 30 countries. And they just bought Mono,
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  which people call the Plaid for Africa. And for
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  anyone who doesn't know, Plaid is that critical
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  piece of infrastructure in the U .S. that lets
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  apps connect securely to your bank account. Mono
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  built that for Africa. Right. And this is all
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  about vertical integration. Flutterwave handles
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  the payments, the actual movement of money. Now
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  with Mono, they get the data and the trust layer.
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  Identity checks, account verification, risk assessment.
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  Exactly. Flutterwave CEO Olugbenga Agbula put
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  it perfectly. He said, payments, data, and trust
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  cannot exist in silos. Open banking provides
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  the connective tissue. And that connective tissue
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  is arguably even more vital in many African markets
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  because traditional credit bureaus often just
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  aren't there. They're very limited. So if you're
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  a digital lender, how do you decide if someone
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  is credit worthy? You have to look at their transaction
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  history, their bank data. That data is the foundation
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  of trust. It is, and Mono is already the backbone
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  for pretty much all of Nigeria's digital lenders.
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  They've powered 8 million bank account linkages,
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  which is about 12 % of the country's entire banked
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  population. That's a massive footprint. So by
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  buying Mono, Flutterwave isn't just adding a
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  feature. No, they are positioning themselves
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  for the continent's next big economic chapter,
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  the credit -driven phase. You can't scale lending
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  without that kind of data intelligence. It's
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  a consolidation that just makes sense. For a
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  startup like Mono, trying to navigate the different
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  regulations in 30 -plus countries is a nightmare.
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  A total nightmare. But FortiWave is already there.
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  They have the licenses, the compliance teams.
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  They can provide the scaffolding, there's that
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  word again, for Mono to scale really quickly.
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  So it turns data into a core asset, just as important
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  as the payment processing itself. And Mono gets
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  to keep operating as its own product, which is
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  great for innovation. It's a huge bet on the
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  future, and it's about building that foundational
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  system so the next phase of growth can happen.
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  Before we wrap things up, we also want to thank
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  our other sponsor for today, Scony. They make
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  your game and want to upgrade your gear, definitely
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  check them out. You can use the promo code SNARFL
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  at checkout for 15 % off your purchase. The website
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  is scony .com. You know, when you step back,
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  today's stories really connect around this idea
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  of building sophisticated infrastructure. They
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  really do. We started with Satya Nadella, who
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  has to justify these massive investments in AI
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  by moving from just... powerful models to reliable
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  systems. And we saw how that push for better
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  systems is showing up for us at home, with Google
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  TV finally making it easy to just talk to your
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  television to get what you want. And then all
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  the way over in African fintech, we see Flutterways
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  building the essential data system that will
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  unlock the continent's next phase of credit -led
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  growth. The common thread is that raw intelligence,
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  whether it's an AI model or financial data, isn't
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  enough. You need the scaffolding, the systems,
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  to make it safe. reliable, and actually work
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  at scale. So what's the takeaway for you? I think
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  it's that if the world's biggest companies are
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  betting billions on building better systems,
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  it might be a good time to look at your own.
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  Are you still relying on tools that feel like
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  slop? Or are you investing in the robust, scaffolded
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  systems that are built to last? Something to
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  think about. A great question to end on. We're
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  here to help it snarfle, so reach out on our
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  website if you have any more questions. That's
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  a wrap on today's top stories. Remember, tech
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  doesn't have to be complicated, and we're here
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  to help connect the dots. If you've got questions
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  or want to learn more, visit us at snarful .com.
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  Thanks for listening, and we'll catch you next
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  time.