Computer Science students from Kenya’s University of Nairobi (UON) are set to launch a tablet they designed.
The tablet will be the first ever from Kenya and East Africa, breaking the tradition of East Africa’s Silicon Savannah as a software only industry after Safaricom‘s MPesa gained global fame.
The group of students from the School of Computing and Informatics with the help of their lecturers also join the cluster community at iHub building the country’s and Africa first super computer.
Sources close to UON Computer Engineering department told TechMoran, the students want to take world by surprise and are not after publicity. After all several developers in Africa have manufactured and sold computers and tablets already with the latest coming from an unexpected place as DRC.
Nigeria’s Inye tablets, Cameroon’s Cardiopads, an iPad Way C from Congo are leading the way to a shift from software to hardware or even an increase of both as they need local content like games and education apps to be used.
The specifications and price and manufacturing partner have been kept secret but TechMoran will find this out but possibly the tablets will be mass manufactured in China.
The tablet is good news even as Friday October 25, the Kenya’s Ministry of Communications and Technology is to launch Social Media Clubs dubbed Social Pro at the university to later spread to all universities in the country.
Muthuri Kinyamu, CEO and Founder of Social Edge Africa, the firm behind Social Pro Clubs earlier told TechMoran that social media can be used as an educational tool instead of being condemned. And there is potential too, for youth to use social media to keep peace particularly as the country nears a major election set for March 2013.
