Founded in 2012 in Nairobi by Johnni Kjelsgaard and Patricia Jumi, The GrowthHub is a startup incubator and accelerator set to assist entrepreneurs in Africa to grow their ventures into commercially strong businesses.| Company Name: |
cocon africa |
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| Company Description: | Cocon Africa manufactures coconut fiber products, coconut peat, and coconut husk briquettes for sale to farmers and industries in Kenya | |
| Location: | Mombasa, Kenya | |
| Key Management: | Michael Berenju, Founder |
What it does
Cocon Africa is a coconut material processing company based in Mombasa, Kenya. The Company uses environmentally friendly machinery to process coconut husk waste into products such as fertilizers, coir fiber, coconut husk briquettes, and coconut peat. The coir fiber can be woven into nets for erosion control, or household items such as doormats, ropes, and mattresses.
Coco peat is used for a variety of applications such as golf course or park terrain, and hydroponics.
The Company is located in the center of the “Coconut Triangle,” a large group of productive coconut clusters, which allows the Company to source material from several nearby coconut plantations.
| Company Name: |
Collabmed Solutions |
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| Company Description: | Collabmed (synonym for Collaborative Medicine) improves patient care for health institutions and clinics in East Africa by digitizing and integrating healthcare. | |
| Location: | Nairobi, Kenya | |
| Key Management: | Ernest Jura,CEO—degree in computer science from University of Sunderland and former NASCOP (National AIDS and STI Control Program) employee. |
What it does
Founded in 2009, Collabmed improves patient care by digitizing data and integrating healthcare in Kenya. The Company offers two products, iClinic and Healthplus, that address the inefficient information systems of the Kenyan healthcare system at both the clinical and administrative levels. iClinicis intended for the private-practice physician in order to reduce time inputting information while increasing patient exposure. Healthplus is an efficient solution that interlinks hospitals and group practices facing information management challenges.
| Company Name: |
DINERO LIMITED |
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| Company Description: | Dinero’sChamaPesa app is a mobile payments platform that allows cooperative savings groups to collectively manage a portfolio of investments and facilitate transactions between members. | |
| Location: | Nairobi, Kenya | |
| Key Management: | Ken Griffith: Co-founder, over 16 years working in web development and digital currency systems |
Ian Grigg: Co-founder, senior software engineer for the past 25 years, MBA from the London School of Business
What is does
Dinero Ltd develops software known as ChamaPesa, which is a mobile payments and savings platform designed to facilitate the transactions and investments of cooperative savings groups (CSGs). These groups often operate informally without traditional banks leading tomismanagement of pooled savingsand existing savings vehicles that lack transparency or access to many low-risk investment opportunities.
The ChemaPesa app provides a platform for CSGs to manage their funds. The platform allows users to issue redeemable contracts for various assets, and trade them between members. The Company generates revenue by charging fees on savings and investment instruments, MPESA transactions, and merchants who sell financial products through the Company’s marketplace. The platform, currently designed to run on Android mobile phones, allows users to purchase and trade several currencies and other financial instruments. Users can add other CSG members though a PIN, who are added to the users address book and can easily transfer assets to one another.
| Company Name: |
Edom Nutritional Solutions |
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| Company Description: | Edom Nutritional Solutions cost effectively manufactures organically fortified staple flours cost effectively and sells them at affordable prices to the malnourished in East Africa. | |
| Location: | Kisumu, Kenya | |
| Key Management: | WinstoneOdhiambo– Founder, Agricultural Economist with 9 years practical sector experience having worked for 2 multinationals |
What it does
Founded in 2011, Edom Nutritional Solutions manufactures organically fortified staple flours cost effectively and sells them at affordable prices to the malnourished in East Africa.
The Company sources moringaoleifera (a wide-growing tree and root in much of Africa and Asia), mushrooms and amaranth into a pre-mix that is used to fortify porridge and maize meal into a healthier food alternative that provides sufficient quantities of Iron, Vitamins A/B/C, Zinc, Calcium,and over 15 other minerals and vitamins to provide therecommended daily requirements to prevent malnourishment.
According to World Bank and World Health Organization (WHO), Vitamin A deficiency compromises the immunity of 42% of children under five, leads to anemia in 61% of children & 64% of women, and directly contributes to the deaths of 60,000 women through hemorrhaging during childbirth due to severe iron deficiency. Nearly 500M people across Africa are at risk of developing Vitamin A deficiency due to the severe lack of access to fortified and processed foods.
| Company Name: |
Mank And Tank – Was a NEXT BIG ThinG FiNALIST |
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| Company Description: | Mank and Tank develops and distributes multimedia rich, accredited Kenyan educational content through virtual classrooms built to bring together learners, teachers & authors. | |
| Location: | Nairobi, Kenya | |
| Key Management: | Martin Khamala– Founder & Head of Operations: |
What it does
Mank and Tank is a specialist multimedia development and content production company creating E-learning material for the Kenyan primary and secondary school segments. The digital content covers six primary-level subjects, 12 Secondary-level subjects, and includes instructional videos, professional voice-over recordings, well-designed animations, illustration aids, and photos in addition to text copies. The educational content is provided and fully recognized by the Kenya Institute of Education, which is the national education standard of the country.
Local teachers and curriculum developers author the content on the E-learning platform-server, while students access the content on desktop PCs and hand-held devices (given by the Company) in which the platform-client is installed. These virtual classrooms exist within a supported Learning Management System (LMS), which allows users to register, pay, plan and manage their classroom activities including setting timetables and viewing test results.
| Company Name: |
Mapsoft Technologies |
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| Company Description: | Mapsoft Technologies provides a mobile computing solution that enables PSV owners track and manage their revenues through activation of modern Smart Ticketing Technologies for Public Service Vehicles. | |
| Location: | Nairobi, Kenya | |
| Key Management: | Patroba Mariga – Founder & CEO |
What it does
MapsoftTechnologies offers owners of Public Service Vehicles (PSV) a Smart Ticketing solution that integrates both the front-end – point of sale collections through card payments – and the back-end – float management, linking to bank accounts and daily settlements. The fleet owners are provided with real time data that allows them to track performance and also have a transparent view of operations. The solution is offered through a hand-held mobile computing device which can perform an array of functions at the POS including accepting card payments, fingerprint scanning, RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) detection, GPS, instant printing and Automatic Number Plate Recognition (RFID).
| Company Name: |
Ndovu Card Limited |
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| Company Description: | Ndovu Card provides a mobile bulk payment solution that allows merchants to pay their employees instantly and increases their shopping efficiency. | |
| Location: | Nairobi, Kenya | |
| Key Management: | Fredrick Alunala – Founder |
Notable Progress to Date:The Company has secured a contract for bulk payments for over 37,000 employees and has partnered with a local bank, PRSP Co. About 56% of investment has gone to software development.
What it does
Ndovu Card Limited is an electronic money transfer company that uses the Internet and mobile platforms to provide transfer solutions to clients. The Company leverages encrypted barcode technology for merchants to use point of sale purchases and bulk mobile payroll systems to serve the under banked and low-income populations. The Company’s barcode technology offers a safer, quicker, and cheaper solution than traditional payment methods.
| Company Name: |
SolarKiosk |
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| Company Description: | SolarKiosk is a network of solar powered kiosk franchises that provide affordable energy infrastructure as well as a modern storefront to distribute goods and ancillary services such as phone charging, internet and refrigeration. | |
| Location: | Nairobi, Kenya | |
| Key Management: |
Monica Oberle – Sales Director:
What it does
Solar Kiosk sells solar-powered kiosk franchises in low-income regions of Kenya, Ethiopia, Ghana and Botswana/Zambia. These modular kiosks generate power through building integrated solar panels that can harvest up to 20kWh of solar energy. The power is saved in batteries that dissipate required energy to mobile charging stations, portable energy devices and refrigerators. The Company centrally manufactures the kiosk electrical components and the other building materials are locally sourced according to design specifications.
The Company is targeting shopkeepers in communities that have limited to no access to reliable electricity sources. Following a training program, local entrepreneurs will become franchisees of The Company, taking control of the kiosk and focusing on selling basic charging services as well as select basic goods and staples. The Company anticipates that future expansion of the franchises will facilitate expansion and supply chain efficiencies of not only the goods and services offered but also the development of local micro-grid systems for schools, community centers, telecom towers, and other utilities.
| Company Name: |
Zana Africa Group |
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| Company Description: | ZanaAfrica is a Kenyan social enterprise that sells radically affordable, high quality sanitary pads and underpants, coupled with health education at scale. | |
| Location: | Nairobi, Kenya | |
| Key Management: | Megan White Mukuria – Founder/CEO: |
What it does
ZanaAfrica equips women and girls with radically affordable sanitary pads and underpants, coupled with informational comics, to enhance their reproductive health and unleash their productivity. The Company offers two sanitary pad brands, Safi and Nia, to meet the aspirations and access behaviors of the two primary segments within its target market: women (20+) and girls (8-19).
In November 2013, the Company launched its first-generation pad product, Safi, based on feedback from women and girls in over 50 focus groups across Kenya: a super-absorbent disposable sanitary pad, produced in Kenya on high-throughput equipment, sold in packs of 2 pads each through community networks of sales agents.. Selling in packs of 2 pads lowers daily out-of-pocket pad expenses by at least 70% for The Company’scustomers, relative to the standard pack sizes of 8-10 pads/pack that currently flood the market. Nia will be sold in termly kits of 32 pads and a pair of underpants to NGOs who distribute to schoolgirls.
| Company Name: |
Zege Technologies Limited |
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| Company Description: | Zege Technologies builds solutions around financial services and mobile payments to foster financial inclusion for SME’s. | |
| Location: | Nairobi, Kenya | |
| Key Management: | Stella Njoki Kimotho – Co-founder |
KariukiGathitu – Co-founder Notable Progress to Date:
What it does
Zege Technologies offers a suite of mobile products for businesses including: point of sale solutions, business intelligence, customer relationship management tool, and mobile money. Through The Company’s product, MPayer Cashbox, businesses can eliminate manual paper based processes, which are time consuming and do not offer real-time easily accessible customer data.
MPayer is a cloud-based solution that allows user to make payments online and offline. The product offers smart reports for business owners to help them make better-informed decisions, which can be accessed either through mobile phone or online.Retail businesses can view customer credit lines, inventory management, transaction history, and customer loyalty programs through notifications and rewards. Customers can also provide feedback to retail businesses.
