Having signed a PriceCheck deal with MTN South Africa, Naspers is looking at signing with mobile operators in Nigeria.
In South Africa PriceCheck has 1.5 million users searching for products on its web and mobile sites (around 35 percent are on mobile). The site has over 30 million products in 6,000 categories from 400 stores.
“Our mobile app will be redesigned and co-branded as PriceCheck bought to you by MTN with nine radio buttons. One of these goes direct to MTN so that you can buy airtime and products. Less than 1 percent of retail happens online, yet as much as 40% of the buying decision process starts on mobile. We are now in a position to impact that crucial moment of influence. The future of commerce is on mobile and together with MTN, PriceCheck is closing the loop,” says MTN.
As part of the launch in South Africa, the app will be available across all MTN devices, and in app stores for Android, BlackBerry, Windows and iOS devices. The app will also be pre-loaded to the MTN Steppa device.
In Nigeria, PriceCheck has 200,000-300,000 users a year and has only been in operation for a year: “There we have double the traffic on mobile to what we have online. There’s 1 million products and we’ve targeted 200 stores, of which 100 have gone live.”
PriceCheck will be looking for both co-branding deals with operators and pre-loading deals with handset vendors in Nigeria.
They send traffic to the websites providing the products and get a small percentage of the order price.
Mahindra Comviva just became the newest member of GlobalPlatform; the organization which standardizes the management of applications on secure chip technology.
Mahindra Comviva is among the top 3 mobile financial technology providers across the globe processing over $20 billion in payment flows. As an Observer Member, Mahindra Comviva, a leading provider of mobility solutions, will take a keen interest in the activities of the GlobalPlatform Advisory Council and the Mobile Task Force. This group works to understand the business requirements of the secure mobile services ecosystem and aims to ensure an agreed and workable application management infrastructure is established.
“Mahindra Comviva firmly believes that there will be an augmented demand for adoption of technologies, like near field communication (NFC), that empower consumers to make payments with a simple tap through their mobile phones,” said Srinivas Nidugondi, Senior VP and Head of Mobile Financial Solutions at Mahindra Comviva. “Our focus on innovation and the creation of a safe, secure and convenient environment to provide instant electronic transactions at any time, and from anywhere, has established our strong position in the mobile financial space. We are confident that our expertise will offer value to GlobalPlatform’s excellent work as it drives adoption of electronic transactions on mobile devices, reducing dependency on other form factors. Thus, we are delighted to confirm our membership as we share the same objectives and goals.”
Kevin Gillick, Executive Director at GlobalPlatform, said: “With the mobile payment services ecosystem rapidly evolving, it’s great to have companies like Mahindra Comviva on board. We look forward to its participation in the Mobile Task Force as we accelerate the establishment of a stable and interoperable mobile ecosystem.”
Novartis (NVS) announced today that two million treatments of its pediatric antimalarial are arriving in Zambia thanks to the ongoing efforts of the company in collaboration with Malaria No More’s Power of One campaign.
Zambia is the first beneficiary country of this campaign sponsored by Novartis. One million treatments of Coartem® Dispersible have been funded through public donations and Novartis matched these with a further one million treatments. These antimalarials will reduce the disease burden in Zambia, which accounts for up to 40 percent of infant mortality in that country.
“Although the incidence of malaria has decreased, the disease still kills a child every minute in Africa,” said Joseph Jimenez, CEO of Novartis. “Our commitment to Power of One reflects our company’s long-term efforts to fight malaria and Novartis remains dedicated to controlling and ultimately eliminating this deadly disease.”
The campaign, which launched to the public in September 2013, uses social, mobile, and e-commerce technologies, enabling the public to purchase treatments for children in Zambia. Donors are able to share information with their social networks and encourage friends to donate.
“One and a half million treatments are already on the ground in Zambia, with a further 500,000 anticipated in the coming weeks,” said Martin Edlund, CEO, Malaria No More. “Power of One is resonating with the general public, and their donations will help us ensure that children in Zambia will have access to the treatment they need.”
Novartis is supporting the campaign financially and has pledged to match up to 1 million treatments funded by the public every year through 2015. For more than a decade, the Novartis Malaria Initiative has worked to improve access to treatment, help communities deliver better healthcare and has invested in research and development into the next generation of antimalarials.
Charmain Wasunna, from United States International University (USIU) has for the past one month been exposed to knowledge she would never have acquired from a classroom setting.
She is part of Microsoft 4Afrika Initiative internship, MySkills4Afrika program. Like many other interns under this program, Wasunna has been introduced to some of Microsoft channels, that the company employs to run its businesses, incentives and all its evangelist programs in Windows application development, building relationship with students and other general marketing activities.
“I have learnt how to deal with customers, work etiquette, marketing distribution models and a bit of project planning, and now am a better person at work than I was after school.” Wasunna told Tech Moran. She hopes to be absorbed at Microsoft after her training.
Having graduated recently, Wasunna is part of the 200,000 Africans Microsoft has made a commitment to up skill by 2016. Microsoft aims to train 100,000 from the existing workforce through its partner community and 100,000 recent graduates, 75% of which it will help place in jobs among its partner network and several others will be encouraged to create jobs.
Martina Hennessy
According to a survey done by PricewateHouseCoopers (PwC), 75% of CEOs in the region are in need of skilled workers, especially since Africa will attract USD 150 billion foreign trades by 2015. The biggest challenge is the capacity of skilled workers to meet business requirements.
MySkills4Afrika program is set to fill this gap by training recent graduates and employed staff in Microsoft’s partner network.
“The MySkills4Afrika initiative aims to help transfer vital skills and perspectives to enable Africans grow, innovate and compete globally, says Kunle Awosika, Microsoft Country Manager Kenya.
Samar Patel
“MySkills4Afrika was designed in line with the company’s heritage of giving back to the communities in which we operate, and in order to advance the overall goals of the 4Afrika Initiative around accelerating innovation, world-class skills and affordable access for Africans.”
The initiative also aims to promote better understanding of the African markets throughout the company, addressing local challenges and promote global leadership and skills development amongst Microsoft employees offer both their technical and non-technical – to contribute to improving Africa’s competitiveness.
The employees contribute their time, talent and expertise through mentoring, coaching to give businesses founders and recent graduates in Africa necessary expertise to function in a 21st century business environment.
Kunle Awosika
“There’s inadequate ICT, sales, marketing, project management and leadership skills among most of groups were are working with,” says Martina Hennessy volunteer from Microsoft who is working with groups of entrepreneurs at iHub. “You’ll find one group has this skills set and lacks in another. “
Hennessy, working with startup entrepreneurs at iHub is among the first wave of approximately 50 volunteers from 17 countries around the world who are working with Microsoft partners, innovation hubs, and NGOs across the continent to impart the necessary skills among the youth to change lives on the continent.
She is part of the MySkills4Afrika employee volunteer program that selects employees from various departments at Microsoft to come to Africa and impart skills and also learn from Microsoft’s various partners in Africa, which include tech hubs, businesses, NGO’s and government arms. The initiative’s focus is both technical and non-technical. Some of the focus areas include project management, sales, marketing, leadership, public relations, human resource and communication.
Although the volunteers contribute their skills they also stand a chance to learn from experiences of locals businesses and Microsoft partners and employees so that at the end of the day, they can champion for skills that will help address the challenges facing Microsoft partners in African markets.
Apart from tech hubs, the volunteers extended their skills to Microsoft partners for example Techno Brain, where they empowered the management with various technical and marketing skills. Techno Brain’s Regional Sales Director Samar Patel says his firm has been Microsoft’s biggest partner since 2004 and also has various programs aimed to impart employees and the youth with employable skills.
“Due to the shortfalls in the training programs at universities, we transfer skills and shed knowledge to the interns to help them become better at work. This is not just technical knowledge, they learn how to deal with customers through intensive training on marketing distribution models and even on basic customer care skills and etiquette,” says Patel.
Though MySkills4Afrika looks like a Microsoft’s CSR program for helping Africa grow, it is not about charity, it is a business strategy for Microsoft’s own growth on the continent as well.
”We believe deeply that helping Africa accelerate economic development and create jobs will help Microsoft achieve our company’s mission in Africa. MySkills4Afrika is about developing Africa’s business climate to enable people to compete and reach their full potential, “ concludes Kunle.
The Microsoft Imagine Cup 2014 Kenya finals were today held at Strathmore University with quite a number of developers showcasing their impressive ideas. Most of the participants came from different universities, looking to give solutions to that help solve the day to day challenges experienced.
The major categories for the 2014 competition are Games, Innovation and World Citizenship. The apps were being created for the Windows Phone, either for the Windows 8, Windows 8.1 or the upgraded version of the Windows 8.
Veronicah Ogeto, Safaricom’s Head of Innovation said that Safaricom is looking to work together with some of the best innovation ideas and entrepreneurs and is working in partnership with other companies to help tackle problems in the country.
Some of the innovations included:-
The refugee solution – this is a game app that will help the humanitarian organizations collect funds to help in taking care of the refugees in the country. The game enables the users to share information about refugees in the country as well as learn the progress of the situation one chooses to help tackle. The download will cost users only seven shillings.
TechSpace – This app is looking to bridge the education quality gap by providing the platform to distribute content to personal devices like smartphones and other smart devices. It will give real time updates of the contents. The team also is looking into making classrooms chalk-less as they also developed a software that detects a teachers hand movements. The developers are looking into working with schools and content developers.
Life Buddy- This is a blood donation app that seeks to find the right donor. Everyone will need to key in their details including the blood group and the information is saved in partner healthcare providers. When a particular blood group is needed, the healthcare provider will look through the data and call up a potential donor requesting them to donate it to the person in need.
This among others are innovations that had a chance to prove the workability of their apps. The winners will be announced at a later date next week.
Microsoft’s co-founder and philanthropist Paul Allen has invested $40 million into Scytl, a global firm for secure online voting and election modernization via his investment management firm Vulcan Capital.
Build to transform and modernize elections globally Scytl was founded in 2001 and by 2006 it was profitable. Since then the firm claims to have grown its revenues at an average of 70% per year, becoming the worldwide leader in the election modernization market with offices in 15 cities and customers in 35 countries.
The firm will use the new round of financing to power its R&D efforts and strategic acquisitions to add to its five acquisitions it has made in the past two years.
“We are very pleased that Vulcan Capital is backing our company with their investment, credibility and expertise”, says Pere Valles, CEO at Scytl. “As the industry leader in the election modernization space, we have a responsibility towards our customers to continue bringing technology, innovation and excellence into this space.”
Abhishek Agrawal, who heads all growth equity investments for Vulcan Capital, will be joining Scytl’s Board of Directors to help the firm continue its mission of transforming the election industry by bringing software and internet based solutions into the election space.
“Scytl is playing a pivotal role in helping governments worldwide to further embrace technology-driven modernization in their election processes, an area which will continue to undergo massive transformation in the coming years”, said Abhishek Agrawal, Managing Director of Vulcan Capital. “We are excited to partner with Scytl which is at the forefront of this with its full suite of election modernization solutions which governments can adopt on a gradual basis.”
Scytl’s end-to-end e-Election Platform covers every process within an election, from election planning and voter registration to online voting and election night reporting, allowing governments to improve the efficiency, accessibility, transparency and security of their elections.
Notebook PC maker Asus doubled its warranty period on its notebooks from one year to two years in Kenya in a move to strengthen its product service portfolio and attract more sales countrywide.
The firm said it will be responsible for replacing the product or defective part of the product based on diagnosis and then the repaired product or part will be under warranty for three months or the reminder of the warranty depending on what is applicable in the scenario.
According to Chris Wen, Product Manager, Asus Kenya, the warranty will begin on the date of purchase and in a situation where the date of purchase cannot be validated, the warranty will begin from the day of manufacture. He added that the warranty will exclude accidental damage, misuse and installations of unrelated Asus software.
With this new scheme, the Taiwanese company hopes that consumers will have greater assurance of a worthwhile investment when it comes to the purchase and subsequent ownership of these devices.
“As an emerging product in the market, locally, we felt it was crucial that we assure our customers of our continued support even after purchase of product to ensure that they do get the most out of the products and have a great experience.” said Mr. Chris Wen, product manager, Asus Kenya.
The two year service contract increases the current one year warranty coverage that was already one of the strongest offered. It also beats the average industry warranty which is currently one year.
“Asus has succeeded in the competitive Information Technology (IT) industry by simply focusing and developing a strong advantage in product design, technology, quality and value cost.” Said Mr. Wen
Yes, it has happened and though you have questions, South Africa’s reign as Africa’s top economic powerhouse is over and a new oga is at the top.
Nigeria has overtaken SA as Africa’s largest economy after it added data which was previously uncalculated from sectors such as telecommunications, airlines, information technology says the Nigerian government putting the West African country’s GDP now totalling $510Bn.
The new report puts Nollywood’s contribution to the at around 1.3% of total output.
According to Jason Njoku, co-founder and CEO of iROKOtv, the VC-backed Video-On-Demand (VOD) platform for Nollywood movies: “It comes as no surprise data from Nollywood has been included in the recalculated GDP figures for Nigeria. It has been growing steadily for the past 20 years and can legitimately be uttered in the same breath as the likes of Hollywood and Nollywood when it comes to movie output data, with some 1,500-2,000 movies being made every year.
“Nollywood is the most hard working, brutal and dynamic of industries that Nigeria has spawned. It is an economic miracle that the industry has not only flourished, but grown exponentially, considering the conservative budgets movie producers have to work with, as well as the antiquated methods of distribution that held the industry back for so many years.
“Nollywood has been, for too long, actively discounted as a potential industry for growth in Nigeria. Investors at home and abroad were unwilling to invest, putting their money in traditional sectors such as agriculture, oil and property. In 2010, iROKOtv secured series A funding of $3Mn from US-based Tiger Global, the very first significant, multi-million dollar investment into the industry, which is really quite astonishing. Since then, we have closed on a further $19Mn of VC investment, bringing the total to $21Mn, which is testament to how Nollywood is now, finally, considered by the international investor community as a very real and exciting investment prospect in Africa.
“Today is a landmark today for Nollywood, with no little thanks to the movie producers, actors and distributors who have helped to put Nigeria on the map culturally and with their creativity and dedication to their art, are helping to drive the economy upwards.”
iROKOtv, coined by media commentators as the ‘Netflix of Africa’, was launched by London-born Manchester University graduate Nigerian Jason Njoku, who saw a gap in the market for Nollywood distribution in 2009, when he couldn’t find any Nollywood movies on or offline. He moved from his home in London to Lagos and started buying the online licences to hundreds of Nollywood movies. The company started as a YouTube channel called NollywoodLove, and became YouTube’s official channel partner in Nigeria for Nollywood movies.
Having secured VC funding from Tiger Global in 2011, Njoku was able to build a dedicated VOD platform for Nollywood called iROKOtv, which launched in December 2010 and was initially supported 100% by advertising revenue. In July 2012, iROKOtv switched to a freemium model, where alongside free movies, subscribers to iROKOtv PLUS could access brand new movies, advertisement-free, for only $7.99 a month.
Millicom, MTN and Rocket Internet’s Africa Internet Holding (AIH), a leading startup builder in Africa, has today launched Lendico in South Africa, a person to person online marketplace for loans to enable investors to directly fund the loans of private individuals.
The new social marketplace will offer borrowers cheap loans and investors attractive returns in Africa’s second largest economy after its launch in Germany last year. Lendico is also operational in Poland and Austria followed.
According to the founders, the idea of social lending is universal: People with money invest in the projects of people looking for funding. One party benefits from attractive returns, the other from cheap interest rates. Lendico is a win-win situation that functions all over the world: without bank counters and with an innovative new process, Lendico is able to beat the prices of banks and pass these savings directly on to their borrowers and investors.
For the analysis of the loan applications the company utilizes an algorithm that classes loan projects in real time. At Lendico, affordable loans and attractive returns are not mutually exclusive: “We have high standards when it comes to selecting borrowers, because we always have the interests of our investors in mind. Due to our cost advantage, Lendico can offer more affordable interest rates and smaller loan sums that for banks usually are not worthwhile“, says co-founder of AIH Jeremy Hodara,
IMG:TheNextWeb
“Lendico has been developed as a digital alternative to banks“, says the Managing Director of Lendico Dominik Steinkühler.“ Lendico is very different from a bank as borrowers and lenders benefit from direct interest rates. Lendico as a global marketplace represents a modern way to get a loan and to invest in a new asset class.”
In South Africa, the volume of outstanding consumer credit balances is $150 billion (R1.49 trillion). The costs associated with a loan are extremely important to consumers. Even one percentage point less means $1,5 billion (R15 billion) more in the pockets of consumers. This transformative power of the p2p model can already be witnessed in the United States. In 2013 alone, the two most important providers of p2p loans procured $2,4 billion worth of loans – a growth of 177% compared to the previous year.
The Africa Internet Holding also runs JUMIA, Zando, Kaymu, Hellofood, Lamudi, Carmudi, Jovago and Easy Taxi which are all spreading across Africa and nearly into market leading positions.
Jeremy Hodara: “We feel it is now the perfect time to expand our focus and vision into the digitalizing finance sector by providing Africa with financial alternatives in order to further support the emerging market’s economy.”
South African borrowers will get loans easily by creating a loan project on lendico.co.za, wait for their credit worthiness to be analyzed and then wait for investors to bid with as low as $35 (R250) or more. If a loan project gets fully funded, the borrower receives his or her loan. Investors receive their respective principal and interest payments from the first month. By diversifying their portfolio across several loan projects, investors can earn higher returns in comparison to similarly secure investments.
The Bloggers Association of Kenya BAKE will on April 12 host a training on the use of Social Media for businesses at the Nailab, 4th Floor Bishop Magua Centre on Ngong Road.
The training will be a chance for social media managers and bloggers to know how to well use th tools to recruit customers, engage them and retain them during good and bad times. The training will also be an opportunity for them to learn the basics of social for brands.
The training will entail platforms such as Facebook,Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Instagram and blogs and video sharing platforms such as YouTube and Vine where consumers can freely engage with the companies whose services or products they consume. BAKE says these platforms have an ever increasing number of Kenyans online discussing, critiquing and sharing their experiences about brands and product reviews and ratings.
The event targets online media influencers such as Brand Managers, Sales and Marketing Managers & Media Agencies to help them better execute their firms Digital Marketing Strategies.
The topics to be discussed:
a. How do Digital Marketing Strategists find and engage online influencers
b. What value do institutions/ Corporates look for from online digital providers
c. Why do Analytics matter?
d. Dealing with institutions directly or with Media Agencies – What works and what doesn’t
e. Requirements – Legal documents
f. Engagement terms
g. Why associations like BAKE matter
h. The fine line – Disclosure, sponsored content, endorsements and Opinions
The training will be moderated by Mark Kaigwa.
The training workshop will feature a panel of the following industry professionals:
1. Manoj Changarampatt – Director, Mobile and IT – Samsung Electronics East Africa
2. Asif Khan, Head of Social Media / Community Management – Squad Digital
3. Maryann Michuki – Digital Media Manager, Safaricom
4. Ahmed Salim, General Manager – Qube
5. Racheal Ndungu, Headof Marketing and E-Commerce, Jubilee Insurance
The training will be free to all BAKE members and Ksh. 500 to non-members. You can sign up your attendance here.
Rocket Internet’s price comparison website PricePanda has today launched in India, one of the fastest growing and most promising economies in the world in a move to create full price transparency and enable customers to make well informed purchasing decisions.
According to Christian Schiller, co-founder of PricePanda, “In 2012 the number of Indian retailers opening an online shop rocketed from 100 up to 600 and is tremendously growing since. Now it is our task to guide our users through the different offers to the deal that best suits their needs. At the same time, our platform empowers e-commerce businesses with helping them to convert their offerings into sales.”
Schiller is optimistic about the launch because e-commerce in India is currently booming similar to how it was in Malaysia where the site first operated there in 2012.
“Today´s launch takes us a further step towards our goal of providing full price transparency to people all around the globe and will be a great contribution towards the Indian transition from the traditional offline market to a modern online community,” Schiller added.
PricePanda’s listings include computers, software, health and beauty, home appliances, music, games and many more to allows customers compare different deals for certain products so as they can make informed purchasing decision. Clicking on a deal will redirect the user to the merchant´s online shop where the product can be ordered.
India launch follows Price Panda’s successful launch in eight countries in South East Asia and Latin America throughout 2012 and 2013.
According to the firm, Indian E-commerce is starting to become more apparent, as already 3 out of 5 Internet users are shopping online. In addition, India´s demographic structure is also in PricePanda´s favour: 98% of the online shoppers are between 18 and 45 years old and the absolute Internet penetration in India is even higher than in the USA. Moreover, M-commerce in India is performing well, with three quarters of the entire Internet traffic deriving from mobile devices. Along with the increasingly affluent Indian middle class grows the purchasing power and makes India to one of the most flourishing and auspicious markets.
PricePanda will take on PriceBaba, Reviews42.com, MySmartPrice.com, Junglee.com, and FindYogi.
Today, as the world commemorates the 20th anniversary of the start of the Rwandan genocide in which more than 800,000 people died over 100 days, Pan-African video-on-demand service Buni TV has released the acclaimed Rwandan film GREY MATTER (MATIERE GRISE) on its $5 a month premium service Buni+ to join friends and family to commemorate the day.
GREY MATTER, the first feature-length narrative film produced in Rwanda by a native Rwandan filmmaker tells the story of Balthazar, a young filmmaker struggling to get his first film, The Cycle of the Cockroach, off the ground. When funding falls apart Balthazar still pushes forward, and soon reality blurs and scenes from the film materialize.
In the film within the film, two siblings (played with precision and talent by Ruth Shanel Nirere and Ramadhan Shami Bizimana) grapple with codependency and post-traumatic stress disorder.
“GREY MATTER is not your typical Rwandan genocide film,” said Buni TV CEO Marie Lora-Mungai. “Rather than setting the story during the genocide itself, Kivu explores its long-term effects by taking us deep into a man’s mind. There are very few African films that explore psychology and mental illness, and this makes GREY MATTER a rare and precious film which should be on everyone’s must watch list.”
Rocket Internet’s Easy Taxi, a Smart Phone application that lets users request taxis with one click and available on Android, Blackberry, iOS, Windows phone, and it is free to download. When you request a taxi, you get the driver’s details, which are sent to you via the app. You can also track the driver on a map, so you know exactly where he or she is at all times. Easy Taxi launched in Nigeria at the end of July 2013.
TechMoran caught up with Bankole Cardoso, Co-founder – Easy Taxi Nigeria and here is what he told us. Who are the founders? Tell us more about yourselves?
Tallis Gomes founded Easy Taxi in Brazil in 2011. His main motive for starting Easy Taxi was the inefficiency of the taxi transportation he experienced in Rio De Jainero during a startup event. After the event he waited for a taxi for over 1 hour and the idea came to him. I launched Easy Taxi in Nigeria along the same principles. I believe that we can create efficiencies in the Nigerian transportation network by brining business innovation to the urban transportation challenges we face in many cities in the country. What inspired you to launch and run a cab-hailing app than work for Mckinsey?
I had been working for a few years at PWC and The Carlyle Group in New York City so I was more interested in starting my own business than continuing in consulting or finance. The opportunity to build and run an impactful business like Easy Taxi in Nigeria was far more appealing to me when I was looking to make a career change. As I already mentioned, this application has the power to change the Nigerian transportation landscape. How does the app work? How do drivers/car owners have their cars operate under Easy Taxi?
The app uses GPS technology to link users to the closest drivers around them. Each driver is equipped with an Android phone that allows them to see the customer requests around them and the driver then decides whether or not to accept.
For instance, if you are in Victoria Island, the app will link you to a driver that is nearby rather than those further away in Ikeja or Mushin. Our drivers are also well trained and safe; we check their licenses and taxi park registration details. Furthermore, we have a relationship with every driver in our network and make sure they meet our rigorous selection criteria before we sign them up to our platform.
Do you think Nigeria is ready for Easy Taxi?
Nigeria has already proven that it is ready for Easy Taxi. We have over 50,000 downloads and an increasing number of our users are recommending us to their friends. There was definitely a big learning curve for drivers and even for some customers as to how to operate an app like this because it was a brand new concept but Nigerians are beginning to understand the convenience and added safety we are providing. I can confidently say that we have broken ground and Nigerians have been receptive to Easy Taxi. Uber is setting up base soon in Kenya and Nigeria, don’t you think that will be tough competition?
Uber will provide stiff competition but it will only force us to continue innovating and hopefully to provide an even better service for our users. There is a clear difference between Easy Taxi and Uber because Uber is a luxury service whereas Easy Taxi is trying to create efficiencies in the already existing taxi network in Nigeria. Our long-term aim is to make taxis more affordable for all Nigerians and to build a more vibrant taxi culture. We are a global company with a footprint in over 30 countries so it is normal that we have numerous competitors in all of our markets.
IMAGE:DailyBeast
Any competitors? How unique are you from them?
Tranzit is our main competitor but there are others springing up. We are unique in the sense that we are an on-demand car service bringing customers a driver within 10 minutes whereas our competitors are more of an advance taxi-booking platform. Aren’t local taxi associations against your company?
Local taxi associations do not see us as a threat in any way. As I mentioned, we are using an existing network of taxis, which is controlled by the taxi associations so they are benefitting from us. We are making their jobs much easier and we are bringing them as much as 50% more business so they have many reasons to like us.
Traffic jams are a problem in Lagos, how do you expect to use technology to solve that?
Traffic jams are a big problem in Lagos and there is not much you can do to avoid them because the infrastructure is not up to par. The main problem in Lagos is that there are too many cars on the road. Through our technology we hope to foster a real taxi culture in Lagos like we have in other mega cities in the world. This will make taxis more affordable, people will use their cars less frequently and the roads will free up. Uber passengers have at times complained of driver harassment-how do you plan to tackle this?
Easy Taxi makes sure that every single one of our drivers understands that customer service is the most important thing. I sympathize with Uber because it is incredibly difficult to control a person that spends 8 hours of their day on the road. We realize that our drivers have a difficult job so we do our best to give them reasons to be happy. Fortunately the drivers have bought into our project and there have been no incidents so far.
Are the Nigerian transport/ traffic laws working for or against you?
The Nigerian transportation laws have not been a hindrance to us. How many cars are now working with Easy Taxi?
In Lagos we now have a network of around 400 drivers. As we continue to grow and expand to other cities in Nigeria we will continue bringing more and more drivers into our network. Where do you expect your business to be in 2 years?
I hope to be the leading taxi application in all of the major cities in Nigeria. When people think of taxis, I want them to think Easy Taxi.
Any plans to expand to Ghana, Cairo , Nairobi etc?
Yes, we have recently launched in all of those regions so you can hop into an Easy Taxi whenever you are there.
The use of Microsoft XP is decreasing following the news that Microsoft will no longer support Windows XP operating system; now Windows 8 is now prevalent and is still growing.
Windows 8, which surpassed Windows XP for the first time in February 2014, currently has 17 percent usage, while Windows 7 remains the most popular operating system with 58 percent usage,according to StatCounter.
The software giant’s latest operating system was officially launched in Nigeria in October 2012, although it became commercially available from November 6 in the same year.
It has been described as the most well-researched, well-planned Windows release ever designed to simplify the things we do every day on our PCs.
Nigeria’s Transerve has launched an anti-piracy alert app in Lagos, this means that battle to fight piracy in Nigeria has just begun.
Speaking on the war against piracy and its new JAMS product, the Managing Director, Transerve, Orapo Cyprian noted that their mission is to create and maintain a pace setting organization by adapting technology to customers’ needs finished with transcending excellent services.
“Apart from setting benchmarks by expanding the frontiers of excellent products and services in the optical media industry, we adapt technologies to meet our customers’ needs”, he said.
The app, manufactured by Transerve Disc Technology Limited, include DVD 5 and DVD 9 replications, glass mastering stamper and a Job Alert Management System (JAMS) to help alert the copyright owners whose jobs are registered through SMS and email of any order placed on their registered products.
Nic Haralambous, founder of Nicsocks and co-founder of Motribe has teamed up with Paul Cartmel, the Managing Director (owner) at New Media Labs to launch AfricanUp, a platform connecting startups, tech hubs and accelerators and investors.
AfricanUp will allow both start-ups and investors to tell their own stories, recommend their peers, and grow their profiles and reputations. The platform has four main categories namely Startups, Accelerators, Investors and Tech Hubs where conversations will be facilitated. Already, there are lots of reputable firms on the platform such as iHub, 88mph, 4Di Capital, Savannah Fund, Knife Capital among others.
“There’s no need to reinvent the wheel when launching a platform like AfricanUp. Our goal isn’t to build a revolutionary technology business. Our goal is to connect startups, founders, investors and accelerators from around the world,” says Haralambous in a blog post.
Build on New Media Lab’s Lenticular technology (lenticular.io), and Haralambous’ business-development, the portal will help investors find startups and startups find investors and vice-versa in a move to grow Africa’s technology eco-system.
“When Nic approached me with the idea, I instantly felt that the Lenticular platform New Media Labs has been refining would be perfect for the job. We decided to partner up and launch a minimum viable product to put Nic’s brainchild to the test. Powered by the reputational scoring and social features of Lenticular, AfricanUp has an incredible potential to be much more than a listing of startups, angel investors and hubs in Africa,” Cartmel says.
Haralambous and Cartmel say one of the major requests investors and accelerators around the world asked for was ‘the great startups’. They realised that there is a search problem in the technology startup space and wanted to create a platform to help startups and investors spend less time searching for each other, and more time building great things together.
AfricanUp is not the first such platform. With great resources for investors and entreprenurs, VC4Africa has been Africa’s Angelist for sometime and was late last year followed by IdeasAfrica. However, AfricanUp connects both startups, investors, accelerators and tech hubs rather than just listing startups and investors working in Africa.
Commodity EXEleni announced the formation of a private-public investment consortium to finance the establishment of the Ghana Commodity Exchange (GCX).
Investment conglomerate partners include Ghana’s top financial institutions including, Data Bank Agrifund Manager Ltd, Ecobank Ghana Ltd, UT Bank Ghana Ltd, as well as IFC, 8 Miles Fund and eleni, with minority stakeholding by the Government of Ghana.
The consortium partners and the Government of Ghana have jointly signed a Letter of Intent with the aim of completing the investment process by April 2014 and launching the GCX over a 12 month period through early 2015.
A second consortium is also in formation for a large-scale investment in warehouse and logistics infrastructure and equipment in eight delivery sites around Ghana as a strategic eco-system partner to the GCX.
In his second State of the Nation Address delivered on February 25, President John Dramani Mahama announced that as part of efforts to create an orderly, transparent and efficient marketing system for Ghana’s key agricultural commodities to promote agricultural investment and enhance productivity, the Government had committed itself to the establishment of a Ghana Commodity Exchange (GCX) and associated Warehouse Receipt System (WRS).
It is expected that the establishment of the Ghana Commodity Exchange will position it as a West Africa regional hub for commodity trading activities.
The GCX will start with spot and future trading of primarily agricultural commodities, including maize, soybeans, paddy rice, palm oil, groundnuts, among others and will introduce other key agricultural and non-agricultural commodities in what is envisaged as a future regional trading platform.
“This exchange will undoubtedly have a transformative impact on our economy and we are very pleased to be backing it, stated Samuel Ashitey Adjei, MD of Ecobank Ghana Ltd. “Following on the success of the Ethiopian model, the African commodity exchange momentum is real.
“The Ghana Commodity Exchange initiative has been in consideration for some time, and long overdue. It is an idea whose time has come, stated Robert Dowuona Owoo, GCX Project Coordinator and former Head of Policy, Research and IT at the Ghana Securities and Exchange Commission.
LAW Compliance, part of the LAW Holdings Group, is currently in pilot with the first ever electronic signature solution in the home loans market, with the ProSign solution for Absa and their attorney panel. The solution’s first signing session took place recently, achieving a remarkable milestone in completing the end-to-end home loans process.
On 19 February 2014, Johannes and Stella Coetzee signed their home loan documents at Blakes Maphanga Attorneys with conveyancer Feyoena Hammann using the ProSign solution, making them the first people to utilise the technology and form part of South Africa’s first secure electronic signing.
ProSign enables customers and attorneys on the Absa Bank home loans panel to electronically sign various required documents. Authentication of the signatories is performed by means of the customer’s FICA documents and the attorney using a unique digital certificate.
An independent date & time stamp is added to each electronic signature to provide evidence that the signature took place at that specific date & time, in sync with a world clock. Various security and technology features are used in the process.
The first ProSign electronic signing in South Africa is a milestone for Absa Bank and the industry says Simon Slater, Managing Director, LAW Compliance.
“For the very first time in the industry, both a conveyancer and customer can electronically sign documents using either a Signing Pad or Tablet. This will save time and make life a lot easier for consumers and conveyancing teams. We congratulate Mr and Mrs Coetzee on being the first users of the system,” he said.
LAW Compliance is a technology company that develops and operates smart compliance solutions for its clients, which include the major financial institutions, various corporates and law firms countrywide.
Egyptian fixed line operator, Telecom Egypt, now has a mobile license which was awarded to them by their government.
According to the telecommunications minister, the state-owned incumbent will pay EGP 2.5 billion ($358,562,500 million) to enter the mobile market. It will have one year to sell its almost 45 percent stake in Vodafone Egypt.
The country’s three existing mobile operators will also be allowed to enter the fixed market, using Telecom Egypt’s network, by acquiring a license for EGP 100 million. Helmy said the details of the unified license, for both mobile and fixed services, will be finished by 30 June, following consultations with the telecom companies.
Head of the telecoms regulator, Hesham El Alaily said: “Telecom Egypt will not receive any spectrum, but instead need to negotiate a MVNO agreement with an existing operator. It could acquire spectrum later, with an auction of frequencies for 4G services planned for June 2016.”
The new unified license requires a single payment plus an annual fee, but did not give any details on the annual fees.
If you want to hear the voices of the pope who was in 1884, well here is your chance because the Vatican said that all 8000 tapes from the Vatican Radio’s pontifical archives, have been digitized.
These recordings have been digitized and can be found online to anyone ahead of the canonization of Pope John Paul II on 17 April.
The initiative was launched as part of preparations for the sainting of John Paul II and John XXIII (1958-63) on 17 April, in the first double papal canonization ceremony in Church history.
Radio Vatican has been storing its unique patrimony since it was set up under Pope Pius XI in 1931, but it has also older recordings, such as Leo XIII’s Humanum Genus encyclical, which the pontiff recorded on a Dictaphone in 1884.
Other highlights include Paul VI’s anguished words following the kidnapping and murder of Italian prime minister Aldo Moro in May 1978, culminating in his public address to God: “You did not grant our plea for the safety of Aldo Moro, of this good and gentle man… who was my friend.”
John Paul II’s emotionally-charged attack in 1993 on the mafia’s “culture of death” following a spate of high-profile killings can be listened to again, as can Benedict XVI’s 2013 resignation speech, where he said he “will simply be a pilgrim starting the last phase of his pilgrimage on this earth”.
John Paul I, who lived for just 33 days, can be heard at one of the few Angelus prayers he led describing the terror he felt as he realised the conclave of cardinals had decided to elect him as pope.
“As soon as the danger began, two colleagues near me whispered words of courage. One said: ‘Be strong! If the Lord gives you a weight, he also helps you carry it”, said the man known among Italians by the nickname “The smile of God”.
Wananchi Group, wants to venture into the Malawi market through Zuku TV as part of its strategy to grow its TV operations.
The move which is being set up at an initial cost of $10 million comes on the backdrop of Malawi’s government successful migration from analogue to digital broadcasting.
Wananchi Group CEO, Richard Alden noted, “ We are excited to unveil Zuku TV in Malawi .We believe through our compelling offering- a wide selection of entertainment channels covering news, sports, movies, documentaries and music we are inevitably contributing to the country’s digital knowledge and economy infrastructure. Our goal is to ensure the majority if not all households in the country have access to our world class digital television content at very affordable subscription charges.”
He added that, With over 105 channel options now available on Zuku TV, they will keep making it even better not only through competitive pricing but also spicing up our content in an effort to give value for money while keeping our subscribers informed and entertained.
Consumers will be treated to many of Zuku TV’s tailor-made channels such as Zuku Africa airing African content, Zuku Life airing documentaries, Zuku Sports, a first of its kind kids channel dubbed Zuku Kids that provides both entertainment and edutainment for children aged between 6 and 12 years and as well as a number of themed movie channels .
“I am pleased to note that over 13 million households in the East Africa region can access Zuku TV services and now with the launch into Malawi we are we have pushed the number to 16 million households,” Alden went on to say. Malawi now becomes the fourth country to have Zuku TV after Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania.
Wananchi group is also planning to venture into Ethiopia and Rwanda by end 2014
The Google Africa Connected competition has announced its winners at an event held in Nairobi. The competition called entrepreneurs, creatives, innovators and web-lovers to share stories of how the web has transformed their lives and work.
Out of 2200 entries from 35 countries, there were only five winners and were selected by a panel of judges as well as public voters. The winners will receive $25,000 (ZAR 260,000) each, and will also have the opportunity to work with a Google sponsor over a six-month period to further their online success.
“There are over 1 billion people living in sub-Saharan Africa and currently 16 percent of them are online. With Africa Connected, we wanted to celebrate how the web is changing lives in Africa, and show how it is contributing to the socio-economic development of the continent. Selecting the shortlist was no easy task: each winner shares a unique perspective of how they have used the internet to solve a problem, earn a living, or create opportunities, not just for themselves, but also for others around them”, says Affiong Osuchukwu, Google Lead for the Africa Connected initiative.
The winning team consists of:-
Sitawa Wafula (Kenya) – Wafula used Google Blogger to establish an award winning blog on mental health in East Africa. Wafula wants to build a physical resource centre where people can access information online and get much-needed help to manage their conditions.
Eseoghene Odiete (Nigeria) – After graduating from university, Odiete learned how to create handbags using Google Search and YouTube. With the help of contacts found via Search, over 100 blogs have featured her designs. She also runs training classes for other women who want to start businesses.
Christopher Panford (Ghana) – runs a transport company helping Ghanaian drivers access vehicle loans, which they use to earn a living. He uses Google Maps to constantly monitor the location of vehicles under bank loans. This assures banks that their loans are protected, while Panford empowers more drivers.
Eric Obuh (Nigeria) – used to be a dump site scavenger, in order to pay for studio time to record his music. After being discovered by the BBC in ‘Welcome to Lagos’, he became known around the world. Since then, he has recorded songs which he shares with new audiences on YouTube. He also uses Google+ and YouTube to raise awareness about underprivileged youngsters in the slums of Lagos, helping to raise scholarship money, and encouraging kids to stay in school.
Eunice Namirembe (Uganda) – runs The Medical Concierge Group which helps Ugandan communities’ access quality healthcare and information. Physician Namirembe has built a 24-hour ambulance call centre by using the Google Cloud console and Google Maps to record patient information and track patient locations.
Google’s Affiong Oschukwu said that there were many more inspiring stories and the company has hosted 21 of them in their website. To access them one can go to www.africaconnected.com.
In an effort to invest in the future success of all the finalists, Google also surprised the remaining five success stories by awarding them $10,000 each to help grow their ventures and initiatives for greater social and economic impact. Recipients included; Tim McGuire (South Africa), Nqobizitha Mlilo (Zimbabwe), Mayowa Adegbile (Nigeria), Lamine Mbengue (Senegal) and Steve Kyenze (Kenya). Back
Microsoft has rolled out updated Windows Phone software with voice-search features and offering it for free to manufacturers of smartphones and tablets.
The software giant’s move is in a quest to catch up with Apple and Google mobile devices considering Windows phones have had minimal attention in today’s market both in mobile gadgets and tablets. The offer will apply to devices with screens less than 9 inches.
The updates for Windows 8.1 include a voice-controlled digital assistant called cortana similar to Apple’s Siri and will be available for all over the coming months. Also available will be separate updates for laptops, larger tablets and desktop PCs, reinstates the start menu that was infamously axed in Windows 8 and will roll out as a free update starting April 8.
“Microsoft is facing challenges on the mobile and tablet fronts and need to change their strategy to move the growth needle, this is a good and logical first step,”said Capital markets analyst.
The new Cortana fully replaces the search feature on Windows phone. Developers outside Microsoft can write their own apps for cortana since the voice controlled digital assistant can learn about consumers from their searches, keep track of people they interact with and set up an inner circle of the most important people and who can contact users during the times of day they set as ‘quiet hours’.
The program can be used to start a Skype call, add a TV show to the user’s Hulu queue or check a friends facebook post.
Microsoft said apps across all its consumer platforms can now be universal meaning they will run across smartphones, tablets and PCs with little to no re-coding.
Mobile subscriber Safaricom has officially withdrawn from Essar’s mobile company Yu purchase not long after the regulator gave the two contenders conditional ownership.
Chief Executive Officer Bob colymore has echoed the move saying the dominating telecommunications company was out of the race to acquire the assets by the time the market regulator set tough conditions for the deal.
Mr Collymore put it clear that the company had been studying the conditions to make a decision whether to get back with the deal or not and did not back out once the regulator put the conditions on the table. “The decision we must make is whether to come back or not,” this was after he declared no interest last week.
The conditions include paying 5.4 million fee for Yu’s license also with it the two telecoms were required to share infrastructure as well as take care of customer money transfer services and SIM registrations. Safaricom also differs with the condition set for them to open up its M-pesa agency network to rivals Airtel, Telkom Kenya Orange and the newly licensed mobile virtual network operators, in which it sort clarification also questioning whether CAK had properly exercised its mandate on the matter considering it directly falls under the purview of the treasury.
The decision comes after the three mobile service companies held a meeting to discuss over the conditions set by the Communications Association of Kenya.
Airtel on the other hand wants to know whether it is required to pay the amount now or wait until next year when it is required to renew its current license acquired from Zain in 2010 even after Airtel CEO Mr Taneja said the conditions are tough and the decisions on them will not be made fast.
Now left for Safaricom to give final decision after looking into opening up the mobile money facility, the company still insists it has taken them years of investment and large amounts of money to build on it to easily give in to the condition.
Third largest U.S carrier will no longer sell Blackberry phones after April 25 after an ugly war of words over marketing snafu.
It all started out as a war of words has eventually resulted to a permanent separation between the two companies having the technology company not to renew T-Mobile’s license that expires on the 25th.
“Blackberry has had a positive relationship with T-Mobile for many years, regretfully at this time , our strategies are not complementary and we must act in the best interest of our BlackBerry customers, we hope to work with T-Mobile again in the future when our business strategies are aligned,” said CEO, BlackBerry, John Chen.
The mobile carrier was evicted after the smartphone manufacturer called it out since T-Mobile was trying to convince its customers to switch to iPhones. BlackBerry’s market share has in the recent past dropped incredibly having very low smartphone activations.
The breakup could however turn out positive to T-Mobile considering just like any other carrier, the company must pay a ‘service access fee to BlackBerry for every one for the company’s phones its sells. It was earlier easy to take in since blackberry was the worlds dominating mobile maker but even after the fee reduction, its still not as profitable.
Mozilla co-founder CEO Brendan Eich has resigned after he came under fire this week for donating to a campaign to ban gay marriage in Carlifonia.
The now ex-Chief Executive Office was elected executive on March 24, donated $1000 for the successful proposition 8 ballot measure that passed in the November 2008 state election. After former CEO Jay Sullivan left the company to pursue new opportunities next having Mr Eich proposed as new head which was followed by a resignation of three Mozilla directors.
OKCupid also protested by refusing to allow users to run the dating website with the Firefox browser after the sites spokesman pointed out lack of equal rights consideration for individuals and partnerships.
“Mozilla prides itself on being held to different standard and, this past week, we did not live up to it. We know why people are hurt and angry, and they are right: its because we haven’t stayed true to ourselves.” said executive chairwoman Mitchell Baker.
Launched in 2011 by Nnamdi Chineme, Nigeria Property Centre, a real estate and property website in Nigeria with property listings for sale, rent and lease has today launched a house housing competition dubbed house hunting Naija that will see a winner walk home with over N 300,000.
The competition looks at the best house hunting stories by users so far on how long it took them to find the houses they were looking for, how they found it , who they dealt with among other details in a more fun and engaging way like this one here.
All the users have to do is blog about their own or a friend’s house-hunting experience on his or her website or blog. Tell the guys at Nigeria Property Centre if he or she has ever used or planning to use the site and or just drop a comment on the entry on their website or drop a comment on any participating blog. Participants can also email them their experience to competitions@nigeriapropertycentre.com or send a link competitions@nigeriapropertycentre.com by the 30th of April.
Apart from the winner walking home with N30,000, the first 3 runner ups will receive N6,000, N2,500 and N1,500 respectively while the first 10 bloggers to send an entry will each receive N1000 recharge card of their choice
Offering Nigerian property seekers an easy way to find details of property in Nigeria like homes, houses, lands, shops, office spaces and other commercial properties to buy or rent, the site looks like it wants to use the competition to raise awareness and sign up more users. This will help it take on the proliferation of sites in the country such as Private Property Nigeria, Nasper’s Property24, Rocket Internet’s Lamudi and new comers like Lotpool mong others.
Nigeria Property Centre boast of up-to-date property information which available for free, an increasing number of properties and depth of detail on each property.
PRESS RELEASE: SEACOM has said today that it has chosen Juniper and Cisco to provide their latest technology for a complete upgrade of the SEACOM global IP & MPLS network.
The network equipment upgrade is all part of SEACOM’s continuing commitment to provide its customers with the latest services and capabilities as part of a resilient, high quality network platform. Coupled with investments in diverse backbone network elements, this enables SEACOM’s customers to offer faster and more reliable Internet services to African and global businesses and consumers.
The deployment of the new service platform will enable SEACOM to provide a wider range of Ethernet-driven products and services to network operators and service providers. It will also give SEACOM the ability to accelerate the adoption and integration of IPv6 for its customers, in a world where global IPv4 addresses have run out. The new network will also allow SEACOM to leverage its strong Ethernet offering, to further enhance its award-winning Remote Peering service across Africa, Europe, the Asia Pacific and North America.
Mark Tinka, Head of Engineering at SEACOM says, “The combination of Juniper and Cisco offers us the right set of technologies to create Africa’s most advanced and progressive IP/MPLS network. These two vendors meet our strict technical requirements as well as our expectations for affordable cost-per-port and cost per-bit metrics. And most importantly, this new infrastructure is 100% Ethernet-focused, which will be great for our customers in having the confidence and flexibility to very easily deploy, scale and grow their networks and services.”
Tinka continues to say that “the new network will further offer us improved levels of operational efficiency and scalability, easing administration and providing a growth path for the future. We will easily be able to scale our IP/MPLS network up to Terabits of capacity and more, giving us plenty of headroom for growth.”
SEACOM will be supporting and promoting Ethernet as the connectivity option of choice for African and global service providers and operators. With SEACOM’s backbone, customers will be able to gain access to Gigabit, 10-Gigabit and 100-Gigabit Ethernet ports at affordable prices, with the ability to dynamically enjoy more bandwidth on demand when they need it.
In addition, the new network will extend the availability of native IPv6 services to all customers, as well as provide translated IPv6-to-IPv4 services for customers who cannot secure additional IPv4 addresses from AFRINIC, says Tinka. “Our new network will offer substantial advantages to anyone looking to do business on carrier-class Ethernet, IP and MPLS infrastructure between Africa and the rest of the world. These new investments will allow us to offer higher-quality services to our customers, so that they, in turn, can provide high quality services to their users within and outside Africa.”
Kenya’s Nakuru town has become the first Kenyan town and the third in Africa after Kigali, Rwanda and Cape Town, South Africa to provide free Wi-Fi to its residents in Africa. Though the town becomes the first in the country to do so, it is the sixteenth globally.
The free Wi-Fi is an initiative of Orange Kenya, Infonet and the Nakuru County Government and the Statehouse Digital team.
In its first phase the Wi-Fi will work with a 10 kilometre radius covering Nakuru Town’s Central Business District (CBD) around the clock. The unlimited data usage connected to seven base stations spread across the CBD will however block movie downloads and visits to adult sites. The county government says it will extend the service to other other parts of Nakuru progressively.
Mickael Ghossein, Orange Kenya CEO says that the provision of free wireless Internet to the counties across the country, will help in making the counties more accessible for business, as well as assist the county governments to improve their service offering through integrated ICT solutions.
The initiative is in line with Orange’s strategy of enhancing the use of its infrastructure to offer value added Data & Voice solutions to the counties.
On-demand taxi service Easy Taxi, has launched nearly free taxi rides in Lagos for the month of April to make Monday the best day of the week.
Dubbed ‘Moving Monday’ the affordable month long promotion will take place on the 7th, 14th, 21st and 28th April, and Easy Taxi customers will be able to request a free taxi ride between 7:00am to 5:00pm worth N3,000 anywhere in Lagos with a simple touch of their smartphone.
In a statement, Bankole Cardoso, CEO of Easy Taxi Nigeria says ‘the creation of Moving Monday will open up the Easy Taxi service to all Lagosians, introducing to them an easier, faster and safer way to get around the city whilst also offering them the convenience of hailing a cab from the comfort of their own home or office.’
Now live in Abuja and going live in Nairobi in a few days, Easy Taxi is simple to use, one downloads the free mobile app, registers and then requests for a ride quickly and easily from a licensed driver. It may be Monday, but Easy Taxi can still get you up and moving!
