January | 2012

ICT Hubs: Assessing the Impact of African ICT Hubs to the Entrepreneurs

Over the past few months, iHub research has been developing a framework around their in-house ICT Hubs project to initiate a research series that will dis-aggregate the unique factors that make up ICT hubs/labs model in Africa (Afrilabs). The series will also have a special focus on the role of ICT hubs in fostering innovative entrepreneurship.

Opportunities are opening up for young people with high tech skills such as software engineering, design, and development. Many of these skills are being nurtured in the Information Communication (ICT) hubs, where technology-oriented individuals gather and collaborate. Unfortunately, little inquiry has been done to understand the various factors which make up an ICT hub model and how such factors are useful to the entrepreneurs in the space. Most important, there has been little assessment of how African hubs/labs have been of significance to the different categories of members in the space. These categories of members will vary in the different Hubs used in this study.

The study aims to understand the following questions:

1. What impact does the hub have on the individual’s development in the different membership categories?

2. What impact does the hub have on the individual’s start-up?

3. What is the significance of the hub community to the individual start-up?

4. What are the most important factors which makes the members continue to use the space?

The main objective of the project is to:

1) Study what factors make up the ICT Hubs model;

2) Understand the entrepreneurs/start-ups in the ICT Hubs through a representative sample size representing the different membership tiers;

3) Assess the impact of the Hub based on the different memberships categories.

iHub Research will use mixed-methods to assess the impact of hubs on members. Qualitative and quantitative methods will be used including: direct observation, focus-group discussions, and semi-structured interviews in 15 Hubs/Labs around Africa.Based on the data collected through focus group discussions, workshop findings, and e-survey results, a visual report will be produced that illustrates the impact of the hubs on the members. In the following months, iHub Research will regularly report on this project’s progress project through this blog. We always welcome your comments and support!

By: Hilda Moraa

27-01-2012

Community Entrepreneurship iHub iHub-Research Start-Ups Uncategorized

How to nurture entrepreneurs and stimulate innovation

Open innovation is key to the success of iHub and can change the working culture of any community of innovators,………

iHub is a network and meeting place that enables Kenya’s innovators to bring their ideas to fruition. Through iHub, the technology community, industry, academia, investors and venture capitalists can meet, share ideas and collaborate.The centre is the first of its kind to operate in Kenya. It allows technologies to progress from the ideas stage to becoming real products and the key to its effectiveness is open innovation — the process of combining internal and external ideas, as well as internal and external paths to market, to advance the development of new technologies.

iHub has embraced the principles of open innovation by nurturing an enabling environment and a collaborative space where a community of technology entrepreneurs can grow and share ideas. This process can change the working culture of any technology hub and stimulate its capacity to create innovative products.

Open innovation

iHubs works by embracing principles of open innovation. They are driven by members who work together on common interests. Through the space provided by iHub, members develop the skills they need to turn their ideas into actions: they build a vivid vision, a team and a business plan, with help from an in-house business unit. The dynamic synergy created by these interactions is what fuels the community as a whole.

Membership is open and free to those who work in programming, design or research. There are three levels of membership: ‘white’ members are those who wish to be part of the iHub community virtually, but cannot be physically present; those who work on specific projects (‘green’ members) can have face-to-face meetings, socialise, and surf the web; ‘red’ membership offers a semi-permanent desk and priority to use the meeting room, for a monthly fee.

Internet connectivity is often a core part of supporting start-up development. The electronic arts brand Zuku has provided iHub with affordable, high-speed Internet, which helps to accelerate collaborations among members.

With its institutional values of integrity and community, entrepreneurism, quality and continual improvement, iHub offers a welcoming, open and happy environment where members can share experience, skills and friendship.

The collaborative space facilitates open discussions among young entrepreneurs, investors, potential business partners, mentors and other members experienced in working with telecommunication companies such as Google and Nokia.

Sharing knowledge is vital; an isolated community of people in a hub, looked after by a privileged few, will not survive for long. A knowledge-sharing culture built up through collaboration, start-ups helping each other, skill sharing and mentorship are key features of the iHub community.

At an individual level, iHub members strive to improve their skills and knowledge about relevant issues or current trends by engaging with the resources available through the open innovation space, such as education events and mentorship from experts within the community.

Innovations taken to market

Several innovations have arisen out of the iHub model of collaboration.

M-Farm was invented by young Kenyan Jamila Abass. It is a mobile-phone service that delivers real-time information to farmers on current market prices, weather alerts and agro-supplies in their area. It also brings farmers together to buy or sell their products in groups, helping them to gain access to larger markets.

M-Farm enables farmers to carry out a cost-benefit analysis before deciding where to sell their products. The analysis is based on the profile of their business, as well as market prices in different countries. It also answers their queries through the interactive voice response function, with voice controls in both English and Swahili.

Innovations such as the eLimu tablet computer are helping Kenyan primary school students to improve their test scores and IT literacy. This is intended to boost their engagement in learning and promote responsible citizenship for sustainable development through education in environmental conservation, applied science, agriculture and human rights.

The eLimu tablet has a simple design and includes features such as 3-D animations to help students understand complex ideas, games to strengthen cognitive thinking, quizzes and access to online Q&A forums with teachers.

The accounting package Uhasibu helps small and medium-sized enterprises to work within Kenya’s legislation and procedures. For a small subscription fee, the online application can be used to generate VAT reports, monitor petty cash and keep track of payments without buying expensive financial management software.

The open innovation process adopted by iHub is not just a powerful tool, but a choice to engage in the 21st century in an entirely different way. It is about co-working, using ideas and knowledge from both within and outside the community, and creating paths to market for new technologies.

By: Simeon Oriko

25-01-2012

Events iHub

Mobile Monday January: Dr. Zhen Liu

Join us on Monday 30th January from 6 pm for the first Mobile Monday event this year.

The session will be a presentation by Dr. Zhen Liu, Head of Nokia Research Centre Growth Economies Lab, which has research teams in Beijing, Shenzhen, Bangalore and Nairobi.

Before joining Nokia, Zhen was with IBM T. J. Watson Research Center and served as the manager of System Analysis and Optimization group, and the senior manager of the Next Generation Distributed Systems department, and was a master inventor at IBM. Prior to this experience, Zhen worked in Orange Labs (formerly France Telecom R&D) as a Research Associate, and in INRIA (the French national research center on information and automation), first as a Researcher, then became a Research Director.

To attend this event, please register here: http://momokejan12.eventbrite.com

For more information check out:

By: John Kieti

24-01-2012

Applications Community Entrepreneurship iHub m:lab

Samsung Apps – Diversifying Local App Distribution Options

The surge in Samsung’s smart-phone marketshare in 2011 may have surprised many. Earlier in 2011, the device manufacturer also surprised many when it announced 100 million downloads from its applications store, only a couple of months after opening. As TechCrunch’s John Biggs explains, the surprises may not be reducing soon for those who are not watching keenly. It is in this series of surprises that the local mobile applications developer in East Africa might want to watch for emerging opportunities.

To many owners of Samsung handheld devices, there is an almost mysterious menu option in their devices labelled “Samsung Apps”. It is one of the device manufacturer’s way of extending the features of their devices through software applications. It is intended to be a way of enriching the user’s experience throughout their ownership of the device. Samsung calls it “making smartphones smarter”. Other device manufacturers including Nokia and Apple have slightly older and perhaps more established applications stores of a similar nature. It is this not so old phenomenon of application marketplaces fronted by device manufacturers, operating system vendors, mobile network operators and other independent players that presents software developers with new avenues for distributing and commercialising their applications.

Samsung Apps (www.samsungapps.com) is the consumer electronics giant’s marketplace targeted at applications not only running on their mobile devices but also on their new wave of Smart TVs. Samsung Apps Seller office (seller.samsungapps.com) is the app store’s section for developers to register applications and to configure how the applications are to be accessed by consumers. For some reason, developers may not configure their apps to be bought by consumers in Kenya on Samsung apps. When asked about this, the Samsung Kenya office promises that they are looking at introducing the possibility for consumers to pay for downloaded apps in Kenya come July 2012.

The prospect of developers selling their apps to Kenyan device owners is perhaps not as significant as the opportunity Samsung Apps presents to local mobile entrepreneurs to diversify distribution channels for their applications. Opening an account to distribute apps on Samsung Apps is free – no amount is charged. This is different from other marketplaces such as the Android Market, Ovi Store and Apple’s App store.

The main pain point for local developers may not necessarily be the absolute amount charged as registration fees to publish in these marketplaces. It is the limited payment methods such as credit cards relevant for other advanced economies that are constraints to local developers publishing their applications. Samsung’s applications store therefore becomes a better “cost” saver. Of course for now, this advantage is relevant only to developers with apps whose commercialization method is not “paid downloads”. Other commercialization methods not based on “paid downloads” include using advertisement, sponsorship and in-app purchase options.

According to Samsung’s Kenya office, once a locally developed application is loaded onto the store successfully, it becomes a candidate to be featured in their traditional and mainstream marketing channels within Kenya. This potentially allows the local developer to ride on the consumer electronics giant’s marketing budget that runs in the millions of Kenya Shillings. It may be that Samsung Apps is currently not the most popular destination for consumers downloading mobile apps for android. However, considering that for most locally developed apps, their local uptake is rather dismal, the mere prospect of being able to ride on a giant’s local budget for mainstream media marketing promotion is worth pursuing.

It is commonly observed that local apps published in android market become obscure and unreachable in the competition for global visibility. If distribution channels such as Samsung Apps can master the art of highlighting locally developed, locally relevant and high quality apps in devices used within the region, that would endear their marketplace to both developers and consumers in the region. With Samsung now promising to build the “Richest African App Store”, applications developers and devices owners can only wait and see how competition among applications distribution platforms evolve in their favour.

For now, developers interested in diversifying their app distribution channels using Samsung Apps may want to watch this video on how to promote their app in the marketplace.

By: Leo Mutuku

24-01-2012

Applications Community Creatives Entrepreneurship iHub

Help! I’m a developer with no clue about design (e-book)

6 and a 1⁄2 practical design tips for developers with no access to designers

There is no doubt about the level of talent that exists here in terms of development of apps and sites. Locally developed apps are trying to be competitive not only in the Kenyan market but also elsewhere in Africa and in the world. Many developers are embracing User Experience (UX) and other design elements as part of the whole application and site development process.

Expert designers and UX pros may not come cheap and some devs are forced to tackle the design elements by themselves. So what if you are quite clueless about design aspects to be incorporated in the development of your app/site? Fret not! Andrew Mugoya of afriapps has written a short e-book with 6 (and a half) practical tips to you and similar developers who may not be able to engage the services of a designer.

An excerpt from the e-book reads:

So you’ve realised you need to learn something about good design?

Let’s face it, without a killer design*, your app has little to no hope. But a killer design requires access to killer designers. And they don’t come cheap. Even if you could afford them, they are not exactly short of work, sitting around waiting for your moment of app inspiration.

So what do you do? You do what you’ve always done; you design it yourself! But you’ve learnt from bitter experience that your design skills are, to put it mildly, horrible. Thats where these tips come in. They won’t make you a killer designer, but they’ll help you avoid being a killer bad one. They’ll stop you from embarrassing yourself and give your app a fighting chance. Think of them as rules to help you simply fit in rather than stand out due to bad design.

Yes, users won’t be attracted to your app for its design. But those that come across it won’t be put off from checking it out because of the design either.

You can download the e-book here

By: Simeon Oriko

23-01-2012

Community

Lend some Unreasonable Support to M-Farm!

Fighting to stick with your New Year’s resolution diet plan already? Here’s a tip: instead of those two large mocha Frappuccinos with extra whipped cream you’d buy this week, why not take that $10 and sponsor the ladies at M-Farm as they work to improve the world, one Kenyan farmer at a time? Your waistline, and a small corner of East Africa will thank you for it.

M-Farm, an agribusiness and ICT company, is one of the startups that came out of the iHub in 2010.

This year has kickstarted well for the M-Farm team. They are a finalist for the Unreasonable Institute , an Institute that arms entrepreneurs creating solutions to the world’s biggest social and environmental problems with the mentorship, capital, and networks they need to do so.

100s of Entrepreneurs from 60 countries are competing for 25 spots at the Unreasonable Institute. They have so far narrowed it down to 50 finalists and the 1st 25 to raise $10,000 USD will be accepted!

Contesting entrepreneurs are not allowed to pay but are instead challenged to raise that $10,000 from hundreds or thousands of supporters on the Unreasonable Marketplace .

The Marketplace provides the Finalists the chance to demonstrate their entrepreneurial mettle, by challenging them to mobilize the support of hundreds of people around the world. Their reward? Working with 50-world class mentors ranging from HP’s CTO Phil McKinney to Paul Polak, who’s enabled over 19 million farmers to move out of poverty, forging relationships with 20 impact investment funds, pitching to one hundred investors, getting 6-weeks of food and lodging, and building an ever-growing network of fellow Unreasonable entrepreneurs for the rest of their lives without having to pay a dime.

The teams hands, since they can’t pay for themselves, are tied but yours are not. Please sponsor them to be Unreasonable this year! Of course we are not expecting you to give anything more than what your heart, mind and pockets can kindly offer,but we do believe in the power of networks and generosity!

Apart from contributing you can support them as well by finding 9 more friends to contribute $10(or less) each. Visit https://marketplace.unreasonableinstitute.org/project/m-farm/

Crowd Sourced Funding using M-PAYER

Mfarm are currently incubated at m:lab East Africa. In the Kenyan spirit of pulling together, Zege Technologies, another m:lab incubatee is supporting mfarm to crowdsource contributions payments via M-Pesa. To use Zege Technologies’ M-Payer service to contribute, you may simply pay to the M-Pesa paybill number 531300 giving “MFARM” as the account name.

By: wanjiku

23-01-2012

Community Events

iHub ladies soccer team

In the last two year, we have discovered that iHub folks have several talents coding, designing, entrepreneurship and sports. For the longest time, the foosball table was the only avenue for demonstrating football prowess, until the male soccer team was constituted. They have gone on to beat teams like Nokia, Kibera etc…

Not to be left behind, the ladies have come together and formed a team, well, we are only four now but we are hoping to have a team and at least three subs, and a coach. Thats 15.

Led by @mariegithinji who has had huge success at the foosball table, the team is hoping to recruit in various positions. I know the number of female supporters of the English, Spanish and Kenyan leagues have risen but am hoping that apart from admiring the nicely chiseled footballer bodies, we can get to emulate them

For instance, I am a great supporter of midfield general Patrick Vieira, which means that no. 4 will be my preferred playing position but I guess thats because I can never play as well as Dennis Bergkamp, Arsenal’s last decent no. 10.

You do not need to know the position, you can just come play for fun, and you might just discover that you have a talent, although it might be late to go pro We hope to play other companies or a team from wherever but we are not getting ahead of ourselves, its just for fun so please come

We will be training on Mondays at Baraton University field, just behind iHub. We will be training together with the male team. Be there on January 30th, but first you have to register here for planning purposes.

See you then

By: Jessica Colaco

22-01-2012

Applications Community Entrepreneurship iHub Members Start-Ups

Press release: SMS ordering: New feature in Myorder Enterprise

PRESS RELEASE – You can download the press release here

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – 22nd January 2012, Nairobi, Kenya

Weza Tele is a visionary firm that leverages on technologies such as, USSD, Mobile Web, and SMS to provide order management, distribution, tracking, circulation and validation solutions. Weza Tele also offers reliable customer service, support and maintenance to its clients.

Myorder Enterprise provides a tailored, deployed solution that automates order management, tracking and validation across the enterprise. At its center is a dashboard where distributors and customers, manage inventory, generate reports, and view performance trends.

SMS ordering: New feature in Myorder Enterprise

According to the CCK Kenya latest report (2012), there are 27 million mobile subscribers, SMS per subscribers per month growing by 125% from 8.5 SMS as at June 2011 to 18.99 SMS at September 2011.

Weza Tele has tapped into this market by developing an SMS-based ordering service for its clients that they are currently working with in the industries of publications, cosmetics, beverages, grocery & food stores as they strive to reach their vendors and end-users with an easier way for them to order from their simple phones. It is easy to use and integrate into your current sales process and the service consists of 3 simple steps:

Register
Order your items
Orders confirmed

How does the SMS ordering service work?

For End Users

The system enables registered customers to send in orders in a simple and memorable format. This works from a basic phone with no need for an Internet connection. Every item on a catalogue a code is assigned that further simplifies the ordering process. We translate the codes, calculate the total price, and send you an electronic confirmation with your order details & prices.

Our software also has built in error correction mechanisms. For instance, if you incorrectly type in your order information, then the system is able to automatically correct that and figure out what you meant to type. It then sends you an sms confirmation before your order is further processed.

For Distributors

At the heart of the software is a simple and well-designed dashboard. This enables you, as a seller, to manage customer information, orders, prices, products, reports and recipients with control rights. You can also periodically receive orders by email, formatted as Excel spreadsheet with customizable fields you would want to see.

Benefits:

● Ease of use — No special equipment needed hence more flexibility when ordering. Works with any mobile telephone that can send Text messages (SMS) or email.

● Fast — simplifies the process for both customer and retailer, as the customer avoids the likelihood of being held in a phone queue and the retailer gets structured, aggregated orders from time to time.

● Low Cost — Affordable operational costs. Free registration.

● Convenience – Buyers send from their mobile phones and receive SMS notifications to confirm orders.

● Simplicity: There is no hardware or software to install so that in a matter of minutes its up and running.

For more information contact :

Sam Kitonyi

CTO, Wezatele

Email: apopheniac@gmail.com

Mobile Number: +254 710 742 134

By: Leo Mutuku

22-01-2012

Conferences Events iHub-Research

CALL FOR PARTICIPATION: 2012 Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing

The 12th annual Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing (GHC) has opened its Call for Participation. The annual conference, presented by the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology, is the world’s largest gathering of women in computing. The Grace Hopper Celebration will take place from October 3 – 6, 2012 at the Baltimore Convention Center in Baltimore, Maryland. This year’s theme ”Are We There Yet?” recognizes that technology and the culture of technology are continuously evolving but there are also concrete goals we are striving to achieve.

At the Grace Hopper Celebration, leading researchers present their current work while special sessions focus on the role of women in today’s technology fields, including computer science, information technology, research and engineering. The technical conference features well known keynote speakers and invited technical speakers, panels, workshops, new investigator technical papers, PhD forums, technical posters, birds of a feather sessions, the ACM Student Research Competition and an Awards Celebration. The attendees who range from students to executives use this global platform to get inspired, stay on top of emerging trends, learn and network

IMPORTANT DATES

* Deadline for submission of Program Abstract: Friday, March 16th 2012

* Notifications: Thursday, May 17th 2012

* Registration Opens: Friday, June 1st 2012

* Deadline for submission of Final Program Content: Monday, June 25th 2012

* Conference Dates: Oct 3rd-6th 2012

SESSION TRACKS

Submissions are being accepted in the following tracks:

* Birds of a Feather (BOFs)

* New Investigators Papers

* Panels, Workshops and Presentations

* PhD Forum

* Posters and SRC Posters

* Social Collaboration Track

* Women of Underrepresented Groups Track

GUIDELINES

Given the diverse audience at the Grace Hopper Celebration, please review the following guidelines prior to submitting content:

1. Your subject should not be something specific to your organization.

2. If you have a panel, the panelists need to span across organizations, institutions and/or companies, with a panel limit of five people including the moderator. Cross-organizational or interdisciplinary discussions are highly encouraged.

3. We encourage submissions that promote diverse and international participation.

4. Avoid anything that sounds like an infomercial.

5. Download the proposal template and use it to structure your proposal. This provides necessary information in a consistent format for the reviewers. We have also provided two samples of successful proposals from previous GHC conferences.

* Template: http://gracehopper.org/2012/assets/GHC-2012-Proposal-Template.doc

* Sample 1: http://gracehopper.org/2011/assets/Sample-Proposal-1.pdf

* Sample 2: http://gracehopper.org/2011/assets/Sample-Proposal-2.pdf

6. We encourage submissions in line with the theme of the conference “Are we there yet?” in the areas of innovation within a company, from academia, or from individual contributors. Technical submissions that discuss the present and future state of technologies are encouraged. For example: Are we there leading technology companies? Are we there creating technology trends? How are we encouraging our girls in Math & Science? Are we there breaking stereotypes?

The organizing committees will review all abstracts submitted to the conference on the basis of a set of criteria including the quality of the submission and its relevance to this conference, originality and scope of the subject matter.

For complete guidelines on submissions for each session track see http://gracehopper.org/2012/participate/call-for-participation/

The Grace Hopper Celebration is a program of the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology.

http://gracehopper.org/

http://anitaborg.org/

adopted from: http://gracehopper.org/2012/participate/call-for-participation/

By: Simeon Oriko

22-01-2012

Community Events

Celebrating the Systers Community

It has been said that the twenty first century is witnessing the ever increasing role of science and technology in all aspects of life be it culture, business, education, politics, to mention a few. Sadly, it has also been noted that women do not have a strong presence in these two fields yet they offer solutions for many global problems. As such, this has been a cause for alarm for a long period of time, and many initiatives have been established to eliminate this problem.

In 1987, renowned computer scientist Anita Borg founded the Systers online community in the spirit of broadly promoting the interests of women in the fields of computing and technology. This was long before online community was part of the mainstream. Systers provides a private space to seek advice from peers and discuss challenges faced as women in technology. It has created an enviroment in which women work more conducive for continued participation in the field. Today, Systers is recognised as the largest email community of technical women in computing, with over 3000 members in at least 54 countries globally.

Every year, Systers members gather in their respective areas worldwide in a forum to discuss technology, challenges they face and to support each other, in what is known as Systers global meetups. This year, in January 28, 2012, it shall be no different. Nairobi Systers event will be held at the Ihub from 2.00 – 4.00 pm to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Systers community. The event will be hosted by the Akirachix and Afriwit (African Women in Technology), ihub and Google. Technical women of all ages are invited to the event as the systers celebrate themselves and commemorate Anita Borg for including all women in the technological revolution- not just as bystanders, but active participants and leaders.

This event aims to bring together girls and women from high school, university, colleges and in industry to network and build relationships. We hope that these loose connections will be the start of greater endeavors among the women.So if you are a woman in Tech don’t miss out on the opportunity to network with the fellow women in tech community.