They say, the best time to have planted a tree was 20 years ago and the next best time is now.

So far we know 18 unis local and international want to set base in Konza is it vital that something should be done?

Can someone somewhere in this project come up with real figures and numbers instead of dreams.

My view since the first time I posted was that Juja would be perfect for ICT growth. KU and JKuat have proven that they have what it takes to buck the trend and go for new age ideas.

The history of the best cities in the world has shown that human capital is essential in city growth and sustainability. Silicon valley for IT skills, Hollywood for actors, Boston for Finance, New York as a harbor, Nairobi as Finance, London for trade etc

So what is Konza?

I argue that Juja, Ngong Road have already started the path towards ICT. Yet, the ict board has seen it fit to ignore these ict entreprenuers, history and facts in the pursuit of a dream.

This will be the first human experiment where you move whole industries from where they started to another place simply because the buildings did not have fire hydrants.

Like I have said, I will be here in 2030 with my kaplot in Konza. But I'm hundred percent sure that the next google will be somewhere in Zimmerman. My expensive kaplot will be in Konza.

Can u picture juja in the year 2030 with google africa head quarters in the middle of those cracking unplanned apartments

@eboomerang probably its you who has no clue what you talking about! if you think you know better why don't you say what you think you know stop behaving like the whole world ends in your mind!

We have had a very lengthy discussion here in wazua related to this Konza City project under a thread titled "Konza city Reality."

First things first, I have a lot of admiration and respect for Dr Bitange and Mr Mugo and all others who are pioneering these projects. They have atleast seen some light and created the confidence in the country that it is all possible if we commit to work for the good of the nation.

Having said that, I have a bit of challenges in agreeing with the bigger picture they are pursuing.

As rightly mentioned here, if you trully and sincerely understand how the ICT industry works, you would agree that they are totally missing the target. It is rather ironical that the discussion is purely being focused on infrastructure and real eastate.

Software development can be considered to be labor intensive (highly skilled labour) and that is the key factor of production in that sector.

I heard Dr Bitange mention that they new city will create 200,000 jobs. To me that figure is highly debatable if not plain wrong. I'll take a sample of only a few companies and the number of their employees.

-Microsoft has 55,002 employees in the US and 92,000 world wide.
-Qualcomm has 12,520 employess in US and about 4000 out of US.
-Intel has 45,400 in US and 37 125 out of US.

Total revenue of these companies = 138,9 Billion dollars (microsoft $69.94B, Qualcomm $14.96B, Intel $54.0B). I've not even taken Apple and others into account.

-Tata Consulting Services in India has 226,751 employees. TCS' revenue is $7.57 Billion

The three US companies directly employ 112,922 people in the US and have a cumulative revenue of $138,9 Billion. Tata Consulting employs 226,751 people locally in India with reported revenues of $7 Billion.

The US is a developed market with extremely highly skilled engineers. India on the other hand has a large supply of engineers (over 20 million) who we can say have some level of skills but not at par with the US. This explains the discrepancy on the revenues. Either way India has been able to draw investors based on this talent pool.

Now, Dr Bitange where are you hoping to get these 200,000 skilled people in ICT related matters to fill that city?

Will you import them?

This is a case where we are putting the cart before the horse.

Fine, the city will not start with 200K people but will gradually grow to that number, in otherwords you will have empty buildings waiting to be occupied over a period of time, right?

I have said this before, that the rate with which we are building infrastructure does not at all compare with the rate we are producing talent. I stand to be corrected; most of those people creating apps are self educated in application development, if not they are coming from abroad.

How I wish we were saying that by 2030 we will have a single world standard university, notice the challenge is to have just one globally competitive university by 2030. Did you see that the govt is planning to close down KARI (Kenya Agricultural Research Institute)? This in a country whose economy is more than half supported by Agriculture, my friend we needs to get real and serious.

-->What skills do you think are lacking in ICT sector because it comprises of so many areas?I think all manner of skills are lacking. Remember I'm looking at the national level, not 200 - 300 people sitting in a building developing apps.

On the other hand, can you please enlighten me and name for me the skills Kenya has in ICT in the various areas?

@murchr I agree ICT is not just about apps. But alot of decisions affecting ICT are not necessarily ICt related.
Political, self interested decisions like Konza affect ict directly.

Can any Wazuan who understands the motivation behind Konza convince me why a company like Samsung or HP would set up shop in Konza and not in the several other global alternatives they have.
ICT grows locally then the multinationals and the big boys follow, and that is the case for all innovative things, disruptive economics are marshaled by startups and the big players catch up through m&a. Look at ICT in India for example, did Microsoft and SAP preceed the Indian programmer or was the programmer the reason MSFT and SAP set up shop there ?
The same applies to Silicon Valley, it's the environment that makes it possible to find the human capital required and thats why investments flow there.

The govt needs to focus on developing human capital within the ICT discipline and leave the rest to the private sector. Paternalistic government activity is a hotbed for corruption and socialist idealism that never materializes. We don't need that! let the govt facilitate, we will innovate.