I don't think I'm a starter when it comes to this industry, I probably know more than you would expect. You can refer to the following thread and comment #7 if you want a reference: thread

Also watch the following video and see the kind premises where companies like Google, Paypal, Logitech all started off -a tiny squashed office: Video

Google only has kym's working in Kenya the others were fired recently since they were not up to the task. In fact, some google employees don't even consider google kenya to be part of Google.

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That is exactly what they think of our "talented" Kenyans and its worse, I just withheld the other comments.


I keep on saying that until we get our heads out of our butts thinking that we are that good, then we shall never be the best.

If the attitide of the ICT board is what murchr has to offer then I can categorically say without doubt that Konza as an ICT project will fail miserably.

I will give you a plain example of what I mean by lack of capital. This is a real story and you can look for me to references if you wish.

Company A is a Kenyan company. They try to get gov't contracts but they are told they are not qualified ( I remember Ndemo saying this in a public forum somewhere and shook my head). They then decide that they will die if they concentrate on getting Kenyan clients.

So Company A decides to market their products and services outside the country. They hit it big.

They decide in the spirit of helping Kenya to hire Kenyans. They can't find any that are qualified to do the work. After 6 months of training, hiring etc they have to accept that Kenya does not have the manpower to deal with the work load.

Meanwhile, their workload doubles. So they are forced to hire Filipinos to do the work.

This company with revenues of over $40,000 in 6 months has exactly 4 Kenyans working for it and 25 filipinos. All their money is offshore accounts and they live in an SQ (the part of SQ is by choice)

They still can't get a loan from a Kenyan bank. They can't get a gov't project since they aren't qualified. They can't repatriate their cash to Kenya since simple things like online banking have been ignored for Konza.

This is a true story Murchr. It is one of 4 I know about. Of course they don't come for your "ict meetups" coz they are busy doing something not dreaming.

In the meantime, the ICT board is building a Konza city in 20 years, and they are giving out awards to companies that have no product or services. Just more dreams to offer. I didn't say it http://www.techmtaa.com/...and-content-generators/

I want anyone to tell me which product or service has won one of their awards that anyone on wazua knows about or can remember.

These are just the facts on the ground.

The ICT board has for sometime been living in dreamland and Konza is the ultimate dream.

Konza will not solve the problem of a young entrepreneur not getting financing. It will not solve the problem of a young business getting gov't contracts. It will not solve the problem of having gov't data in the hands of American corporations. It will not solve the problem of Cronyism in gov't contracts.

Konza however may end up making a few people extremely wealthy at the expense of young Kenyan entrepreneurs who end working as call girls and call boys in the BPO's created.

But first they need to make Kencall profitable before they can make a whole 5000 acres profitable.

I also have an interest in ICT products as a hobby. A few years ago, i discussed with wordbank about an IT solution that would make planning approvals more efficient.

As i was working on my proposal thinking that Worldbank are more interested in helping the poor,financing e.t.c and cant actualize such a project, Worldbank called for ICT programmers to code such a solution and sold it to Nairobi City Council.

I tried to complain but i didn't get any favorable response-only veiled legal threats.

I thought of selling the idea to Uganda and Rwanda where i was also working on some construction project but was too late-Worldbank was already there.
They were also in so many other countries in the world.
At that point i realized that Kenya needs to develop serious ICT policy that seeks to ensure intellectual property is protected.

My main livelihood is in architecture, not ICT-therefore life could continue as normal.
Now that Worldbank had Nairobi City Council, i approached PS Ministry of Local Govt to see whether we can work with other smaller councils in Kenya.
The portal was evaluated technically and was seen to be efficient by Local Govt technocrats.
Unfortunately,the PS again asked me to sell the idea to the individual councils which to me is time-consuming.

Anyone interested in working on this can contact me then we dust it from the shelves and push it to the market again.

I fear for those whose livelihood depends on ICT in Kenya with such weak ICT intellectual property laws.

On another note, the ICT Solution was based on a wordpress portal. Getting programmers for such basic tasks in Kenyan was not easy since most are more into Drupal e.t.c.

Most Wordpress developers/coders work online from all over the world, coming up with marvelous plugins that can virtually perform any task.
Educational courses that teach Kenyans to code the plugins can come in handy.

@MURCHR..

I had not signed 'confidentiality agreements' with Worldbank.
I could not imagine that Worldbank can engage in business or even comprehend code e.t.c. They looked like angels to me then with their 'help the poor' attitude.
I even volunteered for free to help them with ideas on how to modernize Nairobi City council-this is where i gave out the ICT idea.

I went to Kenya copyright board -they can only patent code, not general software idea.

What i saw that could assist was a case law in the US that says if someone gives an idea to another whom they deem to be of high status e.g a priest,president e.t.c then the person of high status creates business with this idea, then some compensation can be done regardless of whether confidentiality agreement was signed or not.

The solution has the possibility in being replicated in over 180 countries worldwide-of which World bank has offices and a network in.

Already, Rwanda,Zambia, a few cities in Asia and Europe have started to use the idea.

@murchr..not any one wins a case against the Worldbank-i dont even think they can be sued due to diplomatic immunity but will need clarification to that.

What the worldbank has is the money and not the ideas.

What startups have is the idea and not the money.

The easiest way to deal with them is to improve on the idea then resell to other sectors of the economy.

This idea was to be consumed by Local Authorities. Unfortunately,most African Govts will listen to the Worldbank first before a small startup due to obvious reasons.

What can work best is for me to team up with an ICT company then we work towards improving and remoulding the product to serve citizens directly as opposed to Governments since Governments clearly already have their 'owners'.
ICT startups in developed countries are well-protected by laws as opossed to here in Kenya. Its not easy to come up with an ICT solution to be consumed solely by the Kenyan Govt due to hurdles. The best method is to reshape the product to serve the citizens e.g facebook,yahoo ,Google, Microsoft e.t.c