Kenya, which has been dubbed the Silicon Savannah due to the numerous innovations generated from the country in the ICT field, is not only a regional leader, but is also competing well on the global stage
A case in point is Simba Technologies who won the inaugural Pivot25 award by designing an application that will provide healthcare information to remote location.
Last year, John Waibochi won the Nokia Global Growth Economy Venture Challenge for his mobile-based supply chain solution hub.
Ushahidi Data-Mapping Platform collated images and reports from the ground during the post-election violence and transmitted them in real time via social media and text messaging. By May 2011, Ushahidi, a free download, had been used in 128 countries to map everything from 2010’s Haiti Earthquake to last year’s Japanese tsunami.
Incubators such as iHub and the University of Nairobi’s Fablab are generating exciting and practical applications and inventions almost weekly.
The world has Kenya’s Safaricom to thank for the revolutionary Msea mobile banking system. Safaricom recently launched a new product after partnering with Call- a – Doc, a mobile health service through which Kenyans will be able to access medical services over the phone at just KES20 (US$0.2) per minute.
It is expected that the service, which enables one to receive expert advice on health-related issues after dialling ‘1525’, will reduce the time and money patients use in consultation. This will be especially useful for those in the rural areas who have to travel long distances to get medical assistance.
The Government is in the process of rolling out a digital platform for key operations. A key pat of this is the uploading and storage of information in all critical areas on a cloud for ease of access and reference.
Recently, the Government launched the multi-billion dollar Konza Technology City development, which is located 60km outside Nairobi, and will be linked to the capital city by a high-speed rail link.
The 5,000 acre Konza City will house a science and technology park, an IT park, incubators, two state-of-the-art medical centres, a media city, a financial city, a conference centre, an Expo Centre, a shopping mall, a golf course and an artificial river. Google has also located its lead sub-Saharan base in Kenya.
Nawa Mutumweno
