Author: Nairobi Business Monthly Reporter

Apptivate Africa is looking to unlock billions of shillings in irredeemable gift vouchers that companies set aside to reward and keep employees every year. The firm introduced its multi-store digital voucher to help companies offer a variety of incentives over the Christmas and New Year festivities. “As the festive season beckons, most companies are unaware that there are options that will be more appreciated than the traditional supermarket vouchers that offer employees limited freedom for merry making,” said Apptivate Africa Chief Executive Officer, Neil Ribeiro. A survey last year revealed that 88% of companies who gave their employees a gift,…

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Andrew Wambari Kairu is the new chairman of KCB Group board of directors taking over from Ngeny Biwott who has held the position since 2013. Prior to this, Kairu served as an independent non-executive director at KCB Plc and KCB Bank Kenya. People abreast with the financial sector say the value of his skills will absolutely get him ahead as the new chairman, though you might not know it by looking at him. He is currently a non-executive director at Dalberg research and a member of the Audit Committee of Commonwealth Secretariat, London. Mr Kairu has also worked at the…

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Volatile market conditions continue to make life tough for investors, but those willing to look beyond the hype can still unearth hidden gems. Melville Douglas, the boutique investment management company within the Standard Bank Group says patience, a long-term view and a commitment to fundamental research remain the most astute way to navigate the current market conditions. The company, which has been delivering superior investment returns and service for more than 30 years and whose Select Global Equity Fund has returned 15% in US dollars for the year ended August 2018, has recently been scouring the investment universe for ideas…

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By David Onjili The average Kenyan business enterprise does not grow to see her first birthday. The difficulty in accessing credit, high taxation and stiff competition from established enterprises all conspire to strangle the newborn before she masters her baby steps. Yet, despite the odds, many young Kenyans, like eagles, fly into the storm buoyant. Elvis Saoke, the 33 year old of Saoke Destinations is one such a man. Trained in airports operations and customs clearing and having previously worked at Davis and Shirtliff, interned at Kenya Airports Authority and researched at Kenya National Bureau of Statistics ,Saoke decided  in…

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More than 200 students at Makerere University are set to benefit from a new SciDev.Net training course called Script aimed at nurturing the science journalists of tomorrow and addressing the lack of high-quality science reporting in Africa. The Scrip training course and networking programme, which is funded by Robert Bosch- Stiftung and was launched at the Next Einstein Forum in Kigali, Rwanda early this year, will be taught to students within the Ugandan university’s Department of Journalism and Communication in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at Makerere University . The agreement with SciDev.Net – the world’s leading source of…

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Uber, the peer-to-peer ridesharing company, has finally launched its boda-boda service in Nairobi. The service which is referred to as uberBODA, will enable commuters to hire a boda-boda using the Uber platform app just as it is with the cab. According to Pierre-Dimitri Gore-Coty, Uber Vice President for Europe, Middle East and Africa, the company is keen on creating technology that meets the needs of the market. “We are excited about the launch of uberBODA in Nairobi. While Uber has grown into a global brand, we understand the importance of building technology to meet the needs of the local market.…

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The Pharmaceutical Society of Kenya (PSK) has outlined plans to mentor and provide career guidance support to KCPE achievers wishing to pursue a career in Pharmacy. The umbrella Pharmacists professional society while welcoming top KCPE candidate Olive Mwea Wachira’s wish to pursue a career in the field, said they have already drawn up plans to orient candidates wishing to join the profession. Speaking at Riara Primary School when he led a team of practicing pharmacists to congratulate Olive Mwea on her achievement as one of the top two candidates who scored 453 out of a possible 500 marks, PSK Chair,…

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Volatility in commodity markets is likely to increase over the next few months, and this could lead to greater civil unrest – especially in the developing world – which could require military intervention.  This recently happened in Tanzania over the pricing of its 2018 cashew nut harvest. The warning comes from UWIN (Unleashing the Wealth in Nations), a new blockchain business aiming to transform farming and commodity trading in Africa and other parts of the developing world. “The current cashew nut price crisis in Tanzania, where the president ordered the army to buy the country’s 2018 nut harvest thereby diffusing…

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mKey, an app that converges social and financial services into an integrated lifestyle, has recorded close to 100,000 downloads since its official launch in early September. Finserve, the fintech that operates mKey, has reported that as at the end of October 99,970 users had downloaded the keyboard app with 309 000 transactions worth Sh17.8 million having been processed over this period. Keyboard app is what enables an app to learn automatically and predict the next word that the user intends to type. mKey additionally processed loans worth Sh5.2 million over the same period. mKey app is targeted at Kenya’s increasingly…

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BitPesa (BTC Africa), the pan-African digital payment platform has partnered up with Sompo Holdings, one of the major Japanese insurance companies, to lower the costs incurred and increase the speed of payments to and from frontier markets, including international remittances across Europe and Africa. The partnership came after Sompo Holdings invested Sh515 million (570 million yen) to acquire a 10% stake of Bitpesa. The partnership aims to further increase global trade and encourage the digitalization of international financial services. According to Sompo Holdings, BitPesa’s technology, which was developed through thorough experiments in remittances and settlements, will be able to help…

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