For all the promise it holds for the future, artificial intelligence is still guilty of historic bias. Voice recognition software struggles with English accents that are not American or British and facial recognition can be guilty of racial profiling. As this technology increasingly outpaces human discourse on race, China seems to be getting ahead on recognizing a diverse range of faces across the wider world, despite its own struggles with racial insensitivity. Facial recognition in particular has trouble differentiating faces that are not white, according to a study by MIT’s Media Lab. While tech companies grapple with how to teach machines about race, their Chinese competitors…
Author: NBM CORRESPONDENT
BY DAVID ONJILI The average price of a Smartphone in the Kenyan market has halved from Sh23000 to around Sh9500 with the vigorous entry of Chinese models. Infinix remains the most popular smart phone by sales to both the low and high-end mobile phone users. Models like Lenovo, Oppo and Tecno are fiercely fighting for a share of the local market. The sales of the gadgets too as observed by the sales from Jumia reveals that the market has continued to grow with over 200,000 gadgets sold via the online platform in 2017. According to a report by Jumia Business…
BY ANTONY MUTUNGA In the engineering field, a number of challenges usually arise whenever one comes up with a hardware idea aimed at having a positive impact on society. The main problem is usually acquiring adequate capital. However, even for those lucky enough to acquire the capital, a number of obstacles still stand in the way to truly create an innovative product. This is because the product requires testing, design iteration, feedback from customers and assistance in design from experts in the same field. The American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) through its Innovation Showcase (IShow) competition, which has been…
Investors continue to cash in on the real estate sector in Kenya driven by (i) the huge housing deficit, (ii) high returns which came in at 24.3% as of December 2017, and (ii) various government incentives and continued infrastructural improvements. The following were the key highlights of last month; Consonance Kuramo Special Opportunities Fund I, a subsidiary of New York-based Kuramo Capital, bought an undisclosed equity stake in Century Developments Limited, a Nairobi based Pan-African real estate development and Investments Company, focusing on building affordable housing communities across Africa. The deal will see Kuramo invest Sh20 billion over the next…
BY DAVID ONJILI Financial freedom is a term thrown here and there but what truly does it entail? An investment is a risk, what we mostly are exposed to are news headlines of individuals losing millions of shillings at the bourse or through pyramid schemes. What we never realize is that investors do make great returns and have learnt the art of seeking financial knowledge from trusted sources. Mercy, 20 years old, for example, had been promised a car by her father. But when the time came, her father chose instead to deviate from the original promise to something else…
Africa has a higher percentage of companies affected by fraud, theft, money laundering or other financial crimes than the global average, according to a comprehensive survey of international business. Thomson Reuters commissioned the survey of more than 2,300 senior business leaders in large companies to shine a light on how pervasive such crimes have become across the world. The report, Revealing the True Cost of Financial Crime, shows that 53% of people questioned in Africa, and 47% of respondents globally, admitted that their organisation had suffered at least one incident of financial crime over the past 12 months, with cybercrime…
In stark contrast to preceding quarters of decline, consumer sentiment in Kenya is on the rise in the latest Nielsen Consumer Confidence Index (CCI) results for Q1, 2018, having gained eight points to 102. Looking at the East African outlook, Nielsen East and South Africa MD Bryan Sun comments; “Consumers are feeling more upbeat in light of the political situation settling down, GDP strengthening and the country emerging out of a period of drought. The private sector also has a more positive outlook and the economy is opening up, with the entry of international retail chains in the country, bringing…
Payton Mathau Failure of a bank’s newly installed internal financial control system might have led to massive multi-million fraud paid by clients, which has been either untraceable or misappropriated. Pan African banking corporation, Eco bank, with operations in thirty six African countries, could have lost over five hundred million shillings following confusion that reigned after it undertook core banking system change in October 2010. The confusion that marred the changes to Flexicube and Chequepoint systems led to the bank to accumulating unclaimed funds amounting to over nine hundred million shillings, which were locked in its suspense accounts with no possibility…
Marking its 30th edition this year, the IMD World Competitiveness Rankings emphasize a long-term trend highlighted in past editions – that the countries on the top of the list each have a unique approach to becoming competitive. The top five most competitive economies in the world remain the same as in the previous year, but their order changes. The United States returns to the first spot, followed by Hong Kong, Singapore, the Netherlands and Switzerland. The United States improves three positions from last year while Hong Kong drops one spot and Singapore remains 3rd. The return of the United States…
BY KENYATTA OTIENO In December 2017, Kiambu County Assembly passed a Bill compelling all institutions in the county to employ 70% Kiambu residents. Before the by-law was passed, political leaders in Kiambu were reported pushing for the County Assembly to hire locally the heads of institutions of higher learning in the county. The motivation behind these sentiments and Bill is some kind of Kiambu nationalism based on hogging opportunities for locals even in universal institutions like universities. This attitude is a wrong interpretation of the spirit of Devolution. Uasin Gishu governor Jackson Mandago led a team a while back in…