BY KENYATTA OTIENO Towards the end of January 2018, Rwanda strongman Paul Kagame, at his inauguration as the new African Union chairman, announced the creation of AU single aviation market. That was good news to my Pan Africanist ears. When people connect, new things happen first in the social sphere to build trust then economic ideas come up the moment people ask “what next?” In 2015, Tanzania pulled the plug on its trade relations with Kenya by reducing the number of flights Kenya Airways can make to Dar-es-Salaam per week from 42 to 14. This came after Kenya’s Ministry of…
Author: NBM CORRESPONDENT
BY BARNABAS ONYONKA If you were to count the gains banking has made from technology on your palms, you will run out of fingers. The great technological advancements that have occurred in the past decade or so have entirely revolutionized banking. Mobile banking has transformed banking from a 9am- 4pm thing to a round-the-clock activity. Rare is the day you would have to wait in line for ages to be served. The usual long queues at the banks are getting shorter by the day and will soon become extinct. Thanks to technology, knowing an individual’s credit status has never been…
When over 3,900 students many of whom are already putting their new skills to use in career-launching jobs celebrated their graduation from Generation Kenya last month, it was evident that equipping young people with practical skills for the labour market is crucial. Generation Kenya, a not-for-profit organization, recruits, trains, and connects young people who are unemployed or underemployed with jobs – and mainly provides employers with the entry-level talent they need. The ceremony held last month at the Kenyatta International Convention Centre celebrated the sixth group of students to graduate from the Generation Kenya, a programme that works closely with…
BY ANTONY MUTUNGA Over the years the Kenyan government has been working on merging some of its state corporations but time and time again this has hit a wall. In 2008 the Cabinet had approved the merging of struggling state influenced banks; Consolidated Bank, National Bank (NBK), and Development Bank. However, this move ended up being dragged on for so long that the government has now moved from the idea of merging to restructuring the banks by using experts. In 2013 the idea resurfaced after the report of The Presidential Taskforce on Parastatal Reforms, which was presented to the President,…
BY DAVID ONJILI Any country that trail blazes an innovation always reaps the maximum and Kenya is no exception; M-Pesa is testament to that. Not only have we been a reference point for the world with regards to mobile money technology, M-pesa has opened avenues for Kenyan youth and their startups to receive global recognition and financial investment for their ingenuity. Similarly, Avakon, established in May 2017, is a vehicle that is going to bring top of the range engineering, development and construction related brands not just to Kenya but the entire East African region. Avakon’s entry into the Kenyan…
Leading sports betting company SportPesa and the defunct Pambazuka lottery have been sued by a man claiming to have won more than Ksh100 million in a jackpot draw held in July last year. Mr John Friendrich says his bet for the Pambazuka National Lottery on 26th July 2017, in which he made six correct predictions and power ball number as required by the playing rules, won Sh109, 234,886, which was never paid to him. Friendrich, described in court papers as a Kenyan and resident of Nairobi, claims he opened an account with SportPesa, listed as first defendant in the case,…
BY LUKE MULUNDA On February 6th, as Kenyans were smarting from a penniless January, the country’s biggest sports betting company SportPesa finally unveiled the winner of Sh230.7 million mega jackpot. Mr Gordon Ogada, a Nairobi resident who lives in Kibera, was the luckiest of the millions of Kenyans who placed bets on various games on different platforms in the hopes of lifting the jackpot, which had piled over the last 10 months since another Kenyan won Sh221 million. The two payouts alone amount to nearly half a billion shillings. If this is any guide, SportPesa is reaping a fortune from…
Opera News, the stand-alone news app developed by Opera, has broken the 1 million-download milestone in less than four weeks since its release. The app, which provides users with easy access to their favourite news and entertainment content, has also been ranked number one in Kenya and has become the news app of choice in the country. “Opera News is already on track to become the number one news and video app in Africa,” said Jørgen Arnesen, global head of marketing and distribution at Opera. “Over the coming year, the way people consume news and videos will change completely. We…
After a long period at the head of one of the largest, privately owned supermarket chains in the entire African Great lakes region, Atul Shah finally gave up his role as the managing director and chief executive officer of the Nakumatt Holdings Limited. This is after the court approved the appointment of Peter Obondo Kahi, who was proposed by Shah, as the administrator of the chain. Mr Kahi comes in to try and help turn around a company which has been facing major challenges that threatened to see it get acquired or worse, close down. The biggest challenge facing the…
BY NIKKI SUMMERS Thousands of Grade 12s, among the last school leavers to graduate under Kenya’s 8-4-4-education system, are entering the working world. By the government’s own admission, this education system does not equip students with work-ready or entrepreneurial skills. As you are a Small & Medium Business owner, I’m sure you can remember how daunting it was starting out with little business knowledge or experience. This is the reality that thousands of school-leavers now face as they enter the working world – it’s new territory and there’s a lot they don’t know. No experience, no job It’s a bit of…