The American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) has received increased, multi-year support from The Lemelson Foundation for its annual ASME Innovation Showcase (ISHOW), the premier international accelerator of hardware-led social innovation. The Lemelson Foundation, the world’s leading philanthropy focused solely on improving lives through invention, has been the Impact Inventing Sponsor of the annual ASME ISHOW since its inception in 2015. The Lemelson Foundation has increased its support of this signature ASME initiative and committed to a three-year strategic investment in the program. The grant provides for $120,000 per year—an increase of more than 20% over previous support. “The whole idea behind ISHOW…
Author: NBM CORRESPONDENT
By David Wanjala Businesses are starting to breathe life once again. In the streets of Nairobi, traffic is almost back to normal as a majority of those who had suspended operations begin opening up shop. Moving forward, these enterprises will have one clear objective, to try and make up for lost time. However, this is not going to be easy for many. A majority of businesses, for instance, rely on credit for operations and with the pandemic having caused banks to re-evaluate loan strategies, the SMEs, especially, will be greatly affected. Many SMEs will be forced to cut on operations…
BY ERIC KIMUNGUYI A communication gulf exists in our modern world between scientists and non-scientists. Yet we can all use a TV without knowing how it works, or take antibiotics for pneumonia without a biology qualification, just as we can pick up WiFi without understanding internet protocols. However, when a gap in general scientific knowledge begins to be exploited to deliver a political victory or precedent that will benefit some, but hurt many more of us, it can start to matter a lot that we and our policy makers get to grips with the science involved. And so it is with…
When we introspect on Kenyan football, seldom do we encounter a story of a man so audacious and visionary as the journey of Mr Solomon Alubala and the formation of Wazito Football Club. Solo, as he is famously known, is the last-born son in a family of 11 children, and played football for Musingu High School in the late 1990s. Upon completion of his O-Levels, Utalii FC, who had won the Kenyan Premier League (KPL) in the year 1997, arrived to sign him. His father, however, turned down the deal and instead had him pursue his academic studies at the…
BY JACOB OKETCH This collection of short stories by Gilbert Muyumbu takes us back to what the essence of a short story entails. No winding and complex plots. The stories do not betray their meaning by being indeed short, always restricted to one episode that is then elaborated in the body of the story. That way, the reader is not distracted at all and easily manages to transit from one story to the next. It is rare to find stories about war among Kenyan writers. This is understandable given that our country has not gone into a full scale war…
FIFA is joining forces with the African Union, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Confederation of African Football (CAF) to jointly address the issue of domestic violence by launching the #SafeHome campaign across the African continent. The initiative is designed to support women and children victims of domestic violence, particularly as stay-at-home measures in response to COVID-19 have put them at greater risk. A number of African football stars are supporting the campaign via video awareness messages distributed on social and traditional media. The African Union-FIFA-CAF memorandum of understanding, which was concluded in February 2019, covers joint campaigns on…
BY JACOB OKETCH One of the biggest worries of an alcoholic is how to resuscitate their intimate relationships after recovery. A long period of drinking leaves a litany of harms that takes longer to sort out. Many relationships have been severed because one of the partners was alcoholic and their behavior made the relationship untenable. You will not be surprised to find many people who live alone because their marriages were broken due to alcoholism. During the period of alcoholism, a tendency occurs where the alcoholic involve themselves in all manner of sexual relations that are not intimate at all.…
Stigma knows no borders – it just manifests differently in different contexts, countries, and societies. The time for action is now – for all the generations of girls and women to come – Elizabeth Blackney BY CHANEL MILLER Last year, I published Know My Name, a memoir about my experience being sexually assaulted on Stanford’s campus in 2015, the trial that followed and what I began to understand about healing and justice. For three years before the book’s release, I wrote while remaining anonymous, known only to the public as “Emily Doe.” Writing my book was like sitting at a desk inside…
BY ANTONY MUTUNGA For over 40 years, China’s economy was poor, stagnant and isolated from the world. However, once they opened up, things turned for the better. Now, the country is one of the fastest growing economies around the world. Among the sectors to flourish as a result is the technological industry. The country is investing highly in research and development, making it one of the most advanced economies. Africa can learn and follow in the footsteps of China to help its technological sector reach a similar feat. To reach its current level in the tech sector, the industry required…
Across several countries especially in Africa, the remote workforce trend is growing and it’s now up to organizations to keep up with the changing needs of their employees With digital transformation being a major area of focus for businesses and governments across emerging markets in East, West and Central Africa, enterprises that will disrupt the economy are those that use technologies that mainly drive business continuity and growth. As organizations across Emerging Africa recognize that application, information technology (IT), security and workforce transformation are key to long-term business success, Dell Technologies is betting enterprise and consumer solutions that accelerate the digital…