Idea Exchange: Bank, Literature, Journalism, Opportunities, and Win a Free Phone

The Africa AgriBusiness Challenge from Enactus Kenya and Syngenta seeks out youth to generate creative business ideas to improve the agricultural productivity of certain crop value chains. Deadline is June 10.

The 2014 Africa Awards for Entrepreneurship will have five awards to celebrate entrepreneurs at different stages of the entrepreneurial life cycle; lifetime achievement, transformational business, outstanding mature business, outstanding growing business and outstanding social entrepreneur.

The Africa Prize for Engineering Innovation. Details here .. via @calestous.

@AfriCOG Investigative Journalism Fellowship Programme 2014. Deadline is 30 May. 

Anthemis Fellowship seeks out entrepreneurs, executives and thought leaders who are passionate about building an improved financial services industry fit for the digital age. The Anthemis Fellowship program includes 4 months at the Anthemis London office, 4 months with one of their portfolio companies and 4 months with a major financial services firm. It also comes with a monthly stipend of EUR2000 and an invitation to attend the Anthemis #HackingFinance Retreat from July 10-13, 2014 in Meribel, France. Deadline is June 1. 

@APO_Source has had a scholarship for an African journalist to to attend the 2014 annual meetings of the African Development Bank.

Bloomberg Africa ‏@BBGAfrica - seeks Swaziland, Eritrea, Djibouti, G.Bissau, Cape Verde, Eq. Guinea, Sao Tome stringers - Please e-mail asguazzin@bloomberg.net

Citi Africa Management Associate Programme Citi in Africa is  looking for ambitious graduates with strong academic backgrounds, maximum of two years’ work experience, leadership, teamwork, and excellent communication skills.

The 2014 CNN/MultiChoice African Journalist Awards will recognise excellence in culture, economics & business (NEW), energy & infrastructure (NEW), environment, health & medical, news impact (NEW), photography, press freedom, sports, language general news, Francophone news and also Portuguese news. Details here and the deadline is 30 May.

EABL Foundation scholarships for needy students who have gained admission to Kenya public universities. Deadline is June 6. 

Etisalat Prize 2014 for African literature is now open with a top prize of £15,000 and a fellowship at the University of East Anglia, while winner and shortlisted writers also receive a sponsored two city tour promoting their books. Details here and the deadline is 8 August.

The Golden Baobab Prizes for Literature include awards for a picture Book (targeting readers aged 6 – 8 years), early chapter (targeting readers aged 9 -11) and rising writers (for a young African author under the age of 18 who demonstrates the talent and drive to become the next great African author for children). Details here and the deadline is June 29.

Jalada / @KwaniTrust seek 3 best Afrofuture submissions for a second anthology. Deadline is D/L 15

Japan Government scholarships  in research, teacher training, technology, and specialized training .. via @njathika

Want to be a Jameson brand ambassador? Here's how to apply (via @uqweli ) oops - deadline also passed.

KCB: The region's largest bank has ongoing internships, management trainee and management exchange programs. Sourced from @RookieKE blog.

 

Kenya Revenue Authority -  KRA graduate trainee program 2014

The Kenya StartUp Cup is open to all Kenyan youth entrepreneurs who can apply to win Kshs 1 million (~$11,500). Details from the @prepaid_africa blog and the deadline is May 20.

KenyaTop100 seeks successful companies with turnover of Kshs 70 million to Kshs 1 billion (~$12,000)  with 3 years audited accounts to compete and be among @kenyastop100 

Kijabe Forest Trust @KijabeForest  is seeking a new logo design.

Kuona Trust has internship opportunities for students at their offices in Hurlingham, Nairobi. 

The Kwani Trust 2014 fiction workshop seeks to develop new contemporary fiction writers between the ages of 18 and 24 and from outside of Nairobi. To apply, check the website, and send email to submissions_at_kwani.org by May 26.

Orange  has launched the 4th edition of the Orange African Social Venture Prize which will award prizes to four projects; three with grants of 10,000 EUR, 15,000 EUR and 25,000 EUR, and a new special prize of 10,000 EUR. It's open to all entrepreneurs or legal entities that has been in existence for fewer than three years at the time of the competition and the deadline is 19 September.

Power Africa Off Grid Energy Challenge from @USADF and @GeneralElectric Africa offers up to $100,000 to 100% African owned and African managed firms that seek to power up under-served parts of rural Kenya. Deadline is June 20.  

School of Data: Become a School of Data Fellow as they are currently broadening their efforts to spread data skills around the world, and are seeking people who are data savvy, understand the role of NGO's, are interested or experienced in working with journalism and/or civil society, or enjoy community-building.  Deadline is 1 June.

Standard Chartered Bank Fast Track Program: The bank is looking for young graduates to join their management trainee program in several African countries, including Kenya, Ghana, Nigeria, Tanzania, Zimbabwe, Uganda, and several international locations. Sourced from @RookieKE blog

 
The Stanford University Africa MBA Fellowship Program pays for tuition and associated fees (approximately US $145,000) for citizens of African countries with financial need who wish to obtain an MBA at Stanford GSB. Stanford will award up to eight Stanford Africa MBA Fellowships annually. Details here and the deadline is 13 June.

Strathmore University @StrathU scholarships from @imbankke for 10 needy students pursuing various Finance related degree programmes.

Swedish Institute Management Programme‏ The Swedish Institute is launching a new leadership programme for progressive leaders from Kenya,Tanzania, Rwanda, Ethiopia and Zambia - offering a combination of theory and practice in the area of responsible leadership and sustainable business.  Details here and the deadline is June 6.

Total Kenya Graduate Management Trainee Program. The company was is looking for young dynamic graduates.  Also sourced from @RookieKE blog but the deadline was 7 May  

The Wall Street Journal @WSJ looking for entrepreneurial reporter to cover the most entrepreneurial of Africa beats--business, from Nairobi. Apply to @pwonacott

Submit your wikimedia proposals to be included at Wiki Indaba 2014 in Johannesburg. Details here and the deadline is 15 May.

The World Bank Young Professionals Program 2014 seeks highly qualified and motivated individuals skilled in areas relevant to the World Bank’s operations such as, economics, finance, education, public health, social sciences, engineering, urban planning, and natural resource management. Details here and the deadline is 30 June.

 
Win a Nokia Lumia 1320: There are very few comments on the blog here despite the number of daily readers, and many of the comments are from spammers promoting products from far off countries. To stimulate comments, I’m giving away a brand new Nokia Lumia 1320 phone (worth about $400/Kshs 35,000) to the person who engages the most on the site. The phone was an excellent, but unexpected, prize awarded to the winner of the best business blog at the recent 2014 Kenya Blog Awards ceremony. During the month of May, readers to the blog and it's archives, can make as many comments as they want, and I'll respond on some. 

Rules 
1. There are no rules about winning.
2. It's about serious comments, not volume - and blog comments only, not tweets/tags

3. This is personal, and the promo has nothing to do with Nokia  or Nokia East Africa.

4. @Coldtusker is excluded :(
5. An announcement will be made on June 14, and there may not be a winner  if no one is deemed to be worthy.

Derivatives in East Africa

On Monday May 16, Strathmore University invited Eduardo Schwartz a UCLA Professor and world-renowned lecturer, advisor, expert and author to give a talk on derivatives.

Introducing the talk, Strathmore Director Jim McFie talked of the plan for Strathmore to be at the academic forefront for learning on derivatives in Kenya, which they are doing with the Global Board of Trade (GBOT) – and that for Kenya to compete with Mauritius as a financial centre, derivatives markets will have to be established in Kenya.

McFie also mentioned a tendency for Kenyan parent to push their children into pre-formed careers at an early age, which was wrong, as he noted that Prof. Schwartz trained and started working as an engineer, before he branched into financial markets.

Prof. Schwartz was giving his first talk in Africa on the subject and chose to give a Derivatives 101 talk, even as he knew there were investment bankers, and officials from the Treasury and Nairobi Stock Exchange present. He observed that it would be difficult to set up such markets given the economic challenges here, but that ultimately, development of efficient market necessary for economic development

He noted:
- You can have derivative on any variable that can be measured without discussion between the parties - e.g. rainfall, presidential elections, sports.
- Popularity? Interest rate contracts are the biggest (390 trillion) followed by credit default swaps (which had rapid growth from 2006 ), then foreign exchange contracts, commodities and finally equity-linked contracts, in that order.
- In any Wall Street Journal, you get a quick reading of all the major forwards e.g. quotes for the UK pound - 1, 3, and 6 months forward, and futures prices of metal & petroleum (gold, silver), agriculture (wheat corn orange juice, pork bellies, rice) interest rates.
- Some arguments in favor for hedging: Companies can focus on main business and take steps to minimize market risks such as interest rates, by hedging, which also minimizes the probability for financial distress.
- Arguments against /dangers of hedging? Shareholders are well diversified and can make their own decisions, it may increase risk to hedge when competitors do not (Southwest Air), and it is possible to take large positions with very little money (traders can change from hedgers to speculators)
- You can get more reading of alocal perspective on derivatives here

While he was said he was shocked that there no forward market in foreign exchange, in Kenya, there are forward markets for currencies, and for some commodities like flowers and fuel, which are done in private arrangements with partners, buyers, and customers, but mainly through large banks. They are not exchangeable, and there is no capital markets mechanism now for this.

(via airliners.net)

The most memorable one was Kenya Airways fuel hedging which they have employed for a number of years during rising fuel prices, but which resulted in a loss of Kshs 5.6 billion (~72 million) in 2009 (more)

With time there could be a few more to deal with gaps such as the current situation where farmers are hoarding maize harvests to draw the government out into paying more for the crop.

Award Season Part Trois

Following on part II

The Anzisha Prize for young Africans (15-20 yrs) who have solved a problem /challenges in their community (via @kenyanpundit)

The Android App competition. in the X.com dev. challenge participants can win prizes of up to $25,000. D/L is 14 May.

The 2nd eLearning Africa Photo Competition runs through April 21.

Facebook’s first hire in Africa - will be a growth manager in Nigeria (via @bellanaija)

The 2011 Freedom to Create Prize main prize and imprisoned artist prize is open to 15 July (via @Kwani)

Various jobs at Google East Africa .

iHub Mentorship program. D/L is 6 April.

Partial scholarships available to attend the 4th Global Forum on Innovation & Entrepreneurship. D/L is April 1

Kenya Government Science & Technology scholarships (29) to study in China, for undergraduates and postgraduates in engineering, medicine, computer science, and pharmacy. D/L April 7.

Connected Kenya Vision 2030 ICT awards from the Kenya ICT Board.

Maisha Filmlab with free screenwriting directing camera sound and production workshops in East Africa. (via @mkaigwa)

Mass Challenge a $1 million start up competition (via @egm_photo)

Panos Eastern Africa media fellowships. D/ L April 6.

Strathmore University’s Mobile Academy . D/L 31 March

Winners of the Nokia Idea storm will have their ideas developed into phone apps. D/L is April 14.

TEDGlobal 2011 takes place in Edinburgh, Scotland in July 2011. It moves from traditional Oxford this and 75 places available, and D/L is April 4.

Africa Youth Trust Young Women Leaders funded by the UN Women Governance and Gender Programme. D/L April 15.

Modern careers: Someone got hired via twitter

Sports: The Watamu Triathlon takes place April 9 & 10 at the Kenya coast. D/L April 4.


Photo is from a blog tracking a Cairo to Cape 12,000 kilometre bicycle expedition (equivalent to 4 Tour de Frances in 4 months). It’s now complete after a tough stint in Kenya.

Tujuane: Transforming from Employee to Employer

Tujuane is a network with almost 3,000 worldwide members, it is an offshoot of Nairobist that was founded in 2006, by a group of ex-Boston graduates who chanced on a means to network and interact beyond Facebook-type connections, but with actual get-togethers and network forums. It has almost 3,000 members including 45 in Kampala, and Dar es Salaam each who communicate and share through newsletter, listing of theirs businesses, a book club soma, surveys and meet-ups.

On November 21 in Nairobi, they held a mixer – or a networking event dubbed The Road from Employee to Employer with an address by Dr. Mulengani Katwalo, the director of theInstitute for Strategy & Competitiveness (ISC) at the Strathmore Business School.


Dr. Katwalo - Photo courtesy of EGM


His talk centered on what local entrepreneurs/business owners can change to enable them to succeed in business. Success is not about starting a business – as anyone can find business plan on the Internet – with the unfortunate result that that 60 – 70% of entrepreneurs fail in the first year. This is because they behave like athletes who try to go from starting to running, but who don’t warm up first:

Entrepreneurs can make changes in six areas to ease the transformation

1. Training/skills development: Many entrepreneurs may have the drive, and the money but lack some skills, necessary to understand customers, and make a transition to understand their business/industry to take it to the next level. They should engage in short courses, but more important they should contribute to the agenda of education. E.g. by working with universities to set the learning curriculum for business such as the local tourism sector.

2. Innovation : Entrepreneurs do not engage in research & development (R&D)(by show of hands no one in the room was engaged in R&D departments/capacities) - and there are no budgets for new ideas and creations. Entrepreneurs need to embrace the process of buying and selling knowledge. If you have a good idea and cannot use, can you sell it?. The developed world is about exchange of ideas, not just goods & services. We need to convert ideas into cold hard cash.
- Entrepreneurs should know there is nothing wrong with copying, benchmarking, or reverse engineering. E.g. the Nyayo Car may have succeeded if it had been built in collaboration with a Japanese company and with just a Kenyan name. That’s how Tata rose to become a world leader in the sector. Presently there’s still a local mindset that doing imitation is inferior.
- In business, be brave enough to learn, pick an idea and use it. The patent for kyondo (baskets) is owned in Japan, and when you see Japanese tourists taking photos, a lot of them act as blueprints for products
- Innovation is crucial, but its not about going to the lab only – its about getting new ideas and converting them into products and services e.g. in Kenyan hospitals, while equipment is new, there has been no innovation in service
- Entrepreneurs should not stop innovating: Once you make enough money – the tendency is for many to move to big (Karen) houses, buy big cars, get new wives etc. They don’t create legacies that sustain wealth, so that every generation has to start over again.

3. Culture: There is a bad (local) attitude and perception that needs to change specially in regards of treatment of customers. This bad Matatu treatment towards customers, as though entrepreneurs are doing them a favour is bad for business. Entrepreneurs do not owe customers a favour - they are providing a service, which customers are paying for. Until our customer service changes to reflect this change in attitude, we will always be second best. In other countries, even if someone doesn’t like you, they will serve you and take your money – and ensure you (as a customer) keep coming back.
- Customer acquisition skills are poor – entrepreneurs do not keep up with innovation in the industry, they don’t read much. There's a lazy tendency to finish work, go to bar and then sleep. To be a world-class entrepreneur, you must make sacrifices, take make deliberate efforts such as take courses to develop management skills and read books otherwise they will always remain second best.

4 Neighborhoods If you don’t know your market, you will always be the village beauty Entrepreneurs need to know what opportunities exist beyond their neighborhoods or they will never take advantage of them. Do you look at your market as the Westlands area (a Nairobi suburb) or the 100 million + people in the greater East Africa – Congo, S. Sudan, Somalia? Only those that have eyes, can see the market, like the South Africans who have invested here in Kenya.
- It's also a perception issue, when you see people – do you see market or problems – what is your attitude towards expansion? Exporting to Europe? etc.

5 Cooperation or competition - This is an increasing trend in the business world to cooperate rather than compete – because not all your competitors are your enemies. This can also work in knowledge exchange (there’s appears to be a marketing understanding in Nakumatt and Tuskys, though both supermarkets, are not competitors as they target different clientele

6. Cooperation - working in networks (like Tujuane, clusters, create linkages, exchanges etc. as individual businesses do not exist in isolation – so entrepreneurs should network with related companies. We had a stimulating group discussions in which participants listed reasons for joining a network as among others - get contacts in the industry, socializing [with like minded people] as they are very busy, Learn new ideas[raises competition], Synergy, Pooling of resources/barter of services & goods, learn new opportunities and for moral support [e.g. for freelancers who work from home]

Business Briefs – May 24

most from the papers this week

Strathmore to train entrepreneurs: Strathmore University has launched an Enterprise Development Centre (SEDC) to train entrepreneurs in management of SME's. This will be done through a six month certificate program in entreprenual management that covers, among other aspects, taxation & law, financial recordkeeping, managing HR, business planning, risk management, diversification, capital budgeting and excellence in customer service. It will use locally developed case studies and also provide networking opportunities and access to service providers through a business club.

ARM split: Athi River Mining intends to spin off its cement, and mineral & chemical operations into two wholly owned subsidiaries;
- ARM Cement Limited – who will continue with the manufacture and sell cement and limestone – (the new Kaloleini factory will be transferred to the subsidiary)
- ARM Minerals & Chemicals Limited – who will produce minerals and sodium silicate building products – (the Athi River factory will be transferred to the subsidiary)

Invest in Uchumi: Gearing up for a revival is Uchumi Supermarkets whose Receiver Manager has places an international tender for financial firms who will assist in the for (i) pre-qualification of financial bidders and (ii) selection of winning bids to become strategic equity partners (new investors in Uchumi). D/L is 6/6

Milky at NSE?: Preparing for a possible listing at the Nairobi Stock Exchange is New KCC who published their financial accounts this week for the year ended June 2007, which showed that they had exceeded the performance over the previous 18 month period; New KCC had assets of 4.7 billion shillings (up from 4.0b in 18 months to 06/2006), turnover of 4.5 billion (compared to 4.9b) and a pre-tax profit of 284 million (compared to 350 m) – after paying over 2 billion shillings to dairy farmers. Meanwhile Sameer is making dairy waves in Uganda

Derailment?: Rift Valley Railways in trouble with the Governments of Kenya and Uganda over the performance of the railway concession. Last year it appeared they had turned the corner in terms of performance.

FYI: You can track NSE shares in real time for free at Rich.co.ke

The Broadband Gap

Earlier this month I received (though the mail) a DVD pack of all the talks from the organizers of TED Global. This is the first time I have seen any TED videos – ever!

While they have been online all this time, it’s not easy to watch any videos online because of the slow speeds – a 3 minute video can take ¼ hour to download, and they you have to rewind it to watch .

Also as more and more local video content and jazzed up websites, go up online, it is unfortunately still not possible to for many intended viewers to access the content watch. Or even bother to try until speeds are fast enough.

I’ll save the links and wait till I find a place that has very goods speeds. Some have impressive free speeds but can’t concentrate and watch there, besides have to lug around a heavy laptop to enjoy them

More Connectivity

Great news that Safaricom are going to roll out video on phones, broadband speeds and a host of other goodies soon. They paid about ½ of what they did for their mobile phone license less than 10 years ago for a 3G license. Maybe I can see some TED video’s from my phones.

Strathmore University have rolled out a campus wide Wi Fi network at the Madaraka campus to enable students with laptops to access the internet from all over the campus. And next students will be able to access the network from their homes via the Kenya Data Networks (KDN)'s infrastructure.