Bankelele writes:
I'll begin by saying that, apart from Enablis, I haven't found a true venture capital firm anywhere in Nairobi. Although many firms describe themselves as 'investment banks', 'development banks', xyz Funds, or venture capitalists, for better or for worse, they absolutely do not fund start-up companies. They like real-life balance sheets rather than projected balance...
The Global Forum on Agricultural Research just published a short document on Advocacy to improve information sharing and exchange in agricultural research for development. The advocacy agenda comprises:Increased and improved investment in ICM at the research Institute, research organization and research system level.Capacity development, especially skills in generating digital content, managing and disseminating it at the Institute and Research System level.Greater coherence and integration of agricultural information systems.Improved governance of information flows to ensure equitable access to agricultural related information...
On 27 August, FAO facilitates an e-Agriculture panel at the IAALD-AFITA-WCCA World Congress. The panel will deliberate issues of ICT as enablers in various critical areas of development, as well as the role of Public Private Partnerships (PPP) in support of e-Agriculture.The session will be an interactive discussion with the audience, with the panel anchored by:Alexander Flor, Dean, Faculty of Information and Communication Studies, University of the Philippines Open University;Manish Pandey, Deputy Director, Katalyst-Swisscontact;Michael Riggs, Information Management Specialist, FAO Regional Office for Asia-Pacific;Roxanna Samii, International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD);and Stephen Rudgard, FAO, as the moderator.The panelists will share knowledge and experiences,...
Image via Wikipedia From TechReview:
...computer scientists in Pakistan are building a system to boost download speeds in the developing world by letting people effectively share their bandwidth. Software chops up popular pages and media files, allowing users to grab them from each other, building a grassroots Internet cache...a team at LUMS is developing DonateBandwidth, a system inspired by...
The Innovation Hub covered earlier co-launches a pre-incubation initiative "for young online entrepreneurs."-Startup Africa,HatTip Sean Park!
Buy into Africa says the Investors Chronicle
Juhel, a growing Pharmaceutical manufacturer founded by Ifeanyi Okoye
Green Wifi covered earlier in...
The Aleutia E2 Has "...been designed from the ground up for use in rural Africa - able to handle high humidity, dust ingression, and even drops (as it has no moving parts). Storage resides on an Industrial Compact Flash card that can be instantly removed for security/anti-theft purposes, and is practically indestructible, ensuring that data is not lost.Because the E2 consumes only 8 Watts of...
From ICTUpdate:
Using the internet and mobile phones, farmers in East Africa learn to work more efficiently with the traders who buy their goods. The Linking Local Learners method of learning explores how farmers can access market information and get a fairer deal...[continue...
Founded by alumni of Ashesi University, DreamOval's "...products include Outreach, i-Wallet, and Global Virtual Stock Exchange (GVSX). Outreach is a communications solution that enables enterprises to utilize SMS and Email for business-critical communication and relationship management(CRM)..."-Ashesi...
Quebec, 13 August. In a ceremony today at the IFLA Congress William Gates Senior presented the 2008 Gates Foundation Access to Learning Award of $1 million to the Vasconcelos Program in Mexico's Veracruz state. In his remarks, Dr. Victor Arredondo, Veracruz secretary of public education and founder of the Vasconcelos Program explained how the Program was named for José Vasconcelos who in the 1920's led a program that brought education and knowledge to rural areas on the backs of donkeys and mules. Nowadays, the Program reaches out, bringing technology and knowledge via a fleet of all-terrain buses.Bill Gates Senior, introducing the award, talked of the importance of reading and libraries and the Gates Foundation's intention to support innovative initiatives that "help people give...
On 26 August, CTA will organise a special session at the upcoming IAALD/AFITA World Congress in Japan.As a result of geographical isolation, poor communication facilities and limited purchasing power, many people working in agricultural development in ACP countries are unaware of the opportunities and resources that are potentially available to support agricultural development in ACP countries.This is particularly true in the fast moving field of ICTs which is heavily impacting on agriculture and shows great promise for ACP states. In recent years, for instance, technological advances coupled with falling prices in hardware have led to the appearance and increasing availability of low cost mobile computers (such as the XO “$ 100” laptop from OLPC), affordable wireless connectivity...
Fusion Capital offers SME focused financial solutions.
Derrick Ashong launches Ashong Ventures.
The Economist applauds Endeavor's success in spreading the gospel of entrepreneurship.
CopperNet leads in the provision of information technology services.
Founded by Baba Jibrin Adamu, Inetworks Canada believes strongly in the provision of low-cost communications and...
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Watch VNL’s CEO Anil Raj talk about the rural opportunity, the challenges associated with bringing connectivity to rural areas, WorldGSM™ – VNL’s solar GSM system,microtelecom, and the future of rural telecom.
A related report from Russell Southwood of Balancing Act states :
VNL’s business strategy is to tackle the cost base of Africa’s mobile operators in a number of different ways. It will...
Image via WikipediaSean Park at the Park Paradigm writes:One of the most obvious - yet no less powerful or potentially transformational for it - themes is the combination of mobile communications, internet and geo-location technologies to disseminate information and increase connectedness from the bottom up. This emergent collective intelligence is all the more remarkable, given the typical...
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The Economist reports on Dabba:
Digital technology may seem unpredictable, but it follows some basic patterns. Innovations quickly become commodities, enable arbitrage and lead to more distributed systems. Combining all three is the recipe for Dabba, a South African wireless start-up, which has pioneered an idea called the “village telco”. It could make phone calls much more affordable for many...
Box Canyon Dairy, a 2,500-acre dairy in Idaho, recently partnered with rugged Tablet PC manufacturer MobileDemand and agricultural industry software provider ProfitSource to implement a mobile computing system that improved the efficiency of daily operations and provides access to the information needed to give each individual cow the veterinary attention it needs.This simple implementation has resulted in significant time savings on the dairy that have helped streamline operations and reduce errors. For more information, read the press release, case study with photographs, or watch a case study...
Sean Park discusses opportunity at the Park Paradigm:
In a nutshell, it really comes down to the power of looking at the industry from a completely different perspective: understanding how markets and financial services can be made to work in the context of sub-saharan Africa, necessarily forces you to see the industry through a radically different prism: infrastructure, distribution, price...
Mugure Mugo founder of Preciss International covered earlier speaks with Manuel de Joya of Eventive about their Ethiopian outsourcing initiative.Answering a question about the continents positioning in this industry he states:
Africa's expertise in various European languages is a singular advantage. The Francophone nations seem to be particularly poised for success.
However, having said that,...
An Information Value chain consultancy founded by Adedoyin Odunfa, Digital Jewels offers a number services. These include:
-Information Security
-Certification
-Perfomance...
From the Dimagi project page:
We are developing the process that would facilitate the use of mobile device to transport images taken by nurses at health care centers (point-of-care) in rural Zambia to a server in Lusaka where doctors can access the images in order to provide expert advice on cervical lesions. We would like to explore the use of this approach to facilitate a scalable national...
Geekcorps profiles an alumni who lost wireless connectivity and rejigged his business model:
Papou Coulibaly saw the potential for offering offline ICT services in Ouélessébougou and went about creating a unconnected cyber café at his boutique. Using the Geekcorps’ Cybertigi design, Papou acquired three computers, a laser printer, scanner, digital camera, photo printer, a Bluetooth adapter,...
Stock Market Nigeria reports on two impending IPO's from non-financial sector companies, Florence Seriki's Omatek Ventures and Tantalizers both covered previously:
The management of the Nigerian Stock Exchange at a recent Quotation Committee Council Meeting (QCCM), held at the exchange, gave a nod to Omatek Ventures and Tantalizers Plc’s bid to list on the Exchange. Omatek Ventures Plc would be...
A news story from IRIN asks what a poor farmer in Cameroon does when something goes wrong? Or when new information is needed. She doesn't have books and libraries or access to the Internet. Knowledge is passed down from generation to generation but that has limits, particularly for an enterprising farmer who wants to try growing something new. One solution is to pick up the phone and call ‘Allo Ingenier’ where an agricultural expert is always on call. This question and answer service is provided by the Documentation Centre for Rural Development in Yaoundé which is part of an agricultural non-governmental organisation (NGO) called the Service d’Appui aux Initiatives Locales de Développement (SAILD). It is part supported by CTA and associated to the SICAC...
Between 2006 and 2007, ODI and partners were commissioned by the World Bank Information for Development Program (infoDev) to produce a Knowledge Map of ICTs and rural livelihoods.Written up in wiki format, the Map is designed to answer the following questions: How can the full range of information and communication technologies (ICTs), appropriately adapted, help to improve the livelihoods of poor individuals, families and communities in rural areas and increase their income opportunities, thereby improving their chances of escaping from persistent poverty? What do we know already, both from research and from experience in the field, and what do donor staff and their country counterparts most urgently need to know about these issues? How should we think about the role of ICT in enhancing...
"...StartUpAfrica is a blog dedicated to new African companies in particular those startups that are in the Technology, Mobile , Internet and Web 2.0 space. Analysing, reviewing and profiling these companies at the same time providing market news, information, tutorials, tips and advice for the entrepreneurs behind...
Uchuuzi is an ecommerce company that sources and delivers goods to their clients offices and homes.Orders can made via cellphone and or internet. Methods of payment include paypal and major credit...
Le Centre de recherches pour le développement international (CRDI), le Centre technique de coopération agricole et rurale (CTA), l’Institut humaniste pour la coopération avec les pays en développement (Hivos) et l’Institut international pour la communication et le développement (IICD) invitent des candidatures pour le troisième appel du programme de petites subventions GenARDIS.Un fonds de subvention pour traiter les questions de genre dans le domaine des technologies de l’information et de la communication pour l’agriculture et le développement rural en Afrique, dans les Caraïbes et le Pacifique (Pays ACP).Le délai de réception des demandes est fixé au 2 juin...
The International Development Research Centre (IDRC), The Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation ACP-EU (CTA), the Humanist Institute for Cooperation with Developing Countries (Hivos) and the International Institute for Communication and Development (IICD) are inviting applications for the third round of the GenARDIS small grants programme.A Small Grants Fund to address Gender Issues in Information and Communication Technologies for Agricultural and Rural Development in Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific (ACP Countries).The deadline for receipt of applications is 2 June...
Last year Cornell University and partners put together a 'WorldAginfo' Design Team to test the premise that "new collaborative information technologies offer an exciting opportunity to transform agricultural education and information systems in Asia and Africa."The Team was charged by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to explore the landscape of agricultural education and information systems in Asia and Africa, and to come up with "a set of recommendations for areas of investment that have the potential to improve the lives of smallholders through better access to agricultural education, training and information."The 300+ page report - entitled Building Pathways out of Rural Poverty through Investments in Agricultural Information Systems - is now available online. It provides a...
Jan Chipcase writes about the pervasiveness of small engineering workshops in hyper industrialized Japan:
Wander around a Tokyo neighbourhood and you'll soon come across a small engineering workshop - part of the urban infrastructure and a skill base that enables small scale repair and manufacturing and is very much part of the flavour of living here..
Within SSA there is a worrying tendency to...
These days, India is a ‘boomtown’ of information and communication initiatives in agriculture and rural development. Mobile phones are fast reaching rural areas, phone centres are available in towns and villages, and government, private companies and civil society are experimenting with ways that information and communication technologies (ICTs) including the Internet can be used to benefit farmers and rural communities (see www.i4donline.net).One of the most interesting of these initiatives is happening near Madurai in southern India. Here, farmer associations, self-help groups, NGOs, Internet kiosks, banks, agricultural colleges, and international groups – like the Commonwealth of Learning (COL) – have come together to harness information, knowledge and ICTs for agricultural...
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