Kenya – KigaliTech

Facebook announces winners of 2021 Community Accelerator Program in Africa

Facebook announced the winners of the 2021 Facebook Community Accelerator Program, highlighting the 13 Facebook community leaders from Nigeria, South Africa, and Kenya who will receive training, mentorship and up to $50,000 USD in funds to invest in an initiative that extends their community’s positive impact. The 13 winners emerged out of over 13,000 applicants who entered the competition.

The Community Accelerator is part of Facebook’s Community Leadership Program, a program to help leaders harness the power of their community to turn impactful ideas into action. Leaders will learn how to harness the power of their community to turn impactful ideas into action. This year’s cohort features a diverse spectrum of communities engaged in interesting social impact activities ranging from combating child sexual abuse to helping moms and sharing stories of ordinary and extraordinary Nigerians from around the world.

“We are excited to announce the 13 Facebook community leaders in Africa who have been helping to resolve social challenges, empowering their audiences with knowledge while connecting with others that share their interests or passion for a cause.” Kiran Yoliswa, Partner Management Lead, Middle East and Africa Community Partnerships at Facebook said . “At Facebook, we are committed to helping people realise their full potential through initiatives like this. We want these community leaders to use the Facebook platform to drive change and provide support and encouragement for thousands of people. We are impressed with the outcome of this year’s Community Accelerator and we look forward to helping our 2021 community Accelerator winners amplify their influence for greater work.”

Community leaders from across Nigeria, Kenya and South Africa as part of the Facebook Community Accelerator include:

Achimugu Elizabeth, Protect The Child Foundation from Nigeria: Protect The Child Foundation is committed to protecting and defending the innocence of children against all forms of sexual abuse and exploitation. Our vision is to have a world that is safe for children to live in. A world free from child sexual abuse and all forms of abuse.

Godwin Juliet, Naija Graphic Designers from Nigeria: Established in 2008, this creative community connects the graphic design industry in Nigeria and beyond with the aim of supporting, up-skilling and offering opportunities for graphic designers to raise industry standards. The community connects employers with freelancers, as well as supporting women creatives.

Izevbokun Osamakue, Mothers, Kids And More from Nigeria: Impactful community empowering Nigerian and African women (and their children) to help each other to progress in their personal and professional lives. The community’s aim is to extract and recognise the potential within and without, and empower women to reach out to other women when they need help. Their long-term mission is to have the opportunity to have a centre where women can come in and get empowered.

Michael Louisa, Natural Hair Babes from Nigeria: Large community focused on natural hair, sisterhood and cultural and economic empowerment for Nigerian women and girls. They created an entrepreneurial sales network in November 2020 when we launched our flagship product, a natural hair herb which is very effective in the maintenance of natural hair, so far, 160 women have been empowered as distributors.

Mwaniki Sam, Teachers’ Notice Board Kenya from Kenya: This group is geared towards national cohesion and integration by bringing together teachers, trainees and tutors from all Teacher Training Colleges in Kenya to build relationships, share job vacancies and promote businesses.

Nworah Martin, Tales of Nigerians from Nigeria: Tales of Nigerians is an emotional support and mental wellness community where members have a safe space to share their real life experiences. Through community events, trainings’ and on-ground outreach, we have directly impacted around 20,000 members. Our positive impact for the long-term is to continue equipping our growing members with the right tools to grow their emotional intelligence, mental wellness and synergy with other members.

Ogudoro Peter, Nigerian Teachers from Nigeria: This community for Nigerian teachers has the big ambition of changing the country’s education system one teacher at a time. Community is made up primarily of teachers who are not receiving good training services from their employers for the very important jobs they do. The community is focused on helping them to acquire the skills they need to make Nigeria’s education system globally competitive.

Olisa Enoch, Prepare for JAMB UTME from Nigeria: Prepare for JAMB UTME helps students prepare for Nigeria’s university admission exam with learning resources and news. Their long-term mission is to have all the learning resources (exam syllabus, quizzes, study notes, videos, question and answer forum) all in one place, which members should be able to access freely or through a subscription service.

Philip Udeochu, Portfolio 9 (Community) from Nigeria: is a Digital Entrepreneurship and Empowerment Platform (DEEP) with a mandate to bring entrepreneurship and vocational education to people at the bottom of the pyramid in Africa using social media. P9’s mission is to make entrepreneurship accessible by ‘simplifying’ and ‘innovatively’ delivering it to everyone’s doorstep through collective and interactive learning and support, using social media systems and tools. P9 has supported the learning needs of a growing community of over 500k members (currently).

Ramuada Tshililo, South African Arts & Culture Youth Forum from South Africa: SAACYF is a community that trains and empowers underprivileged artists from township and rural areas in South Africa through partnership with other organisations, businesses and governments. Their aim is to make Arts, Culture & Heritage opportunities accessible to poor disadvantaged artists through job creation.

Splinters Lucretia, The Official Ocean View/Slangkop Group from South Africa: Ocean View (originally named Slangkop) was established in 1968 by the apartheid government as a township for forcibly removed coloured people. The community is historically disadvantaged, poverty-stricken and affected by a wide range of social ills. The FB group fosters safety and security, as well as delivering education, hospital care, feeding and community upliftment programmes to empower the local population.

Urhefe Ofejiro, Naija Nurses Forum from Nigeria: Established in 2012, this is a community for nurses across Nigeria who collaborate in providing quality and accessible healthcare services to individuals, whilst supporting each other and sharing best practices in their profession.

Wala Amakove, Wanderlust Diaries Ltd from Kenya: brings together a community of travellers to share stories. Founded during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic in April 2020, this mega community of African travellers promotes eco-tourism in Kenya and other African countries as a driver for community development.

To develop their community, all of the selected leaders spent five months learning from experts, coaches, and a customized curriculum. They learned community identity foundations, leading action-oriented programmes and sustainability. They also had early access to new Facebook products aimed at helping communities better manage and activate their members.

What participants will do?

Strengthen their community: Learn from experts, coaches and a customized curriculum so their community can work better together.

Plan your initiatives: Identify important initiatives that will create a positive impact on the broader world and develop a plan to mobilize their community around their goals.

Execute: Collaborate on their initiatives with top advocates and leaders in the community space and utilize new products aimed at helping them manage and activate their members.

www.facebook.com

Microsoft to partner with Kenya and African governments to transform education for Millions of students

Microsoft has committed to collaborate with the Ministry of Education in Kenya as well as governments across Africa to transform the education sector.

During an event in London by The Global Partnership for Education (GPE) and hosted by hosted by the UK Government and President Kenyatta of Kenya, Microsoft acknowledged the importance of public and private partnership to enable educators and education leaders to best use technology to dramatically enhance learning and improve outcomes.

“Microsoft has formidable partnership with the Kenya’s Ministry of Education and all its stakeholders that spans over two decades,” said Angela Nganga Microsoft Education Industry Lead, MEA Emerging Markets. “We affirm our commitment to addressing the urgent challenges presented by the global pandemic but most importantly be a strategic and resourceful partner in designing scalable and sustainable solutions for the education sector.”

Since the onset of Covid, digital transformation of education to enable access to quality education has become more critical than ever. At the same time, education financing is at risk as countries have scrambled to rally public funds to support health systems and investments. To address this critical challenge, Microsoft is proud to be working together with the Global Partnership for Education (GPE), the largest global fund solely dedicated to transforming education in lower-income countries.

GPE recently convened governments and the private sector at the highest level online and in London, to commit to education funding of $5 billion over the next 5 years, along with commitments from GPE partner countries on domestic financing for education.

The event attended online and in person by Heads of State from countries including Ghana, Afghanistan, and Nigeria, as well as several European nations, and parts of the private sector also included a round table focusing on the growing role business partners and philanthropy play in addressing challenges related to girls’ education and data.

Led by Julia Gillard, former Australian Prime Minister and Helen Grant, UK’s Special Envoy for Girls’ Ed, this discussion included Microsoft’s Steve Beswick, Education Director for Europe, Middle East & Africa. Heads of State from several countries were in attendance for the meeting in addition to Kenya, including Ghana, Afghanistan, and Nigeria along with serval European leaders.

‘Microsoft is proud to be working with Global Partnership for Education for this new phase of education transformation. We are excited to engage in the Education Data Leadership program (EDLP), an important initiative to enable education systems to gather more accurate education data, analyze it and make use of it in effective decision-making. It will capitalize on the existing investment we are making in countries supported by GPE.” said Beswick.

“Microsoft is one of our highly valued allies in the drive to address partner countries’ needs for strong, clear and actionable education data. Colleagues from Microsoft contributed their expertise to the Education Data Solutions Roundtable, including in developing guidelines for strengthening education management information systems. Now this business partner is similarly providing in-kind its technical know-how to the new Education Data Leadership Program – which will boost the data skills/capabilities of education ministries. Those skills can be game-changing, and we’re delighted to have this strong working partnership with Microsoft to help advance education system transformation.” Noted Alice Albright, Chief Executive Officer of GPE.

The EDLP aims to support partner countries to strengthen data competency and enhance its education data management systems. Collaborating with business and country partners, the EDLP will provide the Data Boot Camp to the Ministry of Education data teams—professional development sessions that will elevate skills and produce data leaders. The Bootcamps aim to develop a generation of high-performing education data scientists in GPE partner countries. For the EDLP, the initial key countries identified are Kenya, Uganda, Tajikistan, Nepal, and DRC.

Through Microsoft Office 365 A1 for Education, offered for free to education systems, Microsoft is already supporting GPE beneficiary countries by providing Microsoft Office 365 A1 for Education at no cost to education systems, with an estimated value of several million dollars per year. The EDLP will enable Ministries of Education to leverage data available to them in Office 365 to gain insight into teaching, learning and administration taking place in schools using the platform.

Microsoft will also bring together training and support based around Microsoft’s platform for digital skills training, Microsoft Learn as well as Open Edu Analytics a fully open-sourced data integration and analytics architecture and reference implementation for the education sector.

www.microsoft.com

Cyberattacks in Africa comparable to other parts of the globe, says Kaspersky

With digital transformation a top priority on the corporate agenda as companies identify new ways to grow their business, cyber attackers and opportunist cybercriminals remain very active. And although Africa is not necessarily considered a focus area for the more sophisticated types of cybercriminal activity such as targeted attacks or advanced persistent threats (APTs), the continent is certainly not immune to these or other types of cyber risks, warn Kaspersky researchers.

When looking at the general cyberthreat landscape as it impacts consumers and businesses, Kaspersky research shows that in 2020, worldwide, approximately 10% of computers experienced at least one malware attack. Interestingly, in some African countries, including South Africa, the figure was only slightly under the global 10% average, making the African region comparable to that of North America or Europe in terms of cyberattacks. On some parts of the continent, in countries like Liberia Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco as examples, Kaspersky has seen a slightly higher rate, while other parts show a lower rate – a 5% or 6% average. For the first quarter of 2021, the figures are only slightly lower than 10%, both in relative and absolute terms.

Says David Emm, Principal Security Researcher at Kaspersky; “Generally speaking, and based on our research, Africa has the same hit rate as we would see for other parts of the globe when it comes to cyberattacks and activity. This only emphasises that the cyber threat landscape truly does incorporate the whole globe where no continent or country is free of this growing danger and where all consumers, businesses and industries alike need to pay attention to effective cybersecurity measures – and especially during the current pandemic and resultant turbulent times.”

In South Africa, Kenya and Nigeria, Kaspersky’s research has identified the top malware families as ransomware, financial/banking trojans, and crypto-miner malware. When comparing Q1 2021 with Q2 2021, Kaspersky saw a 24% increase in ransomware in Q2 2021 in South Africa, as well as an increase of 14% in crypto-miner malware. In Kenya and Nigeria, Kaspersky saw a large increase in financial/banking trojans in Q2 2021 when compared to the figures for Q1 2021 – a 59% increase in Kenya and a 32% increase in Nigeria.

While on a technical level, not much has changed when it comes to cyberattacks, what is different is that the pandemic presents a persistent topic in which the world has a vested interest in. So, unlike the Olympics or Valentine’s Day which are limited in terms of a timeline, the pandemic offers a wealth of opportunities for cybercriminals to use malware to attack. Everything from the daily numbers and lockdown restrictions to vaccinations, hackers are leveraging on every aspect of the current situation to compromise systems.

“While the bulk of attacks are still speculative and randomly targeting individuals and businesses, there is a shift happening with the increase of APTs and more strategically targeted based attacks. These use continuous, clandestine, and sophisticated hacking techniques to gain access to a system and remain inside for a prolonged period, with potentially destructive consequences. Because of the time and effort required to perpetrate such an attack, these are often levelled at high value targets, such as nation states and large businesses,” adds Emm.

Furthermore, another concern is that as the cyberthreat landscape evolves, the nature of malware is changing.

Continues Emm; “Take ransomware as an example. In the beginning, it was very random targeting as many people as possible hoping for a relatively small amount of money paid in ransom. During the past five years, there has been a shift with a decline in the number of ransomware families being developed as well as an overall global decline in attacks. However, attackers are now focusing on specific companies and individuals where they can get the maximum benefit. The new approach of ransomware is to expose data, negatively impacting the reputation of a company. To this effect, financial crime has become more sophisticated and organised.”

Financial institutions a top targeted industry

The financial services sector remains a top targeted industry in Africa when it comes to cybercriminal activity and such cyberthreats – not surprising when one considers the digital first approach this sector continues to take, driven by the needs and expectations of its customers.

“It is relatively easy for a hacker to target an individual and capture passcodes, one-time passwords, and install malware on their computers to get financial information. Increasingly, this is expanding to financial institutions given the sheer number of new entrants in the market emerging. For hackers, online or cyber fraud offers direct monetisation of an attack and gives them access to money as quickly as possible,” adds Emm.

Financial based malware and cyberattacks are also becoming more targeted, complicated, and difficult to prevent, and with digital transformation progressing at a rapid rate within such a sector, there is no shortage of attack surfaces for cybercriminals to exploit.

“In a world where cybercrime remains rife and is only fuelled by aspects like the pandemic, there is never a moment one should not consider the implications of a cyberattack, especially as the cyberthreat landscape evolves and become even more targeted and sophisticated than it was a mere few years ago. Cybercrime is a business. This means that consumers and companies alike must remain vigilant against an increasing attack surface. Not only does this entail a more focused cyber training approach for staff within an organisation, but also using the latest technologies that feature artificial intelligence and machine learning for accurate and proactive protection and prevention in real-time,” concludes Emm.

www.kaspersky.com

African projects among 30 new AI for Social Good projects to be supported by Google

Working in partnership with Google.org and Google’s University Relations program, their goal is to help academics and nonprofits develop AI techniques that can improve people’s lives — especially in underserved communities that haven’t yet benefited from advances in AI. They reported on the impact of six such projects in 2020. And today, Google is sharing 30 new projects that will receive funding and support as part of their AI for Social Good program.

During the application process, Googlers arranged workshops involving more than 150 teams to discuss potential projects. Following the workshop meetings, project teams made up of NGOs and academics submitted proposals which Google experts reviewed. The result is a promising range of projects spanning seventeen countries across Asia-Pacific and Sub-Saharan Africa — including India, Uganda, Nigeria, Japan and Australia— focused on agriculture, conservation and public health.

In agriculture, this includes research to help farmer collectives with market intelligence and use data to improve crop and irrigation planning for smallholder farmers. In public health, we are backing projects that will enable targeted public health interventions, and will help community health workers to forecast health risks in countries such as Kenya, India and Uganda. We’re also supporting research to better forecast the need for critical resources like vaccines and care, including in Nigeria. And in conservation, we’re supporting research to help understand animal population changes, such as the effect of poaching on elephants, and gorillas. Other projects will help reduce conservation conflict and poaching, including human-elephant conflict in Kenya.

Each project team will receive funding, technical contributions from Google and access to computational resources. Academics in this program will be recognized as “Impact Scholars” for their contributions towards advancing research for social good.

Google have seen the impact these kinds of projects can make. One of the nonprofit leaders supported by the program last year, ARMMAN founder Dr. Aparna Hegde, has received AI research support from IIT Madras and Google Research to improve maternal and child health outcomes in India. The team is building a predictive model to prevent expectant mothers dropping out of supportive telehealth outreach programs. Results so far show AI could enable ARMMAN to increase the number of women engaged through the program by 50%, and they have received a second Google.org grant to enable them to build on this progress. Dr. Hegde says the program is “already showing encouraging results — and I am confident that this partnership will bring immense benefits in the future.”

Congratulations to all the recipients of this round’s support. Google is looking forward to continuing to nurture the AI for Social Good community, bringing together experts from diverse backgrounds with the common goal of advancing AI to improve lives around the world.

www.blog.google

VOGSY and Incentro partnership to boost productivity and profitability in the services industry in Africa

VOGSY, the quote-to-cash Professional Services Automation solution built for Google Workspace users, and Incentro Africa, the Nairobi-based branch of the full digital service company called Incentro, announced today their new partnership. Through VOGSY’s global Partner Program, Incentro Africa will help its customers across Africa harness VOGSY’s unique Google Workspace integrated platform to run their quote-to-cash operations and enhance productivity and profitability. The partnership will also expand VOGSY’s global reach.

A Google Cloud premier partner, Incentro Africa specializes in enterprise work transformation services enhanced by Google Cloud. Incentro Africa is proactive in always looking for new partnerships and solutions to benefit customers and boost their productivity even further. Many of Incentro’s existing customers were looking for a fully integrated solution at an affordable price and Incentro aims to provide this through its partnership with VOGSY. According to Dennis de Weerd, Incentro Africa’s CEO, supplying VOGSY’s ERP system to Incentro Africa’s customers represents a major advantage in transforming their productivity, team collaboration and efficiency.

“VOGSY gives our customers the ability to streamline and manage their quote-to-cash processes from all sales, operations and accounting sides with a single tool that integrates with Gmail, Drive, Docs, Sheets and Slides, achieving the ultimate real-time collaboration and transparency throughout service delivery,” de Weerd said.

As the only Professional Services Automation platform created for Google Workspace as well as the leading quote-to-cash ERP solution, VOGSY is a singular tool that packs significant value for services firms. Elimination of destructive work silos, intuitive UX, real-time business data including project budgets, margins and financial KPIs as well as built-in scalability and security are some of the main benefits VOGSY’s CEO Mark van Leeuwen aims to bring to Incentro Africa’s professional services customers.

“As professional services firms undertake digital transformations, they require forward-thinking partners and access to tools that provide actionable data and real collaboration whether they’re two feet or continents apart. VOGSY is proud to align with the like-minded professionals at Incentro Africa and work together to ensure the efficiency, profitability and sustainability of services firms in the digital era.”

Plan, track and optimize your clients, deals, projects, resources and revenue all within the comforts of the Google Interface you know and trust. Try for free here.

With over 10 years of proven expertise in technical consultation and related services, Incentro, the only Google Premier Partner in East, West and Central Africa has become the go-to partner for successful business transformation in the continent.

From Enterprise Collaboration, Cloud Migration and Smart application development, we proudly serve over 26 countries in Africa and are growing. Whatever your ambition is, we’ll aim for maximum impact. We dive deep into your organization, challenge your plans, build solutions swiftly and make sure they work.

Please feel free to visit our website or send an email to Customer Success Manager Elizabeth Akinyi – liz@incentro.com.

www.incentro.com
www.vogsy.com

Africa is ready to fight covid-19 with seven innovative data projects

Agence Française de Développement (AFD) “Shared Innovation” series highlights innovative programs created or developed in our partner countries to combat covid-19.

AFD, Expertise France and The GovLab have launched call for projects that will use data to combat Covid-19. The goal is to unlock the potential of under-exploited data, as part of the #Data4COVID19 challenge – with a focus on Africa. This call for innovative, data-based proposals aims to address the economic, social and health challenges caused by Covid-19 across the continent. Some 80 project proposals were submitted. Here are the seven winners.

An early warning system to identify disease outbreaks; an analysis of how the crisis has affected students; the identification of missed opportunities for testing vulnerable populations. What do they all have in common? Data.

Data is essential to better understand the different aspects of the crisis and the pandemic. Data can be used to implement policies designed to help communities across the African continent.

And yet, there is too much data that, despite being open and available, lies unused in digital archives. In order to exploit this data to benefit communities, AFD, Expertise France and The GovLab launched the #Data4COVID19 challenge, with a focus on Africa.

More than 80 project proposals were received and reviewed, with the help of a panel of independent data science experts. Project winners obtain funding (the total budget for the seven projects is €567,000), and will gain access to an online platform through which they can interact directly with data science experts to discuss their work, find solutions collectively to the challenges faced, and share results.

This platform will facilitate peer-to-peer learning and help increase the impact and widen the influence of each project. Here’s a glimpse at the seven winning projects.

1. Improving Testing among vulnerable populations

Research Institute for Development

Mali

In Mali, Covid-19 testing among vulnerable populations is generally inadequate due to structural and socio-behavioral barriers. The purpose of this project is to quantify the missed opportunities for Covid-19 testing among vulnerable populations (particularly people living with HIV). The aim is to demonstrate that Covid-19 testing for these groups could be improved with appropriate use of the human and institutional resources available.

In short: a project to quantify missed opportunities for Covid-19 testing among vulnerable populations (particularly people living with HIV).

2. Assessing and minimizing the negative effects of the pandemic on students

Alioune Diop University of Bambey

Senegal

To combat the pandemic, the Senegalese government imposed protective measures in the higher education sector that are likely to have a negative impact on the quality of education provided. To what extent have higher education students been affected by these measures? Could this have an effect on their academic and professional performance? Can a student’s environment have an impact on their results? This project aims to answer all these questions, with a view to finding appropriate solutions to limit the negative effects of health measures on students’ quality of education.

In short: a project to assess how higher education students have been impacted by the crisis and to develop appropriate solutions.

3. Understanding determinants of behavior towards health measures

Nigeria Center for Disease and Control

Nigeria

Nigeria was hit hard by a second wave of Covid-19, partly because people were less willing to adhere to government guidelines. In the first instance, the researchers aim to identify the social, economic and political factors that shape Nigerians’ individual perceptions and beliefs with regard to Covid-19. They will then examine how these perceptions and beliefs affect people’s behavior towards health measures.

In short: a project aiming to understand the political, economic and social factors that shape Nigerians’ individual perceptions and beliefs with regard to Covid-19, and how this affects their behavior.

4. Developing an African Covid-19 vulnerability index

Code for Africa

Nigeria and Senegal

The spread of Covid-19 and its new variants is worsening on the African continent due in part to the many health challenges that existed prior to the pandemic. This project aims to help policymakers to analyze the impact of these preexisting challenges more effectively, by providing them with up-to-date data and digital tools so that they can better plan their Covid-19 response. An African Covid-19 vulnerability index will be developed in coordination with Africa CDC.

In short: a project to develop an African Covid-19 Vulnerability Index, in coordination with Africa CDC, for use by policymakers to inform their decision-making processes with more accurate and up-to-date data.

5. Identifying the role of people’s perceptions in developing effective prevention programs

The Population Council

Kenya

Why are Covid-19 infection rates increasing in Africa? And in Kenya specifically? Do people’s perceptions of their vulnerabilities play a role? How does this affect their compliance with preventive behaviors amid the threat of Covid-19? The researchers aim to develop a better understanding of the causes of the virus’s spread by studying the nature of these perceptions among the social groups identified. The information collected will be used to develop targeted prevention, communication and information programs in key countries to control not only the current pandemic, but also any future outbreaks.

In short: a project to assess how perceptions of vulnerability to Covid-19 affect compliance with preventive behaviors, among the population subgroups identified.

6. Developing an early warning system to identify disease outbreaks

National Institute of Public Hygiene

Côte d’Ivoire

There are many people who, despite being infected with Covid-19, do not have recourse to health care services, making it difficult to detect many cases. This project aims to improve existing epidemic surveillance mechanisms, particularly among population groups with little or no access to health care services. The goal is to develop an early warning system to identify outbreaks and monitor the spread of diseases.

In short: a project to improve existing epidemic surveillance mechanisms through the development of an early warning system, with a particular focus on population groups with little or no access to health care services.

7. Using social networks to better understand citizens and promote compliance with prevention measures

Data Science Institute: Institut National Polytechnique Felix Houphouët-Boigny

Côte d’Ivoire

There are many obstacles to implementing suitable health care measures in response to the pandemic, such as difficulties determining the right measures to adopt and assessing their impact, as well as the public’s mistrust in governments. By using anonymized data from social networks, this project intends to gain a better understanding of people’s expectations and concerns regarding health measures. This research aims to help the authorities regain public trust and implement a more effective policy response.

In short: a project to use anonymized data from social networks for a better understanding of people’s expectations and concerns regarding government measures in response to Covid-19 (curfews, lockdowns, etc.), in order to restore public trust in the authorities.

www.afd.fr

Meet Stephan Eyeson, Founder & CEO of Survey54

British-Ghanaian entrepreneur, Stephan Eyeson, is current CEO and Founder of pan-African consumer intelligence gathering firm, Survey54.

Could you tell us about your company?

Survey54 was launched in 2019 and is a market research outfit that uses AI-powered insights to collect data and interpret consumer habits. What we do is help companies to understand African consumer tendencies and how this can affect their marketing plans and overall bottom line. We are operating right now mostly out of the UK and South Africa but our methods are fitted to global participation. As the company name implies, we are active in all 54 countries of Africa, but our highest areas of data insights are Nigeria, South Africa, Kenya and Ghana.

To which industries do you render your services?

The sectors that have so far benefited from our intelligence are FMCGs, Fintech, Healthcare and Food & Retail. Our clients tend to be international companies operating or making an entry into the African economy, but local organizations are very much in play as well.

How has the market responded to your services?

Positively, especially in South Africa. The current global health crisis we face has produced one silver lining – there’s an unprecedented surge in digitization in Africa. The need to have strong internet at home has gone from luxury to basic necessity. Home orders have shot up and digital interaction has generated more information on consumer behaviors than ever before. We have found this to be a positive trend and our feedback has reflected as much.

In what direction will the company be going Q2 2021?

We aim to expand our offering to purely consumer intelligence and will target expansion in Egypt, Mozambique and Rwanda. We are also working to partner with fintech companies to understand buying patterns and consumer habits within African consumers.

What makes your approach to consumer insights different from that of other existing firms?

We use various mobile and AI-backed technology to automate the consumer research problem. We also leverage different channels such as our mobile app, USSD, Voice and SMS to reach respondents in rural areas and those within cities. We are able to get respondents within minutes as we have a large database of participants across four major countries. We are purely focused on Africa which means we have templates that are tailored towards each country.

The AfCFTA took effect January this year. As your services span all 54 countries of Africa, how does this development impact your operations?

AfCFTA is very exciting for us. We plan to open up our research on consumers which will allow companies to make decisions on which countries they can buy and sell in based on demand. It’s safe to believe that this will be instrumental in companies making the right decisions.

What are the ambitions of Survey54 as a company?

Our goal long term is to be the largest holder of consumer insight on the continent. We’d also like to see a situation where we can make available our intelligence to SMEs as well as startups in Africa. At the moment we mostly work with large organizations that already recognize the need for consumer understanding, but the fact is that a lot of African startups fail because they go blindly into the market. This does not need to be the case.

What is the latest news from the company?

We are currently working on trackers that allow companies to understand and track real-time what Africans are consuming by the day as well as their eating habits. We are confident we’ll see this come into shape by year end.

If you are a company and in need of consumer intelligence data, feel free to directly contact

Stephan Eyeson

www.survey54.com

Incentro Presents: The future of work is here with Google Workspace, a free webinar

When: 22 April 2020

From: 12:00 – 13:30 EAT

Where: Online Webinar

For: CIO/CTO/ Senior IT Management of companies in Sub Saharan Africa

Looking back on 2020, it’s clear that the ways we work have rapidly transformed, from the shift to remote work to balancing time across work and personal responsibilities. This shift to remote work has also accelerated the demand for digitized processes since your business is now living in a distributed reality connected by the internet. But one thing hasn’t changed, businesses still rely on a staggering number of applications to get work done. Working from home and the associated pressures on productivity have only emphasized the need for fewer tools that do more, are easy to use from anywhere, and seamlessly integrate with other software

12:00–12:05 Virtual Welcome
12:05–12:30 Connect in one place with Google Workspace
12:30–12:50 Collaborate and share externally with Google Workspace
12:50–13:15 Design your future workflows with AppSheet
13:15–12:25 Digital Transformation Customer Story with Cellulant
13:25–13:30 Virtual Wrap Up

Speakers

Dennis de Weerd, CEO, Incentro Africa

Elizabeth Akinyi, Google Cloud Professional Collaboration Engineer and Deployment Specialist, Incentro Africa

Nick Treurnicht, Google Cloud Professional Collaboration Engineer and Deployment Specialist, DigiCloud

Simon Mukabana, Google Cloud Professional Collaboration Engineer and Cloud Architect, Incentro Africa

Join our webinar and learn the ins and outs of the the future of work with Google Workspace.

The webinar will be given in English and is relevant for every organization that wants to learn more about the future of work.

Click here to register

About Incentro

Incentro delivers innovative digital solutions, grounded by passion and happiness of employees, Incentronauts. 340 Incentronauts worldwide (The Netherlands, Spain, Kenya) are helping organizations to reach their digital goals.

Based on the maturity of clients, they setup an e-commerce environment which enables customers to deliver an awesome shopping journey and drive growth. They deliver a full range of services from strategy until conversion optimization for B2C and B2B focussed companies

Incentro Africa opened her door in Nairobi, Kenya, in 2017; The takeout on things was special: the company aimed for the delivery of fairtrade software solutions in Nairobi, the capital of Kenya. Our mission? To positively impact the lives of 10.000 Africans before the year 2022.

We continue to achieve this by bringing quality services and digital solutions to the (East) African market, supported by strong partnerships and growing local talent into product experts. We help organizations in developing their Cloud digital strategies in order to increase productivity and collaboration. We achieve this through our value propositions and expertise in enterprise collaboration, cloud migration, and developing smart applications.

Are you bold enough to step into the unknown? We are… and we dare you to do the same. We will be with you every step of the way. Not by making small changes but to truly do things differently – for a change!

From Enterprise Collaboration, Cloud Migration and Smart application development, we proudly serve over 26 countries in Africa and are growing. Whatever your ambition is, we’ll aim for maximum impact. We dive deep into your organization, challenge your plans, build solutions swiftly and make sure they work.

Please feel free to visit our website or send an email to Customer Success Manager Elizabeth Akinyi – liz@incentro.com.

www.incentro.com