The dates: 27th November-1st
December 2023. The venue. The Edge Convention Centre, Nairobi, Kenya. Sweet
things first. Innovators get to walk away with 500K each, in shillings. 47 of
them, from all the 47 counties… on Jamhuri Day, 5 of them get to walk away
with… that’s for the President H.E. William Ruto to announce. The funding is to
enable them take their innovations to market and build viable businesses out of
the same. PIA – The Presidential Innovation Awards, the president is that
serious.
The Start-up sessions are a serious affair,
the titles a mouthful, the colon abused: (Session: Founder Stories: An
Exclusive Interview with Leading High Growth Start-ups: Learning, Pivoting and
Critical Decisions during and Unprecedented Accelerated Business Growth). Ok,
some of the lessons when scaling up: Ask for help; Believe in yourself;
Resilience; Change of Mind-set.
What’s the share of Bill Gates in
Microsoft? We are asked. We throw figures around: 30, 90, 50… the percentages…
Less than 2%, the speaker says (will have to Bing that up)… anyway, the lesson
being that: are you building something that’s bigger than yourself? Meaning
that you’ll have to let go of your baby at some point. That you’ll have to put
processes in place and trust people towards this. That is, by making your team
understand the vision of where you want to go.
Alexander Odhiambo, co-founder and CEO of
Solutech Limited, has an interesting take on start-up dynamism. Theirs has been
steady but sure growth, retaining 99% of their clients (a KPI) before even
thinking of outwards expansion by seeking even more clients. Moreover, they
have built their business upwards by bootstrapping, rather than getting
external funding… less stressful, that way… something for entrepreneurs to
ponder about.
The moderator: Harry Hare, Founder CIO
Africa. Other panellists: Ken Njoroge, Co-founder, Cellulant… Zena Msonde,
Founder, HASHTECH… back to Alexander, he admits he used to get stressed when
his competitors got heavy external funding… MarketForce, Twiga Foods… ‘What are
people seeing that I am not seeing?’ The question. This as his friends – seeing
things on his behalf – would tag him on this.
There is agreement in the ballroom that
scaling is not easy at all and that one has to be careful every step they take.
That one has to work on disrupting themselves before they are disrupted by the
market… be on the move, thinking of that thing that will get you out of the
market… Share your ideas with as many people as possible as not everyone is as
passionate as you in bringing your idea to life (otherwise, if entrepreneurship
was easy, everyone would be doing it… damn NDAs!). Again, Nike style… Just do
it! Start!
Other pointers… trust yourself; trust your
idea; trust God; trust the process… (cliché) it’s always impossible until
someone does it… Again, a bit of luck comes to play… necessity being the mother
of invention (and dreams, the father of innovation – my coinage; proper citation:
‘Dreams are the father of innovation’ – Sant Mark, 2023)… That Estonia, a
country of 1.2 million souls, operating at -5°C (negative five degrees) most of
the year, has 11 unicorns… Skype, Bolt, DX5…
Another Session: The Reality of the Effect
of an Entrepreneurship Journey on Mental Health. The Moderator, Kendi Ashitiva,
Co-founder, Niskize Counselling Company… she shares those memes, how others
sleep, how an entrepreneur sleeps (… did I answer that email… I NEED FOOD… The
Simpsons)… an entrepreneur’s day that is depressive-manic… such and such…
The panellists: Dr. Mandela Kibiriti, Chief
Medical Officer, BYONB… Sam Gichuru, Founder and CEO, Kidato School (you
probably know him at the Nailab… and his inspiring story where he ‘started
life’ as part of an ‘exhauster’ crew – political promises, yesterday’s wheels
on meals, honey sucker… the lingo)… June Odongo, CEO and Founder, Sengo
Technologies… apologies first.
Apologies, first… Sam Gichuru gives us some
context on entrepreneurs vis-a-vis mental health. You remember Kuna Foods? Probably,
you were among the trolls that was KOT (then, now Kenyans on X) that made fun of
the founder… how his was a stupid idea, that he couldn’t compete with chapo-dondo
and the food-kiosk model where you could do ‘surua’… Kenyans can be brutal…
Anyway, Sam has us do the maths. Of how the 1million dollars was used.
1million dollars = 150 million bob. The
founder’s salary? Let’s cap it at 500k a month… in the one year of Kuna Foods
existence that’s 12million bob. We remain with 138million bob… where did it go?
To our brothers and cousins and neighbours… as boda-boda delivery guys, his
staff, the petrol station ecosystem, the government… money circulating in the
economy and creating jobs that he had brought into the country… nope, we kick
him when he is lying flat on the ground.
Kuna Foods, it resonates with me… around
the same time, a neighbour had an accident. A boda-boda rider… some of us
visited him – the men, some didn’t . Some of the women, they said, he was
haughty and ‘passed’ people without greeting them… my neighbour, she was among
them. Let’s call her Mama Jayden… anyway, another replied, ‘This morning, Baba
Jayden passed by me without greetings, as usual…’ Quickly shutting Mama Jayden
– that when you point at someone, the other four fingers are pointing at you…
Anyway, that was the nature of Baba Jayden, the silent type… you get the point.
Kuna Foods, on behalf of KOX, we are sorry
and shame on us… we now know better. Gems shared during the session? Do things
necessary for the business to grow (likened to eating glass) so that you can
savour the things that made you get into business in the first place.
Fundraising is really stressful. People talk when you get funding and when you
fail, but not the in-between. That you have to learn to celebrate failure as
this ups your chances of success.
Others… That the traits that bring one to
entrepreneurship are the ones that predispose you to mental health issues
(could be said of Creatives)… That, if you are to build a billion dollar
company, you’ll have to solve a billion dollar problems… That you are not your
company, hence don’t carry its successes and its failures… The clincher? That
the markets, currently on the down, are opening up in 2024… time to position
yourself. (All the money in the world is still there, it will circle back)
Session: Planning for and Executing a
Successful Exit Strategy. The moderator, Stephen Gugu, Founder, Viktoria
Venture. Panellists: Eston Kimani, Founder, Africa’s Talking, and ChatSasa;
Caroline Wanjiku, CEO, Digital Village Africa… Eston has an apt metaphor about
entrepreneurship… ‘Entrepreneurship is like going to war… you shed blood, sweat
and tears. Even when you win, you are still wounded.’
Pointers from the discussion: Work on your
mental resilience, for instance, run a marathon so that you learn to cut some
slack for yourself… embrace failure and success… exit strategies include IPOs,
mergers/acquisitions, leaving the business to the managers, estate succession…
in all, always work with professionals (valuers, lawyers, etc… and cheap is
expensive) while exiting.
More pointers: Give it an honest shot… some
ideas will work, some will not… but we are working towards a better Africa.
Work on yourself as an entrepreneur and on your business and find a balance.
Join various programmes. Being a profit-focused business helps you have a sense
of the right direction and super-focus on customers. Have a de-risking strategy
by increasing your floor (de-risk yourself as we live in a world that’s very
unpredictable). Be a bit more generous when giving out equity (the cleaning/tea
lady got 300K USD!). Lastly, companies are bought, not sold!
A bit on pitching: What’s your impact?
Which SDGs are you touching? Have you addressed the risks you see in your
business? Where do you make the money (business model, ensuring the Lowest
Common Denominator is not left out? That would be us, ‘kabambe’ phone users,
with our USSDs, e.g., *254#... Do you have a convincing elevator pitch? What’s
your go-to-market strategy? How do you protect your idea? What is your Customer
Acquisition Cost? Lifetime Value of the customer? The take-home message from
the celebrated industrialist who has supported young innovators over the years,
Manu Chandaria, ‘Innovation is not a monopoly of any nation.’
NB: Meanwhile, I have a small ask:- I am
running a campaign that will enable me launch my two books in February, end,
2024. I humbly ask of your donations of 20KES/20Kshs/20bob, towards this. The
campaign is dubbed #20BobSanaa. Thanks in advance. You can also support by
liking and sharing this content, or by buying these books using the following
links:
‘A Funeral Dress for
Nyasuguta’ available at: https://nuriakenya.com/product/a-funeral-dress-for-nyasuguta-by-mark-mwangi/
‘Love Told, Poetry
Souled, Family Bold’ – available on Amazon Kindle at http://shorturl.at/hzALY
Buy Good Till Number: 9080911, Gatere Mwangi
Send Money: 0708 276 622, Mark Gatere
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