Mental Model Monday: Important? Knowable?
I often rush into things. Work shows up on my desk or I read an article and I think its the next big thing or risk for my team. I spend time picking at the tip of it, before reaching…
Kenya Telco Stats 2016
Here’s a summary from the Communications Authority of Kenya on sector performance and trends on the key segments of mobile telephony and electronic transactions for the financial year 2016/2017 (July – September): Mobile Telephone Subscriptions: 38.5M subscribers, down from 39.7M. A decline of 3.0% from…
Mental Model Monday: AutoCatalysis (Delayed Again!)
I quite like this model. Autocatalysis is a model from chemistry, which occurs when a reaction speeds up on its own. Essentially one reaction creates another, which creates another, so on and so forth until at some point it tapers out. In business,…
Data Privacy and Why I Sometimes Get Mad at Donors
I read many articles out there on how mobile finance startups are abusing people’s data and people need to be careful of the startups that are offering mobile finance products. I think this attitude is generally bad for the people…
Mobile Is Massive for Africa
I lived in Tanzania for five and a half years. In that time, I saw some phenomenal changes in the penetration of mobile products. I pulled some stats today to show what I mean. In 2009, when I…
Mental Model Monday: Scale
Being bigger is better. We’re seeing this in the tech world right now, where companies like Facebook, Uber, Amazon and Google have reached scale and are dominating all their competitors. The gist of this is that companies can reach a…
Mental Model Monday: Charlie’s View
I’m a big fan of Charlie Munger and think a lot of what he writes is pure gold. Today I’m busy launching a product in Rwanda, so don’t have much time to write. Instead, I give you something far better,…
MNO & Start-up Collaboration
MNOs are the digital distribution network in Africa. They’ve invested massively in laying out cables and towers, and they’ve done a great job of it. Mobile penetration is increasing across Africa, and 3G is becoming more readily available. Read the…
Mental Model Mondays: Prioritization of Lists
Sure, this might sound like common sense. Writing down lists and prioritizing what’s on them is pretty standard getting things done 101. It’s what most people do. So here’s a twist on one that I think helps my lists. It’s…
M-Kopa and Fintech in Kenya
I really respect The Economist trying to write about Fintech in Africa without focusing on M-Pesa. Usually the narrative about Africa is pretty stale. However; this article focuses on M-Kopa, an asset financing company that started out with solar lamps. M-Kopa’s…