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Airtel Uganda Introduces First Ever Data OTT Packs

By
GURU8 Staff
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0

Airtel Uganda has today launched Uganda’s first-ever data OTT packs that will enable subscribers to enjoy undisrupted connectivity by simply subscribing once and getting both data and OTT of the same validity.

Data OTT packs combine data and OTT Tax by maintaining the same data volumes of the selected bundles and simply adding OTT Tax to them. When an Airtel Uganda customer subscribes to this Data OTT pack, they will get a data bundle combined with OTT of the same validity as the bundle pack purchased. For example; daily 15MB will be purchased at UGX450 and it will include UGX250 for the 15MB plus UGX200 for the daily OTT – both valid for 24hours.

Commenting about the new product, Airtel Uganda Managing Director Mr. V.G. Somasekhar noted that, “Gone are the days when subscribers had data but could not connect because they had not paid their OTT and vice versa. With these new packs, we are bringing convenience to our subscribers whether they prefer daily, weekly or monthly data packs.”

“This is the first offering of this sort in Uganda and we are proud to lead the way when it comes to providing our subscribers with affordable, convenient and innovative telecommunications solutions,” he added.

To subscribe for the Data OTT packs, subscribers simply Dial *185*2# select Buy Data Bundles, select For Myself/For another number, select Data ONLY OTT Packs and finally select the pack of choice. Below are the products being offered under the Data OTT packs?

This announcement comes on the heels of a directive from the Uganda Revenue Authority, the tax body in Uganda, which changed OTT validity to 24 hours. Airtel Uganda also recently added more options to the OTT menu giving subscribers the ability to pay their taxes on a quarterly and annual basis.

This Infographic Shows The Dangers Of Click Fraud

By
Boses Muhinda
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0
click-fraud-stats

Click Fraud which is the practice of repeatedly clicking on an advertisement hosted on a website with the intention of generating revenue for the host website or draining revenue from the advertiser.

Click fraud is a crime because each click accrues as a cost to the advertiser, even though the clicks are driven by people who have no interest in the advertised product or service. According to the Infographic Google lost over $1 billion due to click fraud now imagine what it would do to a small agency.

Here are some key insights into click fraud;

click-fraud-stats

Infographic by Website Promoter

10 steps to a successful partnership with a custom software development vendor

By
Guest Writer
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0

No one ever hires a custom software development vendor without doing comprehensive research on a company first. We carefully weigh up all the pros and cons, check the client references, negotiate contracts for months to make sure this cooperation brings the desired results. However, is it enough to find a trusted software engineering company to skyrocket a project to success? What does it take to forge a successful partnership with your vendor?

Running a business and managing the product development process is hard, and it’s getting only harder when you need to do it from two sides and build connections between two teams: the on-site one and the offshore one. Granted, hiring a software development partner is a good strategic decision when you want to innovate and implement technology transformations. However, one should clearly understand that finding a reliable vendor isn’t enough for your outsourced project to be successful. What really matters is establishing a strong partnership with your provider to make your cooperation fruitful and mutually beneficial.

Once you settle on the software development vendor, here starts the journey. Below is what many entrepreneurs end up finding out the hard way by trial and error method.

1.  Choose the right engagement model

According to the Forrester report, in today’s customer-centric world, entrepreneurs should consider some new partnership models with their software development vendors such as extended team, managed team, managed services, and others in contrast to traditional staff augmentation and fixed-price models.

Fixed price projects work best when the requirements such as budget, scope, and deadlines are predefined. Rarely does it happen that all the requirements are clearly articulated from the start. That’s why, it is the least flexible model since it does not presuppose any possible changes, which usually appear in the process.

On the flip side, extended (or dedicated) development team model is an optimal choice for long-term projects with evolving requirements. You receive the team of software development professionals entirely focused on your project, define their workload, and have total control over the process. Moreover, it is highly flexible and fully adaptable to any changes. From our experience, we can say that dedicated development team model leads to the most sustainable results when it comes to outsourcing custom software development.

2.  Balance cultural and time-zone differences

To build a lasting partnership with a software development vendor, businesses need to make sure that offshore provider’s culture is close to theirs or at least they are ready to accept it. This concerns both ethnic divergences as well as unfamiliar business ethics.

For instance, Indian developers tend to overpromise when it comes to clients’ needs and ideas. They are not likely to question the client’s requirements and suggest some alternatives ways of product development. The specialists from Eastern Europe, by contrast, are more Western-oriented and like to ask questions and contribute to formulating a winning product strategy.

Regarding the differences in time zones, it is essential to be aware of the overlap hours with your software development partner and schedule regular meetings and planning sessions for both teams to be on the same page.

As you can see in this infographic, there is a significant time difference between the US and Asian countries such as China, India and the Philippines, while the overlap between the US and European countries, including Ukraine, is much more convenient. It is always possible to find at least a three-hour overlap to sync up the processes. Moreover, it is not always bad to have your offshore team far away from the on-site one, especially when your product needs 24/7 technical support.

3.  Clearly articulate your security standards

Naturally, small-sized companies don’t have well-developed security policies as they need specific expertise and substantial investments in time and resources. Thus, if security is critical for your project, you should choose a mature vendor that goes through recurrent audits of its security controls and policies and has the corresponding certificates (ISO 27001, PCI DSS, etc.).

The compliance must be verified by an accredited third party (e.g., once a year) that proves that the company meets international security standards. Moreover, the vendor should specify what administrative and technical controls they apply to ensure the integrity, availability, and confidentiality of the information assets.

In addition, you need to make sure that the contract with your vendor guarantees the protection of your data and intellectual property.

4.  Establish effective management processes

Even if you hire the best software engineering team, your project may be unsuccessful due to misaligned management. Managing distributed teams is challenging, and there are different approaches to doing it effectively. Sometimes clients entrust their vendor with leading a project, putting together the right team and controlling delivery. In such case, you need to make sure that the company you choose has an established management system which also complies well with your management practices. On the other hand, projects can be fully managed from the client’s side. Thus, the client takes on more risks and responsibility.

Today, there are many proven ways to manage an offshore team and make the working process productive and clear. The Agile methodology and Scrum, in particular, provide better transparency, greater flexibility, better results within the shortest time possible. Agile models meet the needs of today’s rapidly changing markets much better and lead to faster delivery of software.

5.  Build connections, integrate multiple teams

Before the project kick-off, there are a lot of things you need to align both at the technical and organisational levels to enable cross-team collaboration. If you work on this alongside your vendor, the process will be much faster and more efficient.

Firstly, you should ensure technology alignment as your distributed teams must share the same coding practices. If your teams are located in different time zones, you may build self-sufficient development centres that would work on separate modules and require less collaboration. Also, regular code reviews may help you control the code quality and will enable knowledge distribution.

Secondly, visiting your offshore partner will contribute to building tight-knit connections between your distributed teams. Seeing is believing: when you have a chance to come and see how your team operates you can better understand their pain points and current needs. This would help you bridge the distance and culture gap and become closer in terms of interpersonal connections.

6.  Keep communicating

Whatever it takes, you should strive to maintain healthy communication with your software development vendor. This would eliminate a bulk of issues and risks. A lot of offshore projects fail simply because of miscommunicated expectations, tasks, objectives, and needs.

Make sure you devote enough time to clearing things up with your vendor and your dedicated developers. There are a number of various team collaboration tools such as Confluence, Trello, Slack, Jira, Asana, and others. They can help you keep the processes in sync and will give you the level of control you require.

7.  Tap into the vendor’s expertise to innovate

Nowadays every company is a technology company. Even though today you may be developing a simple web application, in the future you will not do without innovative technologies like Big Data, VR, and AI. So if you choose a mature vendor with diverse tech expertise at the outset, you will be able to tap into it when needed.

Virtual Reality is widely used for employee training and product presentations, Big Data analytics can help you understand your customers better, machine learning allows companies to make predictions, optimize costs and gain a competitive edge. Developing all this expertise in-house is costly and time-consuming, especially if it is not your core business.

Leverage the knowledge of your offshore partner, and you will have access to all these technologies right when you need them.

8.  Control your outsourcing budget

In fact, the budget of the project is determined by the engagement model you choose. To avoid spending money like water, you should clearly understand the scope of your project and your final goal. For instance, it doesn’t make sense to employ a full-time IT architect or a UX designer if you need their services only during a certain period of time within a project. On the other hand, it is not reasonable to pay developers or QA specialists an hourly rate if they are going to be fully involved in the project and will work a 40-hour work week. Hourly rates are much higher than the monthly rates of dedicated engineers, so T&M contracts are not the best option for lasting partnerships.

As for the Fixed Price model, it works well for businesses who have a complete vision of the product, clearly defined requirements and know their target audience, industry and main competitors well. If there is no such clarity, no vendor will take on all these risks and the responsibility for product delivery by signing the fixed price contract.

9.  Choose a partner for long-term cooperation

Even if you seek an offshore team for a short-term project, let’s say, you need to develop a simple mobile application, you should consider the benefits you may gain from this cooperation in a long run. Chances are you will have some more projects to work on in the future. And when you have an offshore team that is already highly motivated and knows your business inside out, achieving success is much easier.

When you select a provider, you should always aim for long-term cooperation even if initially this is a short-term project. It is always easier to leverage your current provider for your next projects instead of looking for a new one.

It often happens that the dedicated offshore engineers stay longer on the project than the on-site employees. Therefore, they become the product knowledge holders and can share this expertise with people who join the team later. This is the biggest benefit of the dedicated development team model and the long-lasting partnerships.

10.                Build the relationship of trust

According to the report by the Project Management Institute (PMI), changing project goals account for 36% of failed projects, whereas changes in the plan don’t lead to failure. There is nothing worse than when your offshore team find themselves blindsided by unexpected changes you introduce on the strategic level as the project progresses. It is essential for the custom software development vendor to have a complete vision of a project. For a partnership to be truly successful, you should formulate short-term and long-term goals of a project right from the outset. It would help offshore specialists contribute to creating a winning product strategy and adapt the team as requirements are changing.

Every business owner wants the outsourced projects to be delivered on time and on budget, at the same time, maintaining the highest product quality. This is feasible only if you set up effective cooperation with your software engineering partner right from the start. The journey to building trust and establishing tight connections with your custom software development vendor isn’t going to be lightweight. But once you establish a successful partnership with your provider, it will pay off.

Start small and move forward stage by stage, and you will see that each step has a knock-on effect driving you in the right direction.

Guest Post By Marta Hlova

Marta Hlova is a creative Content Marketing Manager who works with N-iX to help businesses implement technology transformations. Marta believes that success comes to those who hustle and are always looking to learn new things.

How To Prepare For Big Growth: Scaling a Development Team in Fintech

By
Tetiana Boichenko
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0
Scaling a Development Team in Fintech

When fintech startups prove their idea feasible and start scaling operations, they start ailing from a shared pain. Quick and efficient extending of their teams along with hunting for the necessary talent may be a tall order.

As a result, fintech companies looking to scale up their development encounter the following hurdles:

Finding the suitable expertise for fintech development

58% of respondents of the UK fintech census mentioned engaging qualified and suitable talent as the most significant challenge for fintechs. Due to the galloping pace of IT development and consequently – a burning demand for high-end software engineers, the European Commission expects the shortage of IT-skilled staff could amount to 825,000 by 2020.

Source: FinTech Census 2017

Especially that concerns such in-demand specialists as blockchain developers, smart contract developers, data scientists, Machine learning engineers, and other rare experts that are now more and more frequently required for innovative fintech projects. For instance, we can see now many use cases of machine learning in fintech, and how demanded AI and machine learning talent is in fintech domain.

Painful HR activities in-house

What’s more, companies looking to scale up their software development often struggle with HR activities and communication issues. They call for additional effort, costs, and may distract the company from their core focus. And it seems more reasonable to outsource these additional competencies to an offshore or nearshore team.

Where and how to find fintech development talent

Many fintech companies search for a software development partner in Eastern Europe or Asia. Eastern Europe alone gives access to a rich talent pool of software engineers. For instance, CEE is home to over 789, 000 IT specialists, and Ukraine is alone home to 1,000 software development companies. For example, such fintech leaders as CurrencyCloud and Ratesetter cooperated with IT vendors from Eastern Europe.

Source: IT outsourcing destinations of Eastern Europe

When looking for a reliable software development company, pay attention to the following factors:

The available pool of specialists. If you want to extend your team quickly, choose mid-size and big companies with 500+ specialists. This way the experts can be easily reallocated to your project.

Also, the company should have solid brand recognition as it will help to find the necessary expertise easier. In fact, most fintech projects are interesting and challenging, and if you choose an established IT outsourcing company with a strong brand image on the market, it won’t be hard to find the development resources you are looking for, including senior software engineers.

The potential software development partner must have expertise in migration to microservices, secure and reliable API design, distributed architecture, and more.

Security can’t be compromised. A potential software development partner must be compliant with top security regulations, laws, and rules, follow the best global practices, and hold information security teams that will be responsible for following all the security procedures. For instance, a fintech company that accepts card payments, stores, processes and transmits cardholder data, must ensure it hosts their data securely with a PCI compliant hosting provider.

To ensure data protection and compliance with GDPR, a company can request the vendor to provide pseudonymization of the data. Pseudonymization is a de-identification procedure by which personal data is replaced by one or more artificial identifiers, or pseudonyms, and thus the IT vendor has no access to actual users’ personal data. Also, the customer can require the IT vendor to work remotely with its data without moving it to servers in Ukraine.

The vendor can offer the cooperation model that best fits needs of your fintech project. If the fintech company is looking to engage a team as a seamless part of their own one yet working remotely, dedicated development model (team extension) is the best option. What’s more, it is the best choice in terms of cost-efficiency for long-term fintech development projects as it allows you to have a more predictable price in the end. Before the project starts, you and the IT vendor decide upon a monthly cost per engineer allocated to your account. A software engineer is typically allocated full-time (160 hrs per month) with a long-term assignment duration (1+ year).

In addition, there is a delivery manager allocated to your account. They will be responsible for business processes integration, technology alignment, setting up, overseeing effective communication, and more.

Flexibility and scalability is another huge advantage. You can either hire a strong team of senior software engineers or engage middle and junior developers that will ensue tasks of your in-house senior engineers. You can scale up or down the team as necessary adding or removing technologies and specialists that work with them.

Fintech companies may choose different approaches to team augmentation. Some companies choose to grow in numbers and hire many junior and middle engineers, delegating minor tasks to their nearshore team. While others choose to empower their outsourcing team with core tasks and decision-making. Both options are fine, and your potential vendor must be able to do both. You can also start from something small, and then when you build the trust with your team, assign them with heavier duties.

Wrap-up

Finding and hiring fintech development talent in-house is painful, time-consuming and costly. What’s more, fintech companies may have very specific resource needs, and some  fintech software development experts may be very rare, for instance, blockchain or smart contract developers.

Thus, it makes sense to delegate some of your fintech software development tasks to a nearshore outsourcing vendor. In order to make your cooperation efficient, you need to choose a mature and reliable IT outsourcing partner and the most scalable and flexible cooperation model that best suits your fintech development project.

The World’s First Folding Phone by Royole is such a Stunner!

By
Joel Osekeny
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0

Royole Corporation, a company in China beat phone makers Huawei, LG and Samsung to produce and launch the Royole FlexPai, the world’s first folding smartphone.
In the latest press release by Huawei, a folding smartphone from the company was to be launched in mid-2019, with a support for 5G network, while Samsung announced to launch a similar device later this year as it ends. LG too is set to launch such a device in 2019.

 

However, a new innovator, with 6 years experience on the market, headquartered in California, United States launched its own folding smartphone last week. Royole corporation was founded by graduates of Stanford University in 2012.

 

The tablet looking smartphone is about 19.8cm screen size and a thickness of 7.8mm, with the ability to fold in half and have two displays on one side once the other end is folded backwards.

It comes with a 6gb RAM and an inbuilt 128 GB internal storage. Another variant of the same device had an 8gb RAM with an internal storage of 256 GB. There is also a provision for an SD card to extend storage capacity. It’s operating system, Water, is based on the latest Android 9 pie. The phone goes for about USD. 1,300 on the market.

What the election to Council of the International Telecommunication Union means for Uganda

By
Doryn Crystal
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0

On 5th November, Ugandan Minister of ICT and National Guidance Hon. Frank Tumwebaze along with other delegates successfully got Uganda elected to the International Telecommunication Union governing council at an event in Dubai (United Arab Emirates). Out of 177 votes, Uganda got 114 votes to be elected to governing council to join the other 12 countries that were selected from Africa and the 48 from the entire world.

The election means Uganda will be an ITU Council Member State elected for 2019-2023.

International Telecommunications Union (ITU) is the United Nations specialized agency for information and communication technologies – ICTs. The ITU was created in 1865 to manage international telegraph networks, but as new technologies were invented, the management of international radio frequency spectrum, broadcast signals, maritime and aeronautical mobile communications, and geostationary orbit slots for communications satellites became part of its mandate.

The role of ITU is to act as a catalyst in fostering cooperation among the States of the world in order to promote their participation in a global communication satellite system. It is by fostering such cooperation that the ITU can make its maximum contribution to the cause of world peace. It’s also supposed to consider broad telecommunication policy issues to ensure that the Union’s activities, policies and strategies fully respond to today’s dynamic, rapidly changing telecommunications environment.

ITU is committed to connecting all the world’s people – wherever they live and whatever their means. Through our work, we protect and support everyone’s fundamental right to communicate. In recent times, Uganda has increased its infrastructure to improve on the connectivity in the country and it’s joining the council will catalyse that agenda more.

Because ITU allocates global radio spectrum and satellite orbits, develop the technical standards that ensure networks and technologies seamlessly interconnect, and strive to improve access to ICTs to underserved communities worldwide, Uganda too is slated to be a direct beneficiary and also influence on the making of these policies.

The next council sitting of the 2019 Session will take place from 10 to 20 June 2019, in Geneva.

Raxio appoints Abdul-Rahman Baguma Ahmed Vice President- Technology and Operations

By
GURU8 Staff
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0

Raxio Data Centre Limited, the first privately owned co-location, Tier III, carrier-neutral data centre in Uganda, has appointed Abdul-Rahman Baguma Ahmed as Vice President of Technology and Operations. Mr. Ahmed is a Ugandan national with 15 years’ experience in large IT projects focused on data centre infrastructure planning, architecture, designing, implementing and management.

Since 2006, Mr. Ahmed has worked at MTN Uganda, the largest telco operator in Uganda. Most recently, since 2013, Abdul was the Infrastructure Manager in MTN’s Shared Services Division, covering Uganda, Zambia, Swaziland and Rwanda.

In his role, he oversaw and managed all the hardware infrastructure, network  infrastructure, provisioning and maintenance practices, security practices, disaster
recovery planning and execution, as well as general oversight of daily operations of
MTN’s data centres in those countries. Previously, as Data Centre Facilities Manager,
he also oversaw the design and development of new data centres for MTN and
modifications to existing ones.

Speaking on the appointment, the Raxio General Manager- James Byaruhanga said,
“Abdul’s appointment is timely as we prepare for the groundbreaking of the data centre
in Namanve before year-end. We believe his experience, expertise and skillset are
ideally suited to lead the technical implementation and management of such a unique
and state-of-the-art facility, that is expected to have a transformational impact on the
Ugandan economy.”

In acceptance of his appointment, Mr. Ahmed said, “I am more than excited to join
Raxio and be part of this iconic project that will set a new standard for IT infrastructure
in the country definitely change the way we do business, especially with regard to
business continuity and disaster recovery.”

This is a Press Release from Raxio Data Centre Limited

Econet Media Refocuses Business towards a Digital Future

By
Brian Code
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0

In order to maintain its position as a leader in broadcasting innovation in Africa, Econet Media has reviewed its business strategy and service offerings, to align them to changes in the global digital and satellite broadcasting sector, and growth in access to mobile and fixed broadband on the continent.

The strategy review will see Africa’s leading multiplatform broadcast network focus on three core services; Kwesé Free Sports (KFS), Kwesé iflix and Kwesé Play. KFS is Africa’s largest free-to-air TV service, Kwesé iflix is Africa’s leading mobile video-on-demand sports and entertainment platform while Kwesé Play is a leading-edge video streaming service with more than 200 sports, entertainment, kids and news channels including Red Bull TV, NBA, YouTube, TED and Bloomberg.

With increased focus on these three services, Econet Media will streamline its direct-to-home satellite television service with a reduction of third party channels available on the Kwese TV Bouquet, and the removal of Kwesé branded sports (excluding KFS) and general entertainment channels. The new bouquet will carry FTA, religious, and free news channels which will be available to viewers for a minimal administrative fee, in lieu of the monthly subscription fees. Kwesé subscribers who have already paid their subscriptions for November 2018, or in advance, will receive refunds.

The rationale for the changes is that Kwesé was launched at a time when the global pay television industry was in transition. Business models were evolving from traditional content rights linked to linear broadcast channels, to premium content rights moving towards digital media platforms.

During the transition, Kwesé has successfully built a satellite TV business with presence in 11 markets, a free-to-air business across 27 countries, delivered the 2018 FIFA World Cup Russia™ across Africa to a network of 115 sub-license broadcasters across 37 countries – reaching over 200 million households, acquired a controlling stake in a leading mobile video-on-demand service, and launched its own OTT service Kwesé Play.

The business has also managed to secure leading sports rights and general entertainment channels to build a compelling content offering across its platforms, making a significant shift in the continent’s complex and competitive media industry.

Having recognized the importance of carrying original local content, Econet Media will also establish its own content creation hub, Kwesé Studios. Through Kwesé Studios, Econet Media will invest in developing its own original programming and provide a platform for African producers, scriptwriters, actors and directors to tell authentic African stories on a pan-African broadcast network. These changes are in keeping with Kwesé’s commitment to providing affordable premium content, maintaining an innovative approach to content delivery and being attuned to audience viewing and purchasing habits.

As a consequence of the revised business model, Econet Media is also reviewing its operational structures across all markets where Kwesé TV has a presence which may result in changes to the company’s various business units. Joe Hundah, Group President and Chief Executive of Econet Media, says the business’ repositioning is perfectly timed in response to market trends.

“We believe these changes will safeguard the future success of our business as we continue to make an indelible impact on Africa’s media industry. The revised business strategy will also ensure that Kwesé TV continues to remain competitive within the industry. Refocusing our business offering across markets is a strategic move which aligns our business to OTT and video-on-demand trends which present significant growth opportunities for Kwesé. This renewed focus on digital services will see us provide new compelling offers for our customer’s enjoyment.”

“Additionally, through the development of the Kwesé Studios content hub, Econet Media will now have a legitimate claim to being the home of African content, as we will now create a place where Africans can tell their own stories and shape their own narrative.”

“Kwesé’s entry into the market had a game-changing impact on the media industry. With these

changes, we believe Kwesé will continue to positively disrupt the industry for the benefit of African consumers, as we continue to provide affordable premium content through digital media services.”

Daily OTT Subscription Is Now Valid For 24 hours Not Up To Midnight

By
Joel Osekeny
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0

The plea against the biting OTT tax has not reached deaf ears. Concerns from the society have been made to the government and telecommunication service providers to either stop charging the OTT tax while others asked for a change in the mode of payment.

Mobile telecommunication networks have adjusted the period upon which the tax will run. In a press statement MTN has released to the public, the telecommunication company has announced that the subscription for the tax will expire after 24 hours.

“With effect from 1st November 2018, the validity of your daily OTT tax of 200/=, has changed from midnight to 24 hours” reads the statement.

Tweeps used the announcement to also ask other telecommunication companies if the expiry for their OTT is also 24 hours.

“Hi, validity period for daily OTT is now 24 hours” reads a response airtel has made to one of the tweets.

Prior to this announcement, the tax no matter what time the user subscribed to it expired at midnight. Even when the user subscribed for the tax at 11pm, the expiry has always unfairly been midnight.

This change is a likely relaxation from the government and URA, the taxing body because it was the same authorities that required the telecommunication companies to end the data subscription at 11:59 pm.

Feedback from users have been positive including some users claiming that they are not going to start paying the OTT after the changes have been effected.

Uganda’s Joan Nalubega Shines at the 2018 Anzisha Prize Awards

By
GURU8 Staff
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0

The Mastercard Foundation and African Leadership Academy announced Joan Nalubega, 21, the second-runner up at the just concluded 8th annual Anzisha Prize awards gala.  She is the co-founder of Uganics, which produces mosquito-repellent soap to combat malaria in Uganda. With the US$12,500, she will conduct a certification study for the company’s products and prepare Uganics for export to neighbouring countries which will help to widen her impact in the fight against malaria.

22-year-old healthcare entrepreneur Melissa Bime won the US$25,000 Grand Prize at the 8th annual Anzisha Prize awards gala.  She is the founder of INFIUSS, an online blood bank and digital supply chain platform that ensures patients in 23 hospitals in Cameroon have life-saving blood when and where they need it. She is only the second woman to win the grand prize since Best Ayiorworth took it home in 2013.

The first runner-up, 18-year-old Alhaji Siraj Bah will receive US$15,000 in prize money. He is the founder of Rugal Trading in Sierra Leone, a company that produces handcrafted paper bags as well as briquettes for cooking fuel. Alhaji hopes that the funds will boost the impact his business is already having and will enable him to hire more youth from his community.

The keynote speaker, renowned entrepreneur Sim Shagaya spoke plainly about the challenges faced by the continent but was confident that young entrepreneurs are best placed to solve them. He concluded his inspiring remarks with a simple message to the finalists, “you must lead!”

“We are proud of all 20 finalists and are excited to see two young and dynamic women taking home top prizes,” said Koffi Assouan, Program Manager, Mastercard Foundation. “Their contributions will continue to impact their countries and they are role models for other young women across the continent. They are demonstrating how to turn obstacles into opportunities that create value and jobs for others.”

The Anzisha Prize, the premier award for Africa’s youngest entrepreneurs, is a partnership between the African Leadership Academy and the Mastercard Foundation. The 20 finalists spent 10 days in a business accelerator camp strengthening their business fundamentals before presenting their ventures to a panel of judges that included Ntuthuko Shezi, Bita Diamomande, Saran Kaba Jones, and Polo Leteka.  They join a pool of more than 85 Anzisha Fellows and a network of support that includes access to mentors, experts, and networking. Each returns home with a US$2,500.

“This year was exciting in that we announced our new efforts to support the parents of very young entrepreneurs in Africa,” said Josh Adler, Vice President of Growth and Entrepreneurship at African Leadership Academy. “Our new book – Raising the Boss – uncovers the critical role they play and how we must invest in them if we are to see more young people confidently choosing an entrepreneurship career path post-school.’

Applications for the next cycle of the Anzisha Prize will open on 15 February in 2019. Nominations for promising youth entrepreneurs are welcome all year round.

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of African Leadership Academy (ALA).

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