I start by pinching myself for not including Mobile Monday Kenya in our Tech winners of the year 2010. Clearly Mobile Monday Kenya was among the big winners of 2010, but 2011 could be better and bigger for Mobile Monday Kenya. Take a look around you, everywhere it is all about mobile..mobile phones, mobile money transfer, mobile banking, mcommerce, texting, mobile web access.
It is impossible to predict the future but based on what we have seen, i can tell that mobile is going to be big in Kenya and Africa in the coming days and years. I am happy that Mobile Monday Kenya is already taking active role in setting up the tone in the mobile innovation field and the much needed success in Kenya.
Starting the year with a bang, on 17th Monday 2011 , the first meetup at iHub.. From mobilemonday.co.ke :
The Mobile Monday-KENYA team is excited to be starting 2011 with a very exciting line up of Speakers. This coming Monday the 17th of January we will be having PesaPal, a payment platform that helps Kenyans buy and sell on the internet using Mpesa,Zap and Credit Cards. They will be talking about âE-commerce ecosystem in Kenya.â
If youâre into E-commerce and M-commerce this is a MoMo event you donât want to miss!!
Please remember to register or go to http://momoke2011.eventbrite.com/!!
So what is Mobile Monday Kenya about? Again from mobilemonday.co.ke
Mobile Monday is a global community of mobile industry visionaries, developers and influentials fostering cooperation and cross-border business development through virtual and live networking events to share ideas, best practices and trends from global markets.
Mobile Monday has the following objectives:
- To encourage innovation within the mobile sector.
- To facilitate networking between small and large companies, and between local and foreign.
- To help local companies effectively participate in international initiatives through the import and export of visions, concepts, technologies, know-how and best practices.
- To present innovative visions, trends, studies and forecasts from the mobile marketplace.
- To facilitate and create partnerships.
Critical issues for the year 2011
As for 2011 Siku njema huonekana asubuhi (A good day is apparent in the morning). I am already excited about the year and I feel the following issues should be addressed adequately this year.
- It is high time we start to see apps designed specifically for mobile devices.. lower end phones and smartphones from Kenya. The people of Kenya have to  Stop being just consumers but  be producers too.
- Data speeds and prices. In terms of business model somebody said due to Airtel voice is dead and it is time for Data. As consumers we are clearly falling in love with Airtel and i guess now we are all eagerly waiting for them to launch of their 3G network in the coming months. Â Again in terms of data there is still innovation gap, what type of contents are people looking for online?
- Ecommerce and mcommerce ecosystemâŠDiscussions on this are being kicked off by Pesapal at iHub today, 17th 2011
- The use of Social Media for Businesses. Marvin Tumbo did a brilliant piece on why Kenyan companies need Brand Advocates. Whether you are running Big or Small company the reality is you canât ignore social media anymore. DiscussâŠâŠ
- Going Green. What does going green mean? And how green is green? May be we need to start by stopping Kenya from being a dumping point for the used products in other countries. Last week i saw this tweet: â@Chuani: “@matrixster: How would y’all like a web based SMS system to name and shame traffic offenders?”â . And I was like, that one should have happened  ten years ago. ..
I like this platform and how its making many Kenyan developers believe in themselves. I wont be surprised if we get other awardwinning innovations that are driven by market need, solving large scale user issues and with potential for huge growth.
Nice article @kachwanya
Thanks Martin and the first Mobile Monday was packed, a lot of interest on what is going on around the mobile industry in Kenya. As i said it is going to be a great 2011