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Payment Portal Promises Major E-Commerce Shift in Kenya
by alice 30 Jan '10

30 Jan '10

(Balancing Act) Payment Portal Promises Major E-Commerce Shift in Kenya When Quentin Faulkner launched an online store for parents looking for good quality clothing for their children two years ago, his peers told him he would close shop in weeks. But the business - a baby clothing store that has no physical location and is solely marketed using social networking website Facebook - now handles up to 90 transactions a month. That growth has inspired him to launch a second e-… [View More]commerce website – www.Bagalicious.co.ke <http://lists.balancingact-africa.com/t/6647/235533/964/0/>, which sells handbags. We handle up to 155 orders a month on this website. January is shaping up to be our second best month in terms of orders and revenue," said Mr Faulkner. More recently, web commerce has become a key driver of the many online commercial portals that Kenya's restless technology entrepreneurs (also known as techpreneurs) have been trying to establish with the growth of internet use in the country. In this club of online commerce start-ups is Totallytoto.com <http://lists.balancingact-africa.com/t/6647/235533/965/0/> launched at the beginning of the year to solely sell goods online. The firm joins a growing list of websites that are selling mostly foreign made goods to Kenyan consumers at competitive prices. Mystrawberrystore.com <http://lists.balancingact-africa.com/t/6647/235533/966/0/>, pesapal.com <http://lists.balancingact-africa.com/t/6647/235533/967/0/>, enrakenya.com <http://lists.balancingact-africa.com/t/6647/235533/968/0/>, kalahari.co.ke <http://lists.balancingact-africa.com/t/6647/235533/969/0/> and nsoko.co.ke <http://lists.balancingact-africa.com/t/6647/235533/970/0/>, styleconnection.co.ke <http://lists.balancingact-africa.com/t/6647/235533/971/0/> and intokenya.com <http://lists.balancingact-africa.com/t/6647/235533/972/0/> are the vanguards of this budding internet economy. Growth of the internet sector is expected to create new opportunities for the development of e-commerce and m-commerce linking Kenya more closely to the global economy. This new push for e-commerce got an impetus mid last year with the landing at the Kenyan coast of two undersea fibre optic cables that linked the country to high-speed internet connectivity, laying the groundwork for a digital economy. E-commerce is expected to give rise to a digitally-enabled economy that runs on platforms such as e-government, e-health, e-education, social media and e-science. Because of its association with lower overhead costs, e-commerce has enabled retailers to charge lower prices besides offering consumers a more convenient shopping window. Globally, the e-commerce industry is now worth $500 billion, but Africa's many technological challenges, including the absence of local electronic payment portals, have ensured that the continent accounts for only a tiny fraction of it. With the arrival of broadband internet, Kenyan companies are now refocusing their strategies to tap on online commerce that is expected to grow at an annual average of 10 per cent in the next decade. Helped by the changing landscape in the travel industry, national flag carrier Kenya Airways is for example offering online ticketing and tens of small and medium-sized firms such as e-manamba.com <http://lists.balancingact-africa.com/t/6647/235533/973/0/> are offering commuters the opportunity to purchase tickets online. Media companies such as the Nation Media Group have also gone online to sell digital editions of their publications. Nakumatt, the country's largest retail chain is planning to launch an online hyper-mart that offers for sale on-line all products available in its stores. It will work as a complementary sales tool that will serve customers in remote areas. And to ensure its success, we have enlisted the support of a leading logistics solutions provider to handle the delivery and logistics support elements," said Atul Shah, the Nakumatt managing director. Currently, MamaMikes.com <http://lists.balancingact-africa.com/t/6647/235533/974/0/> - the oldest locally developed e-commerce portal - draws its customer base from Kenyans living in the diaspora but now hopes the availability of a local payment portal launched by I & M Bank last week will open the online shop to the domestic consumers. The website has been offering its customers a platform to buy gifts for relatives and friends in Kenya from abroad. The menu of items on sale includes mobile phone airtime, Nakumatt or Uchumi vouchers, or cakes and flowers during special occasions. The company now handles around 500 orders a month, a figure that had grown steadily until last year when a number of small enterprises offering the same service entered the market. We never realised growth last year, partly because of intense competition from new players offering the same services," said Segeni Ngethe, the company's founder. Analysts say last week's launch of the country's first electronic payments system may not have an immediate effect on the budding e-commerce industry citing the pricing structure that I&M Bank and Visa will offer the retailers. That pricing will determine profit margins for online sales - a key ingredient for e-commerce. For many Kenyan e-commerce retailers, card use translates to higher transaction charges and reduced profit margins. The larger the profit margins, the easier it is to accommodate Visa transaction fees. When an online company sells products with margins of 70 per cent, it is easy to justify paying a fee of 5 per cent of the sale price to visa to make the sale possible," said Mr Ngethe. But for smaller firms that generate lower sales margins, hefty payments to Visa may force them to hike prices in order to make profits. "This is an unnecessary expense for us. Our margins are small enough that this has a significant effect on our bottom line. It will also involves a much higher level of security and protection to safely use credit cards for online transactions and that administrative cost is too high for us," said Mr Faulkner. In Kenya, alternative payment systems have been gaining popularity as consumer demand for different payment avenues, other than credit cards, intensifies. Online retailers say Kenyan consumers have been shying away from credit cards in favour of cash on delivery or mobile money transfers.And as security concerns surrounding e-payments increase, some online retailers are turning to outsourced payment processing companies such as Pesapal to manage their e-payments. A poll of e-commerce outfits reveals that the most used payment system in Kenya is cash on delivery, which accounts for 70 per cent of on-line purchases. A growing number of payments (around 20 per cent are made using M-Pesa or Zap, a segment that many industry insiders believe will grow as more consumers get online using their mobile phones or computers. With eight million users already on the system, M-Pesa is gaining ground as the cashless currency of choice because they offer instant payments at rates lower than those charged by banks or credit card vendors. Only five per cent of online purchases are paid for using credit or debit cards which two million Kenyans have access to. The remaining five per cent of the payments made through intermediary payment sites such as Pesapal or Paypal. (Source: Business Daily) [View Less]

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National survey shows Kenyan Internet market heading towards “critical mass”
by alice 30 Jan '10

30 Jan '10

(from Balancing Act) National survey shows Kenyan Internet market heading towards “critical mass” The latest national survey from market research company Synovate shows Kenya’s Internet market is growing fast and on the basis of this growth will soon reach “critical mass”. The growth in users is coming from both urban and rural areas and is predominantly amongst the young and well educated. Russell Southwood pored over the results. The total sample for this random survey was 1,500 … [View More]people, with 500 of those in a boost sample from across the major districts of Kenya. Therefore the coverage is nationally representative of adults 15 and above and has a sampling margin of error of + or – 3%. It makes comparisons with a similar survey it carried out in 2007. On the basis of this sample, Synovate estimates that there are now 3.5 million Internet users in Kenya. However, daily Internet use has grown from 2% of the respondents in 2007 to 5% in 2009 and weekly use from 5% to 12% over the same period. The daily use figure is the crucial one as it shows users who are finding that that they cannot do without Internet services. If the weekly Internet use is broken down on an urban vs rural basis, urban use grew from 22% of respondents in 2007 to 30% in 2009. Rural use grew from 4% to 9% over the same period. These results confirm a lot of anecdotal evidence that has been reaching us about young people using the Government’s new Internet centres and cyber cafes in rural areas. The lower income groups recorded a much more fast paced growth in internet access. However Internet penetration within middle class and below is still very low, making it the group with the highest growth potential. And following the expected drop in Internet costs LSM 4-10s should provide the highest growth in usage. At least half the non-users across all social categories said they would be interested in using the Internet if they had access. In terms of age, 50% of the respondents using Internet were aged 15-34 with 21% in the 18-24 age bracket. The upcoming generation of Kenyans will be regular users of the Internet and it will form as much part of their lives as mobile phones. Over 56% of the Internet using respondents were college or University educated. Therefore those countries with better education levels in Africa will show markedly higher Internet penetration levels. On average, the Internet users in the sample spent approximately 70 minutes on the Internet per visit. This level of media user is close to the average time spent on television on daily basis but does not challenge radio use which is much higher. This will inevitably impact on the media usage of key socio-demographic groups. Although the survey results did not include newspapers, it is likely to be them that suffer as younger generation make less use of the printed word in getting information. The big shift in where sample respondents accessed the Internet between 2007 and 2009 has been a significant fall in the number of those using Internet cafes and a commensurate rise in the number using mobile phones. Strikingly, this trend – of using mobile phones for access – is more pronounced amongst the rural part of the sample. This is bad news for cyber-cafes for despite rising numbers of users they are not coming their way. But this is good news for mobile operators if they can get their mobile Internet offers cheap and pre-paid. The five top uses of the Internet range between 40-50% of the sample users and were in descending order: entertainment; games and music; social networking and instant messaging; e-mails; general surfing; and job search. The pattern is very close to existing mobile usage (with the exception of job search) if you take SMS as the equivalent of e-mails. Users are starting with what they know but will inevitably become more adventurous as more content and services are put on offer. Not surprisingly it is the young who are disproportionately more likely to be members of social networking sites but membership is more likely to be male than female. Facebook was by far the most popular site although You Tube (which features in the Top 10 sites used in Kenya according to Alexa.com) does not feature. BBC, CNN and The Nation are the most used news sites. The significance of these findings is that Kenya is both one of Africa’s largest mid-scale markets and is a bell-weather in terms of technology adoption. Crudely, what happens in Kenya will start to happen elsewhere. And as the uptake of M-Money services shows, this is not simply an urban, well-educated, middle class phenomenon. Critical mass kicks in when the number of users starts to create networking effects. In other words, existing users start to draw in new users who don’t want to be left out. In Kenya, this is clearly already beginning starting to happen. And although the number of daily Internet users is smaller than the overall estimated total of 3.5 million, it is beginning to grow significant and will continue to do so as access prices fall and local content offers become more varied. For more details either e-mail Joe Otin of Synovate on Joe.Otin(a)synovate.com <mailto:Joe.Otin@synovate.com> or phone him on +254 4450190-6. [View Less]

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Very soon....your handwritting will be readable :-)
by Judy Okite 30 Jan '10

30 Jan '10

What a life saver!! over the years I have watched my handwritting, deterioriate........its actually reached a point I cant read it anymore......Thank God, for technology.....there is an option!! To our dear Doctors....Am I hearing deep sighs of relief?? .....read below,what guys next door are about to do....... http://www.elearning-africa.com/newsportal/english/news213.php Kind Regards, -- "An optimist stays up to see the New Year in. A pessimist waits to make sure the old one leaves".Bill Vaughan

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The end of Open Source as we Know it?
by Al Kags 29 Jan '10

29 Jan '10

http://alkags.com/?p=493 <https://photos.sun.com/thumbnail/400/400/5163> It occurs to me (after a spell of burying my head in some sand) that Oracle has bought Sun Microsystems (who in turn had bought MySQL)It occurs to me (after a spell of burying my head in some sand) that Oracle has bought Sun Microsystems (who in turn had bought MySQL). I have several issues in my head that are struggling to find words: 1) that Jonathan Schwatz, my favorite CEO blogger, is moving on (this is just … [View More]

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educational tourism
by meshack emakunat 29 Jan '10

29 Jan '10

dear listers i have no doubt how our beloved country (kenya) has invested poorly in the educational tourism. try compairing the number of foreign students in our universities with those who fly out of the country to SA , USA ,UK China etc. first i think the country's education system is slow in adopting the new learning technologies. its about time the kenyan students and the government put some empasise/effort in this issue. a good example is in our own public university … [View More]

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May be of interest: How to stop predatory tendencies by internet service providers
by Victor Gathara 29 Jan '10

29 Jan '10

http://www.businessdailyafrica.com/-/539546/851482/-/9w03sl/-/index.html DFID, the Department for International Development: leading the UK Government's fight against world poverty. Find out more at http://www.dfid.gov.uk. ______________________________________________________________________ This e-mail has been scanned for all viruses by Peapod. The service is powered by MessageLabs. For more information on a proactive anti-virus service working around the clock, around the globe, visit: http://www.peapod.co.uk/cleanmail

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Re: [kictanet] Web sites must support IPv6 by 2012, expert warns
by McTim 29 Jan '10

29 Jan '10

The lead says: Corporations and government agencies must IPv6-enable their public-facing Web sites in the next 24 months or risk upsetting a growing number of visitors with lower-grade connectivity. IPv6 is, if anything a higher grade of connectivity in that it is designed to add features that IPv4 didn't have. -- Cheers, McTim "A name indicates what we seek. An address indicates where it is. A route indicates how we get there." Jon Postel On Fri, Jan 29, 2010 at 10:52 AM, Alex Owiti &… [View More]

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Web sites must support IPv6 by 2012, expert warns
by Alex Owiti 29 Jan '10

29 Jan '10

Dear listers -Crack your Brains. Web sites must support IPv6 by 2012, expert warns;http://www.cio.co.ke/index.php/view-all-world-news-stories/528-web-sit es-must-support-ipv6-by-2012-expert-warns.html Alex Owiti Senior Writer CIO East Africa eDevelopment House 604 Limuru Road, Nairobi PO Box 49475 00100 Desk: +254 20 3714646 Cel: +254 714-259942 Email:alex.owiti@cio.co.ke An IDG/AeRC Publication

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PARTICIPATION ON CIO EAST AFRICAN MAGAZINE
by Alex Owiti 29 Jan '10

29 Jan '10

Dear Listers,something interesting for your reading. Uganda telecom regulator to 'name and shame' poor providers:http://www.cio.co.ke/index.php/view-all-main-stories/546-uganda-te lecom-regulator-to-name-and-shame-poor-providers.html Alex Owiti Senior Writer CIO East Africa eDevelopment House 604 Limuru Road, Nairobi PO Box 49475 00100 Desk: +254 20 3714646 Cel: +254 714-259942 Email:alex.owiti@cio.co.ke An IDG/AeRC Publication

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ISOC Next Generation Leaders Programme
by McTim 29 Jan '10

29 Jan '10

All, I see this as being complementary to the Diplo courses, with a slightly different focus: http://www.isoc.org/leaders/ "The Next Generation Leaders Programme - Preparing young professionals from around the world to become the next generation of Internet technology, policy, and business leaders. In order to be successful, the next generation of Internet leaders will require a wide range of skills in a variety of disciplines as well as the ability and experience to work with people at all … [View More]

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