The concept of Innovation Hubs, famously known as Technology Hub, is no longer new. It is almost 15 years since the discussions about innovation hubs started in the continent, with some hubs going back to 2008. Reports and academic papers are available, offering clarity about what they are and their…

Premature regulation kills innovation, but also unregulated perilous innovations can be catastrophic. How do you find a balance? The goal of a 21st-century regulator is beyond regulation is to facilitate things to happen in the safest but efficiently and productive manner. Regulations can be barriers to innovation. For example, when…

A young lady shared her CV looking for a job in my company. The CV shows she has a Diploma in Records Management from one of the local universities — My first question was can you manage files in the Cloud? Do you know anything about Google Drive? To her…

This article provides an overview of the AI landscape in Tanzania as well as captures lessons learned from the IdeaLab project carried in Tanzania by AI Commons, Sahara Ventures, and Tanzania AI Lab through the support of The Botnar Foundation. Background Last quarter of 2020 when we were working on the…

Sahara Accelerator — has been a busy Q1; we started the year by onboarding seven startups and launching the PesaTech Accelerator, we have partnered with UNCDF Tanzania to Accelerate FinTech startups in the country. — Last quarter of 2021, we decided to restructure how our accelerator program operates and agreed to pay attention to quality rather than quantity. We innovated a new investment facilitation model, whereby we take a commission from the successful introduction of startups to investors instead of equity once the deal is…

I love to write controversial articles because it makes us think. Recently, the amount of startup capital coming to Africa has increased significantly, and African startups' money raised reached $5B in 2021. A few unicorns have also emerged in some of the more matured Startup African startups ecosystems, primarily Nigeria…

Let's Talk Innovation, Technology, Entrepreneurship, Leadership and The Future of Africa. — Part Two of Season One of the Afruturist Podcast, The Diary of The Hub Manager — a conversation with movers and shakers of African innovation and technology entrepreneurship with Peter Kisadha (PK), Principal Manager, Research, Future Africa, Nigeria. In this episode of the Afruturist Podcast, I caught up with PK…

This article reflects the Swichi Project implemented by Sahara Ventures in partnership with DW Akademie and Tanzania Media Foundation (TMF). — In the past few years, digital transformation has disrupted all most every sector media sector included. It is almost a year now since I wrote the article, “News is No Longer News, Technology Disrupting Traditional Journalism.” showing how technology is disrupting the media sector and threatening the existence of traditional…

My TEDx talk was on opportunities brought by the digital economy in Africa and how youths are capitalizing on them. This article is the script of the talk. — Sometime in 2013, at the National Football Stadium, Benjamin Mkapa Stadium, over 10,000 people showed up. It is usual for the stadium to be packed during football games, but it was for the football match. Instead, it was an interview. Thousands of candidates showed up to interview for 70 Constable…