New trends in successful ERP implementation

Transcription

MAY 2014
From Connected Kenya to
Smart Kenya Master plan P4
ACCFIN named Best ERP
Provider in 2013 P12
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TECHNOLOGY
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FEATURE: Dot Africa and individual
ccTLDs will complement each other P16
ISSUE 04
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WWW.CIO.CO.KE
BUSINESS
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New trends in successful ERP implementation
As the market becomes less tolerant of big and expensive
implementation of traditional ERPs, providers are changing
by offering customers choice and flexible solutions
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Tracom: Biometrics to enhance financial inclusion | P8
New APPOINTMENTS | P23
No Clouds, No Rain, No food | P41
Transaction Failed | P44
Guaranty Trust Bank
Guaranty Trust Bank
Cote d’Ivoire
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Gambia
CIO EAST AFRICA | MAY 2014
Ghana
Kenya
Liberia
Nigeria
www.cio.co.ke
Rwanda
Sierra Leone
Uganda
UK
AMBROS/D45832/K
450 000m² of
connected warehouses
on one network
DHL partnered with Vodafone and Safaricom
to create a single network across Africa and
the Middle East. This enables them to pinpoint
almost 2 million orders across 450 000m² of
warehouses. This partnership lets DHL commit
to delivery times with 98% accuracy on
time in full.
enterprise.vodafone.com/DHL
Vodafone
Power to you
www.cio.co.ke
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Kenya
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EDITOR’S note
Michael Ouma
Uganda
One down, one wobbly, two standing and 3
MVNOs
Tanzania
Rwanda
EDITORIAL DIRECTOR
Harry Hare
EDITOR
Michael Ouma
TECHNICAL STAFF WRITERS
Lillian Mutegi
Kamau Mbote
COLUMNISTS
Bobby Yawe
Sam Mwangi
HEAD OF SALES & MARKETING
Andrew Karanja
ACCOUNT MANAGERS
Amuyunzu Oscar
Vanessa Obura
Benjamin Anyetei
DESIGN
Brian Kamau
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2
That’s the title that aptly captures Kenya’s mobile telecoms
scene at this time, though this may not be the case a few
months from now going by how fast things are changing.
Rumours about the possible winding up of Orange operations in Kenya
– though muted - have been there since
mid 2012. They became more pronounced in November 2012 when France
Telecom (FT) decided to convert its debt
in Telkom Kenya into equity, thereby
increasing its stake to 60 per cent, with
the government retaining 40 per cent.
When FT again raised its stake in the
Kenyan subsidiary to 70 per cent last
year, many analysts knew that it’s just a
matter of time before the France-based
Orange calls it a day in Kenya by selling
the unit to a new entity.
But then, more or less at the same
time, other rumours surfaced that Essar
Telecoms’ yuMobile was also in the red,
and ready to sell. Officially, though, the
yuMobile CEO was stating that the firm
was only looking for a “strategic investor” to put in cash to finance its expansion and not about to sell outright.
That was before March 2014 when
Communications Authority of Kenya
(CAK) announced that it had approved
the sale of yuMobile to Safaricom and
Airtel Kenya for a total of about Kshs 10
billion (USD 117.2 million). The sale is yet
to be concluded after CAK asked Safaricom to open up its M-Pesa infrastructure
to competitors.
Now let’s go back to Orange, where we
started, and look at some similarities.
During a media briefing on April 15,
www.cio.co.ke
Mickael Ghossein, the Orange Kenya
CEO, insisted the company was only
looking for a “strategic partner to inject
new cash to support its growth.” Orange
needs about Kshs 2.5 billion as Capex
this year.
The choice of words here is quite
telling. Just like the yuMobile CEO, Mr
Ghossein said Orange is also looking for
a “strategic investor.”
We know how yuMobile’s search for
such an investor ended, with the Indiabased firm leaving the Kenyan market.
At the moment, the main question is
which direction FT will decide to look
when it eventually divests from Kenya
– that’s whether it will face East and sell
the Kenya unit to Vietnam’s Viettel or go
South and let MTN have it.
Just as the industry is bidding farewell
to an operator with another one unsure
of its long-term future in the market, the
CAK has moved to license 3 MVNOs, enabling the licensees to compete directly
with existing MNOs by providing voice,
data and mobile money as well as SMS
services.
All these adjustments and trends
are an indicator of interesting times for
Kenya’s telecoms industry. And I’m sure
by this time next year, we’ll have experienced even more transitions.
[email protected]
Quoted Verbatim
Maturity as far as payment systems is
concerned is in Kenya…”
Paul Njau, MD, Tracom
PCK is the first stop for financial institutions who want
to roll out agency banking services as we have over 500
outlets throughout the country
Dr Enock Kinara, Postmaster General,
Postal Corporation of Kenya (PCK)
I have 4 children and 3 grandchildren…and they are really
expensive. So next time you’re making a decision to work,
please consider Hitachi Data Systems as I’m paid according to
how we sell…
Tony Reid, COO, HDS EMEA during
BusinessDefined launch in Dubai.
Good leaders learn from their mistakes
but since we are great leaders, we want to
learn from the mistakes of others…”
James Mwangi, CEO, Equity Bank during the release of the
bank’s Q1 Financial results.
They (MNOs) have enough capacity from the resources we’ve
given them. They should therefore inculcate the culture of
sharing…”
Francis Wangusi, director general, Communications Authority of Kenya (CAK) during the
issuance of MVNO licenses to 3 firms.
www.cio.co.ke
3
PUBLISHER
from the
From Connected Kenya:
to Smart Kenya Master plan
So, we launched the national ICT master plan again at
the Connected Kenya Summit last month. This is about
the second or third time the plan has been launched in
the same number of years, but that should not take away
anything from it, it’s a good plan.
every change of
government must
always come with
orphaned projects,
which need to
be realigned
with the new
administration,
but my experience
knows better.
Also new, is what we are now calling
it. It was christened “Smart Kenya”
in line with the thinking in the new
administration. Although not entirely
original, Smart Kenya is a good way of
branding the master plan and removing the tired phrases like “National”
and “ICT” from the naming convention.
I think Smart Kenya will be easy to sell
even to the technophobes in government. It cleverly removes the “tech”
tag from the name and provides an
opportunity to engage without feeling
the technology pressure.
Now that we are done with the ceremonies and positioning, it’s time to get
moving. It’s time we seriously started
working on the implementation of the
strategy and get the expected outcomes. As they say, a plan is as good
as those who see it through. For full disclosure, I was in the team that crafted
the document that was launched by
the previous administration, and I must
admit the new team has added quite
some “meat” into “our” document.
What is unfortunate is that in most
African countries, every change of
government must always come with
orphaned projects, which need to be
realigned with the new administration, but my experience knows better.
We have seen this tendency affecting
multi million dollar projects, which go
to waste, just because it was not “our”
project.
And this is not just within our sector,
4
www.cio.co.ke
Harry Hare, Editorial Director
it affects all sectors. And while one
would want to appreciate that probably the new sheriffs want to seem to be
in control of the process and therefore
create their own structures and put
in place people that they believe will
deliver the projects, it does not make
sense for projects of a national appeal
not to be insulated from temporary
political re-alignments. These waste
time and money and in some cases, kill
projects in toto. But I digress.
The new team at the ministry now
needs to move with speed to start
executing the strategy. There is a lot of
private sector goodwill to see this strategy through and it will be a shame that
we go back to Connected Kenya 2015
without any of the flagship projects in
operation. From the floor of the event,
several organisations came up to proclaim support for various components
of the plan, and these should really be
very low hanging fruits for the implementation team to nail.
At CIO East Africa, we have taken a
decision to independently monitor
the execution and implementation
of Smart Kenya and plan to publish a
report that we intend to launch a week
before the next Connected Kenya summit. Ours will be an observer mission
looking from the outside, our little
contribution to the Smart Kenya plan.
Walk with us.
[email protected]
MAY 2014
CONTENTS
6 In Brief
7 TrendLines
Tracom in drive to enhance access to
financial services via biometric solutions
Airtel Kenya infrastructure to be used
by 3 licensed MVNOs
Cisco unveils new video collaboration
solutions
COVER STORY
A
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ccording to a recent study by research firm Gartner the
adoption of cloud ERP 2013 through to 2023 has the potential to replace the aging core ERP system with almost
half of organizations interviewed saying they planned to
move within the next 5 years.
New trends in successful ERP implementation | 31
Product Review
CIOPROFILE
HAKKEN sets up Kenya office
ACCFIN named Best ERP Provider in 2013
DISTREE Africa conference set for Nairobi
in June
15 twitterINTERVIEW
24
Linda Kamau,
Vice President,
AkiraChix
AkiraChix
developing
ladies in tech thro’
networking and
mentorship
18 TrendANALYSIS
Tecnotree eyeing clients from East Africa
20 SpecialFEATURE
Demystifying Mobile Virtual Networks
22 Pictorial
23 NewAPPOINTMENTS
Adil El Yousseffi
Lucy Quist
Roshi Motman
26
Mr Hu Xin, CTO,
ASUS TRANSFORMER
T100
OPINION 34
Cyber Security Threat Preparedness: Are
we?
ZTE Corporation
Public private model will
enhance efficiency of Kenya’s
LTE network
FEATURE
After sixth edition, Connected Kenya
goes regional next year
Cybercrime: A Threat For Modern Day
Businesses
The Paradox: Innovation vs Best
Practices
How to make Enterprise Architecture
projects a success
Making a case for Kenya’s new National Digital IDs
44 LastWORD
Transaction Failed
www.cio.co.ke
Barrack Otieno,
16
Administrative Manager, AfriNIC
Dot Africa and individual
ccTLDs will complement each
other
5
inBRIEF
DHL Express wins ‘Courier
Operator of the Year in
Nigeria’prize at BoICT awards
AROUND
Global logistics firm DHL recently
won the “Courier Operator of the Year”
award at the Beacon of Information and
Communication Technology (BoICT) 2014
organized by Nigeria’s Communications
Week Media. DHL was presented with the
prize in recognition of its achievements
as an exceptional international firm
operating in Nigeria.
Nigeria’s iDEA Centres to become financial independent in 2
Years
Nigeria’s Information Technology
Developers Entrepreneurship
Accelerator (iDEA) is to become
financially self sustaining by 2016,
according to Federal Ministry
of Communication Technology
(FMCT) Progress Report on Projects
& Programmes Implementation
released recently.
iDEA provides essential
support to entrepreneurs to build
software skills, solutions and
businesses critical to their success.
Entrepreneurs accepted into iDEA
Centres receive support in the way
of physical work space, shared
facilities, training, mentoring and
access to capital.
The report which covered
July 2011 to February 2014, said
that the iDEA centres which are
currently being wholly funded
by the government through the
National Information Technology
Development Fund (NITDEVF),
should be able to fund themselves
more independent of government
by 2016/2017. The plan entailed
that iDEA would be funded through
funds from multi-lateral agencies
like Microsoft, IBM, Google, etc.,
local companies, private individuals
and revenue generated by iDEA
itself
AROUND the
Nokia issues safety warning for
Lumia 2520 tablet’s charger in select
EU markets
Nokia announced a product advisory
for the European and UK variant of the
AC-300 charger, which is used exclusively
with the Lumia 2520 tablet. Consumers in
Austria, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Russia,
Switzerland and UK are strongly advised
to suspend use of the charger until further
notice. Also, consumers who purchased
the Lumia 2520 travel charger accessory in
Austria, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Russia,
Switzerland, UK and the US are strongly
advised to suspend use of the travel charger
accessory.
6
The BoICT awards were established
to reward the vision and enterprise of
individuals and companies that have
contributed to the growth of the ICT
industry. Communication Week said the
objectives of the awards were to evaluate
and recognize standards of excellence
in the country’s quest for growth and
development in the use of ICT.
“This recognition is reflective of
DHL’s strength as the dominant express
and logistics provider of choice in
Nigeria. Furthermore we continue to
offer innovative solutions to a growing
consumer market especially in the life
sciences and telecommunications sector
and to the emerging SME market,” said
Randy Buday, country manager, DHL
Nigeria.
W RLD
The full articles
are available on
the CIO East
Africa Website
www.cio.co.ke
Ericsson Application Awards semi-finalists
announced
The Ericsson Application Awards have announced the top 10
semi-finalists for the 2014 €25,000 prize, five from the student
category and five from the company category. Team WorkMode
from South Africa and Team SOP from Nigeria are amongst the
semi-finalists representing sub-Saharan Africa.
Team SOP developed an application that allows users to receive
push notifications on availability and analytics on electricity in
their area. This is a first for Africa and will harness the power of big
data to make people’s lives easier. Team WorkMode developed an
application that empowers workers of tomorrow to manage their
time effectively while in and out of the office.
www.cio.co.ke
Staff Writer
TrendLINES
Garmin AT’s headquarters
Satellite solutions provider Garmin
looking for business partners in West Africa
Satellite navigation and communication solutions provider Garmin
Southern Africa is set to host a trade delegation in Accra, Ghana
from the May 12 to 16, 2014.
The purpose of the trade delegation is to engage
with prospective businesses partners in West Africa
who have strong distribution and/or reselling capabilities and a proven track record of successfully furthering brands into their designated markets.
Sustainable farming and the information required
to plot out a field, calculate the area for planting seedlings or determining the land gradient of your farm to
select the most suitable pump are just some key uses
of our products.
With global annual revenues of over U$2.5 billion
and a presence in 54 territories around the globe,
Garmin has sold over 100 million products sold worldwide and realised that it is important to have the right
mix of channel partners, products and tools available
in each territory to provide product support.
Marine Echo range of fishfinders make use of GPS
and sonar technology to map and view fish under water which is a great aid in subsistence fishing. Garmin
Outdoor watches are great for hiking, where the
handheld devices track waypoints. With the expansion
of cities and roads in Accra, Lagos, Yamoussoukro,
Yaoundé, Libreville and Dakar, the Garmin Automotive
products become a valuable tool in navigating the
streets, finding petrol stations, hotels, restaurants, and
shopping centres.
The extensive ranges of products serve many
industries including Marine, Outdoor, Automotive,
Sports and Wellness. Garmin’s products or tools are
suited to developing economies where infrastructure
requirements are extensive and mapping out of new
boundaries, roads, waypoints are key to the countries
expansion.
In conjunction with PDSA Ghana, Garmin will be
hosting discussions on West African business opportunities to resell, distribute and service our wide range
of GPS products and solutions.
Marine Echo range of fishfinders make use of GPS and
sonar technology to map and view fish under water
www.cio.co.ke
7
TrendLINES
Michael Ouma
Paul Njau, MD, Tracom
Tracom in drive to enhance access to financial
services via biometric solutions
The uptake of biometric solutions is on the rise in the country and in the
entire region with various firms using these products in various areas of
their operations, mainly in areas such as ID control and registration of
persons and voting among others.
According to Paul Njau, MD, Tracom, a regional provider
of biometric identification solutions, Biometrics are increasingly becoming a viable option for securing identity
of individuals especially in developing countries where
it is seen as an enabler for economic growth. “Key areas
where these solutions are employed include the financial
sector where they are being used to enhance financial
inclusion. Most of the adult populations do not have
financial accounts because of identification issues, which
makes enrollment inaccessible,” said Njau in an interview
with CIO East Africa.
Njau said that biometrics can be used to help providers
take financial solutions to the masses, by offering solutions that enable service provision in a convenient and secure manner. For financial institutions, said Njau, Tracom
believes that biometrics can enable providers take their
services out of the branch to the people, and “out of the
brick-and-mortar structures to where the people are.”
Statistics indicate that 59 per cent of people in developing countries don’t have formal bank accounts while 77
per cent also live on less than $ 1 per day. “This means
that there is a large group of people that has not been
reached by financial services based on their economic
situation as well as level literacy. But with biometrics,
attracting new clients is easier as you only need to capture
one’s physical attributes – face, iris, finger prints among
others,” said Njau.
Currently, only 12 per cent of the market uses face
recognition as most identification is done via finger prints.
“Most of the biometric solutions we have are meant to
address issues around illiteracy of account holders. The
solution is also able to work offline meaning that even
when there is no internet connectivity, one is still able to
access services and manage fraud incidences in the process,” said Njau, adding that the key focus for biometrics is
in micro-payments and poverty eradication programmes
supported by NGOs and government.
Tracom’s clients from the financial services industry
include Coop Bank, Equity as well as National Bank. “In
terms of biometric systems, we see a lot of demand in
South Sudan and Uganda because the two countries
don’t have national identification systems and biometrics
would make it easier for them to provide various services
to the population. We also see growth in third-party payment systems that require security in terms of government regulations,” he stated.
59 per cent of people in developing countries don’t
have formal bank accounts
8
www.cio.co.ke
Kamau Mbote
TrendLINES
Adil El Yousseffi, CEO, Airtel Kenya
Airtel Kenya infrastructure to be used
by 3 licensed MVNOs
Airtel has opened a new chapter in the telecoms industry in Kenya
with the announcement that it will host three Mobile Virtual
Network Operators, (MVNOs) on its Kenyan Network.
In a statement, Airtel clarified that the MVNO services will run on the unused capacity on its network,
ensuring that it maintains seamless quality experience
to consumers.
On April 14, the Communications Authority of Kenya
(CAK) director general Francis Wangusi announced
the award of MVNO licenses to Equity Bank (through
its subsidiary Finserve Africa), Zioncell Kenya - a technology company that provides mobile value added
services to mobile network operators - and Mobile
Pay (which runs the Tangaza mobile money transfer
service).
While handing over the licenses to the operators
at a function in his office, Wangusi indicated that all
three MNVOs will not own a spectrum license or need
to put up their own infrastructure, but that they will
utilize the installed excess capacity on the Airtel Kenya
network with which they already have agreements.
The CAK boss also noted that “As you are aware,
spectrum for building mobile network infrastructure is
limited and we are therefore unable to accommodate
many mobile network operators (MNOs). At the same
time the cost of building a mobile cellular network
is high and few entities have the capacity to invest in
such infrastructure”.
The companies have been awarded the MVNO
licenses under the ‘Application Service Provider (ASP)’
category of the CAK’s Unified Licensing Framework
adopted in 2008. Telecom and non-telecom companies as observed from the three licensees can now
leverage their existing brand assets and equity to enter
the mobile industry and create value. The MVNOs will
be able to provide cellular services similar to those
offered by the existing mobile network operators
including customer registration, SIM cards issuance,
billing and customer care to end users. The CAK has
developed guidelines that will generally act as safeguards to the end users in terms of quality of service.
The MVNOs are obligated to provide services within
the set Quality of Service parameters and targets.
the MVNO services will run on the unused capacity on its network,
ensuring that it maintains seamless quality experience to consumers.
www.cio.co.ke
9
TrendLINES
Staff Writer
Cisco New video and collaboration endpoints
Cisco unveils new video and
collaboration solutions
Cisco has announced a new video and collaboration solutions
designed to put high-quality video at the fingertips of everyone in the
organization—in organizations of all sizes.
The systems will allow people to effectively share
video and content in rooms of any size depending upon
their needs as well as the setup of the room. The fully
integrated systems combine a sleek design with a simple
and intuitive user experience and will be available for
purchase from May 2014.
In its second generation, the Cisco TelePresence MX200
is optimal for smaller rooms, easy to install, and offers
premium HD resolution out of the box while the Cisco
TelePresence MX700 and Cisco TelePresence MX800
represent the performance line and are ideal for medium- to large-sized rooms. These integrated systems
come equipped with premium HD resolution and support
H.265, which will give users incredible quality at half the
regularly-needed bandwidth.
Costing less than the price of a PC, the Cisco TelePresence SX10 Quick Set builds upon elements many companies already have in smaller meeting spaces—flat panel
displays—to create incredible video meeting spaces. Sure
to be popular with SMEs, this system turns any standard
flat panel display into an HD video collaboration system in
10 minutes or less. By making such a high-quality experience available at such an attractive price point, Cisco aims
to make video the de facto collaboration tool for every
conference room. The new products come when industry
statistics indicate that more than 93 percent of meeting
rooms globally aren’t equipped with high-quality video.
Sabrina Dar, Cisco GM for East Africa said: “Previous
attempts to deliver collaboration have been incremental
and good. But the cold, hard truth is that today’s collaboration tools are forcing users to do today’s jobs with yesterday’s technology. It is time for a change. The industry
is ready for a great leap forward, and Cisco is making that
leap. These new products represent the first phase of a
multi-phase rollout in how Cisco is reimagining collaboration and setting the foundation for a revolution in the
industry; stay tuned for more.”
the cold, hard truth is that today’s collaboration tools are forcing
users to do today’s jobs with yesterday’s technology.
10 CIO EAST AFRICA | MAY 2014
www.cio.co.ke
Michael Ouma
TrendLINES
(L-R) The HAKKEN Kenya management Team Carlos Oliveira, Angela Mwelu and Nuno Pitta
HAKKEN sets up Kenya office
After setting up its operations in Portugal and Nigeria, Hakken has
established a Kenya office to act as its regional hub for East Africa.
Carlos Oliveira, Managing Partner, HAKKEN said
that they have an already established a solid presence in Portugal and in Nigeria, Kenya was the next
key destination. “We have an already established,
solid presence in Portugal and in Nigeria, hence it´s
important to note that we are also here (in Kenya) for
the long term. Therefore our clients should expect
a specialized IT management company with global
experience yet strong local presence that aims to work
side by side with them on a long and strong win-win
partnership,” said Mr Oliveira.
According to Oliveira, Hakken’s focus which is
aligned to its areas of expertise is to help create value
to customers through technology, by offering a blend
of consultancy and solutions that will enable reduce
costs, optimize on current and future IT resources and
bridge the gap between IT and business.
After Kenya, Hakken – which provides IT service
management consulting; IT service management
solutions and dashboards; asset and configuration
management; IT cost reduction as well as IT service
management training – plans to set up a Dubai office
in the second quarter of this year. Hakken - which
previously had a MoU with Seven Seas Technologies
(SST) that expired in 2013 making it venture out independently – also has partnerships with other global
IT vendors including HP, Compuware, EasyVista and
Solarwinds.
“HAKKEN Kenya will be our ‘hub’ for the East
Africa region. Focus on growing in the region is at the
moment being split between myself and my 2 other
business partners - Angela Mwelu and Nuno Pitta. We
no doubt envisage to expand our local workforce as
we continue to grow and expand our operations,” said
Oliveira.
The Kenya hub is expected to enhance the firm’s
interaction with clients who are drawn from various
industries including financial, telecoms and insurance
sectors. “Although our solution and service offerings
cut across all industries - we nonetheless see huge
potential in the financial sector due to our specific
and unique offers for banks, namely helping them
to control the performance of all their channels in a
detailed and consolidated way,” he stated.
create value to customers through technology, by offering a blend of
consultancy and solutions
www.cio.co.ke
CIO EAST AFRICA | MAY 2014 11
TrendLINES
Staff Writer
Raymond Cheruiyot, CEO, ACCFIN East Africa
ACCFIN named Best
ERP Provider in 2013
ACCFIN East Africa, a Diamond Sage partner in East Africa that
deploys ERP solutions across the region, has been named as the “Best
ERP Solutions Provider for the Year 2013” by Sage.
According to Raymond Cheruiyot, CEO, ACCFIN East
Africa, the award confirms that the company is responsive
to client needs.
“The achievement basically boils down to being in
touch with the market, being in touch with Sage ERP
users, meeting clients’ expectations in terms of solutions
and a bigger focus on understanding User’s position
alongside that of our ‘Mother Partner’, Sage ERP Africa,
to maintain the Standards and beyond,” said Cheruiyot
After bagging the award, the firm has its sights now set on
new partnerships and business opportunities, key among
these being Kenya’s newly created County Governments.
“Beyond 2014, we are looking at partnering with County
Governments in meeting their revenue management,
having a procurement management process that meets
transparency standards while eliminating bottle necks by
invoking cloud technology, making it easy for all Governors to Manage their county affairs on the go through
intuitive Business Intelligence tools and of course seamlessly interfacing County System to National Government
Financial Management System,” he said.
Over the years, ACCFIN has offered services to clients
drawn from public and private sectors, implementing
the Sage 300 ERP to a “satisfactory level to a number of
clients,” according to the CEO.
“In private manufacturing some of the deployments are
in the biggest beer manufacturer in East Africa, and in a
big electrical cables manufacturer in the region as well. In
the private sector, we provided solutions to two Standards
bodies for both goods and seeds while in a health sector,
we have it deployed in a leading healthcare facility in East
Africa, AAR and health insurance provider Metropolitan
Life,” he said.
ACCFIN’s deployments in the education sector have also
involved the Sage 300 ERP (formally known as Sage ERP
ACCPAC) in all public and private universities. The firm,
which attained its Diamond partner status in 2013, offers
ERP support, training, customization and implementation. “Cloud Computing is the trend. The Sage 300 ERP
works within the clouds and mobile, thereby eliminating
bottle necks in terms of Business Management to achieve
efficiency, make better business decisions and promote
accountability,” said Cheruiyot.
Cloud Computing is the trend
www.cio.co.ke
Staff Writer
TrendLINES
A past Distree Africa Event
DISTREE Africa conference
set for Nairobi in June
The DISTREE Africa 2014 conference which aims to unite
technology and electronics vendors focused on developing and
managing both business-to-business (B2B) and business-toconsumer (B2C) channels is set for Nairobi, Kenya from June 19 –
21 at Safari Park Hotel.
The 3-day event provides channel partners with
the opportunity to meet senior executives from major
international brands in one place at one time, including Kingston, Sandisk, Seagate, Targus, Toshiba and
WD plus many more. With each vendor pre-arranging
meetings with participating channel partners in
advance, DISTREE Africa offers the perfect platform
to discuss new go-to-market opportunities or review
existing relationships.
Farouk Hemraj, CEO at DISTREE Events said: “DISTREE Africa will cover the regional B2B channel as well
as the B2C market,” added Hemraj. “Companies such
as Brother, Ricoh, TP-Link and Trendnet are just some
of the brands with B2B products that will use the
event to identify new channel opportunities in Africa.”
of one-on-one meetings, conference programme,
exhibition, awards, technology showcases and workshop sessions to deliver a comprehensive business
development platform for both exhibitors and channel partners.
DISTREE Africa will allow exhibitors to build indepth relationships with influential channel partners
from more than 20 African countries including key
markets such as Angola, Ghana, Kenya and Nigeria.
The event will also gather multiple distributors
looking to further develop their African channel customer base. Confirmed distributors for DISTREE Africa
2014 already include Asbis, BDL, Despec, GCT, Jurassic,
Mitsumi and Space.
DISTREE Africa will offer a compelling combination
The African market is clearly ready for an independent channel event
that allows channel partners to meet multiple suppliers
www.cio.co.ke
TrendLINES
Staff Writer
The SAP Social Sabbatical team, which is drawn from 12 countries
SAP partners with Kenyan firms for
Business Insights
Twelve SAP experts drawn from various fields including human
resources, finance, IT and other business areas have completed a monthlong program in Kenya.
SAP positioned the 12 employees with four social
enterprises operating in Kenya. The program, dubbed the
SAP Social Sabbatical, saw 4 local organisations, Juhudi
Kilimo, African Management Initiative, Open Capital and
Sanergy gain from best practices when it comes to business processes and solutions implemented by the team.
The program’s implementing partner is PYXERA Global,
a non-profit organization based in Washington D.C. that
helped facilitate the selection of the organisations participating in the program.
Andrew Waititu, MD, SAP East Africa said that the Social
Sabbatical Program not only provides an effective avenue
for SAP to give back to the communities in which it operated, but in addition, SAP is able to gain meaningful nsight
and feedback from the field that will go a long way in
customizing and improving SAP solutions globally.
“SAP East Africa is proud to bring the SAP Social Sabbatical program to Kenya, having watched it make progress in
various other regions, including India, Brazil, South Africa
and China. The program provides our employees time to
share their skill-sets and gain an important understanding
of challenges experienced by different businesses from all
corners of the world. It is also through initiatives like this
that SAP is able to develop technology solutions that are
tailored to emerging markets such as East African,” said
Waititu.
The organizations that benefited from this year’s Kenya
chapter of the program were African Management Initiative, which supplements learning institutions in the training of business leaders in response to the growing middle
class population with a target to train 1 million African
managers by 2023 and Open Capital Advisors, a client
facing business that provides financial consulting services
to high impact small and medium sized enterprises. “SAP
has helped us think of how we can better keep track not
just of customers, but everyone we meet with,” said Rodney Carew, Senior Analyst at Open Capital Advisors.
SAP chose a number of Kenyan businesses for inclusion in its Social Sabbatical program based on their social
impact and their focus on strengthening entrepreneurship
in Kenya. Additionally, organizations selected for the first
round were those whose business challenges matched
with available SAP team skills. More businesses will be
covered in the next round of the program.
The program provides ....time to share their skill-sets and gain an important understanding of challenges experienced by different businesses
www.cio.co.ke
TWITTER INTREVIEW
Lilian Mutegi
@murugimutegi tweeted @Lkamau
AkiraChix developing
ladies in tech thro’
networking and
mentorship
Akira is a Japanese word that means ‘energy’ and ‘Intelligence’,
and those two words aptly describe this group of ladies. AkiraChix
is an association that inspires and develops women in technology
through networking, training and mentoring.
In a continent where women form a
majority of the population and half of
the workforce, it is an anomaly that
the percentage of women working in
technology is less than 15%. Technology
is one of the key factors driving Africa’s
A
passionate
heart and
a beautiful
mind
makes
one an
Akirachic.
projected economic rise. As such, there
is enormous potential for maximizing
the growth of technology through
increasing the number and quality of
women in technology.
In a nutshell, what is Akirachix?
AkiraChix is a community of women technologists
whose aim is to generate a powerful workforce of
women in the field of ICT and STEM careers
Currently, we’re working with Precious Blood and
Kenya High. We have just launched a kids’ tech and
arts camp, which introduces kids to tech at an early
age. We are using Scratch from MIT to teach.
What’s Akirachix’s major role in the society?
Empower women through IT via training, outreach,
networking and mentorship initiatives with a focus
on the underprivileged women in society
So how was the idea of Akirachix born?
Akirachix was born in 2010. During the iHub
opening party, we noticed the room had very few
women and there was a clear call of action from us.
Define your role at Akirachix
I’m a co-founder and programs director. I develop
programs based on community and industry needs
focusing on planning and execution.
What major milestones has Akirachix made
since its inception?
Successfully graduated 36 girls, partnerships with
industry leads Intel, IBM and being recognized as
“Unsung Heroes” by the US Ambassador. We’ve
also received several grants from organizations
such as Google (RISE), Half the Sky Movement,
Infodev and SIDA
Last year, Akirachix partnered with Intel to
form ‘She Will Connect’ initiative. What is it
all about?
The initiative aims to expand digital literacy skills to
young women in developing countries which falls
in line with what we do.
Do you have any other initiatives that you run
as Akirachix?
We have a training program for girls from the
slums teaching computer literacy, Web design,
entrepreneurship, mobile app development,
graphic design. We also do high school outreach
to encourage girls to take STEM-related careers.
www.cio.co.ke
Five years from now, where do you see
Akirachix?
We aim to expand the Akirachix model in 2 other
counties - Eldoret and Machakos. Transition 60% of
our students into employment or entrepreneurship
What does it take to be part of the Akirachix
community?
A passionate heart and a beautiful mind makes one
an Akirachic.
Feature
AfTLD: Dot Africa and individual
ccTLDs will complement each other
By Michael Ouma
The African Top-Level Domain Organization or AfTLD – the
association of top level country code domain name (ccTLD)
managers in the Africa region which seeks to help ccTLD
managers discuss issues around management of ccTLDs recently announced that it’s now registered in both Mauritius
and Kenya. To shed more light on AfTLD’s engagement with
the continent’s domain managers, CIO East Africa conducted
an in-depth interview with Mr Barrack Otieno, administrative
manager, AFTLD. Below are excerpts:
Barrack Otieno, Administrative Manager, AfTLD
AFTLD is now registered in both
Mauritius and Kenya. What benefits
can KeNIC and local domain registrars under Domain Registrars Associaction of Kenya (DRAKE) expect
from this development?
The African Top Level Domains
Organization was incorporated in 2002
to be a focal point for African Country Code Top Level Domain (ccTLD)
managers in coordinating, formulating,
developing and presenting a unified Approach to issues related to the Domain
Name System. AfTLD also presents a
forum for sharing ideas between the region’s Internet community with an aim
www.cio.co.ke
of promoting the utilization of territorial
country’s Top Level Domains. Kenya
Network Information Centre (KeNIC) is
one of the members of Africa Top Level
Domains Organization.
In 2011, AfTLD received an offer from
KeNIC to host its Secretariat in Kenya.
KeNIC has been an active member of
the company by participating and hosting AfTLD’s capacity building programs
in addition to providing technical and
operational support. Registrars are
allowed to join AfTLD as associate
members, currently most of our associate members are ICANN accredited
AfTLD takes cognizance of the fact that ccTLDs
are critical national resources and this is so in
Kenya as well.
registrars on the African Continent. However,
we welcome members of the Domain Registrars
Association of Kenya (DRAKE) to join AfTLD as
Associate Members as well. By being an active
participant in AfTLD, KeNIC gets the benefit of
building capacity and becoming experts on the
domain name business and governance in the
Africa region as well as globally.
The registration of AfTLD in Kenya comes
at a time when there´s an on-going debate
about the future management of the “.KE”
domain. What´s AfTLD´s position on this
matter?
AfTLD takes cognizance of the fact that
ccTLDs are critical national resources and this is
so in Kenya as well. We do realize that, for such
resources, there are stakeholders with varied
interests and, for ccTLDs, these make up the
Internet community in such national settings.
For these reasons, AfTLD accords each member
the respect they deserve; we avoid interfering in
sovereign national issues unless we are called
upon to provide input where we strive to provide professional input. In providing such input,
we aim to strongly encourage the local Internet
community to work on and resolve such issues
at the national level.
How has AfTLD worked with individual
cctld managers to spur uptake of domains
considering that Kenya´s “.KE” domain has
just about 30,000 users with only South
Africa and Egypt leading with over 200,000
users each?
AfTLD has a 5-year strategic plan that is currently being implemented. The ultimate goal of
the plan is to enhance Internet management on
the African continent through improved management of ccTLD registries. Since inception,
the organization has been conducting capacity
building programs aimed at building technical
competence of registry managers on the African
continent.
We strongly believe that as an active particiwww.cio.co.ke
Feature AfTLD: Dot Africa and
individual ccTLDs will
complement each
other
pant in these, Kenya will benefit and be able to
grow its domain registration and user base.
This year AfTLD in cooperation with and support from Internet Society, ICANN, AfriNIC, the
French registry and Francophonie the association of French speaking African nations will
launch a ccTLD Study to establish the needs
of African ccTLDs like Kenya. This will enable
the adoption of a more focused approach in
addressing the challenges faced by various
African registries which are varied in addition
to developing an observatory where data on
African registries can be obtained.
In 2013 AfTLD, the Internet Society and ICANN,
in partnership, launched a community of practice known as the Africa Domain Name Forum
as well as an award scheme for African ccTLDs
in Durban South Africa. The forum attracted
more than 200 participants from different parts
of the world and has been replicated in different regions in the world. This year’s forum will
be hosted by the Nigerian Internet Registration
Association from 7th to 9th July 2014 in Abuja
Nigeria.
The continent´s gTLD “.africa” is set to be
delegated by ICANN. In your view, how will
this impact on the uptake of cctlds - positively or negatively?
Although ccTLDs and gTLDs are often considered as competitors, they act and have acted
to compliment each other in many cases and
in many countries. This will apply to African
ccTLDs and the Dot Africa domain as well as
it applies to the whole region of Africa where
AfTLD operates. We have seen this already in
Europe where dot-EU and in Asia where dot-Asia
are successfully co-existing with ccTLDs.
The uptake depends on the marketing strategies deployed by the different actors given their
responsibility and mandate to manage the critical Internet resources.
TrendANALYSIS
Kamau Mbote
Although South Africans
have average loyalty levels,
research by tefficient also
shows that South Africa has
one of the highest churn levels.
With South African CSPs
spending 20% of their revenue
preventing churn to maintain
customer loyalty, they need to
direct more attention to their
customer relationships
Stavros Vougas, VP, Tecnotree, MEA
Tecnotree eyeing
clients from East Africa
Tecnotree, a Finnish-based provider of messaging and charging
solutions for operators and service providers, is keenly looking at
attracting partners in Africa, particularly. The firm, founded in 1978,
in Espoo, Finland – the hometown of Nokia – sees East Africa as
very attractive for business. Stavros Vougas, VP for MEA and APAC,
Tecnotree spoke to CIO East Africa’s Kamau Mbote on their plans.
What is Tecnotree involved in with its presence in
the East African market?
Tecnotree has multiple deployments in East Africa
centred on Convergent BSS & Care and Managed Services
solutions. Tecnotree’s existing customer engagements on
the continent means that we are strongly rooted in Africa
as a whole; however in particular, the East African market
is a very attractive area for market growth. We predict a
bright future for our work in the region and as the markets
and customer demand both continue to grow; we’ll certainly be considering further investment in the people and
technology in the coming years.
Kindly detail the overview of Communications
Service Providers (CSPs) market in Kenya?
The CSPs market in Kenya has a strong focus on
increasing customer loyalty and to do it, we are providing
services that cater for online consumer needs. According to a MobileSquared report, TV and video usages in
Kenya now stand at 25% and partnerships are expected
to arise between CSPs and mobile operators to offer additional services such as video streaming in order to retain
customers.
Even without a partnership yet, as an operator, Orange
Kenya has been looking to increase levels of customer loyalty through offering bundled services such as fixed-line
broadband, free airtime and mobile SIM services. With one
With one of the lowest churn rates on the continent, the
adoption of Mobile Money has also had a positive impact
www.cio.co.ke
TrendANALYSIS
Investing in fast, reliable LTE is likely to
be where there will be a positive impact on
revenues.
of the lowest churn rates on the continent, the adoption of
Mobile Money has also had a positive impact on CSP loyalty
in Kenya. Just one of the multitudes of mobile value-added
services launched throughout Africa, CSPs are not only meeting customer demands but also supporting the community
and its people in agriculture, education and healthcare.
What trends have you seen in customer loyalty to telecom providers within the African region and how does
it differ in other markets?
Customer loyalty trends across Africa vary, even within the
same regions. In East Africa, loyalty figures in Kenya contrasted significantly to those in Nigeria. Classified as the most
loyal mobile users in Africa, two-thirds of Kenyan customers
spend more than 2 years with their existing CSP and almost
a third have been loyal for over five years. But only 44% of
Nigerian respondents are classified as loyal and stay with
their existing CSP for more than 2 years. South African loyalty
was the average with half of users remaining with their CSP in
excess of 2 years.
Although South Africans have average loyalty levels,
research by tefficient also shows that South Africa has one of
the highest churn levels. With South African CSPs spending
20% of their revenue preventing churn to maintain customer
loyalty, they need to direct more attention to their customer
relationships.
What opportunities lie in the telecom market and
how can operators transform their businesses towards
a marketplace of digital services?
It will be through Telco 2.0 that CSPs will be able to transform their business towards a marketplace of digital services.
Telco 2.0 is about taking up a start-up mentality through
adopting new and sometimes unproven technologies and
business models, in order to compete and benefit from the
massive innovation engine that is the internet. Working
this way has enabled companies to focus more on relevant
services for their end user customers.
For example, Tecnotree worked with Booxmedia to provide a convergent IP-TV service, through the deployment of
charging and customer loyalty solutions, which we demonstrated at AfricaCom last year.
For commercial opportunities in the telecoms market, operators should look to the next generation TV and video services that are predicted to dominate the LTE enabled world.
This is where mobile customers are increasingly spending
their money. It is estimated that an operator stands to generate monthly revenues of between $12.2m and $146.6m a year
through mobile TV and video services.
How can telecoms monetize from service bundles in
the age of competition?
Investing in fast, reliable LTE is likely to be where there
will be a positive impact on revenues. Almost 50% of CSPs
believe that LTE will have an effect on increasing consumer
data spend. Service providers should ensure to include, as
part of their bundle, the popular services that are continuing
to grow in demand. These popular services include on-demand video service, which are now attracting 54.8% of CSPs,
followed by TV on 42.9% and then cloud and video storage
both 40.5%. It is also worth taking advantage of opening up
payment options, because prepaid and postpaid content
are rocketing in popularity, up by 30 – 50% respectively in a
single year.
What does the future hold for the telecoms market in
Africa?
The price conscious African communications market is
hugely competitive with low ARPUs hindering profitability and cost effective infrastructure delivery. However we
are now seeing the market passing in to the more mature
“growth phase” after more than a decade of subscriber
acquisition and network build-out meaning that ARPU and
subscriber growth have to come from new sources – new services, innovation, new segments, stickiness and net-positive
churn.
In one key area, Tecnotree sees the move to “stickiness”
in the form of CSPs experimenting with ‘Offer Personalization’: advanced Self Care, truly convergent and tailored user
experience,
dynamic personalized bundling of product offering
andreal-time offer creation based on subscriber behaviour,
personalized campaigns and loyalty programmes. These are
all designed to create the perfect relationship between the
CSP and the subscriber on an ever-evolving basis. New styles
of Value Added Services are being evaluated such as cloud
IP-TV, video conferencing, content aggregation and delivery,
and location-based services.
To compound the competitive landscape, other industry players with large customer bases, such as banks and
supermarket chains, are now looking to establish own-brand
MVNOs to offer their customers tailored communications
services and to build on their own version of ARPU. Hence we
see an increasing demand for multi-tenancy CSP platform
sharing, cloud applications, new generation VAS offerings,
analytics and behaviour-based campaigns, offers and loyalty
management.
www.cio.co.ke
SpecialFEATURE
Kamau Mbote
Francis Wangusi, Director General, CAK
Demystifying
Mobile Virtual Networks
The Communications Authority of Kenya (CAK) recently awarded
licenses to 3 to operate as mobile virtual operators, providing voice, data
and mobile money and messaging services.
The three firms issued with MVNO licenses are
Finserve owned by Equity Bank; Zioncell partly owned
by Mobile Decisioning Holdings and Mobile Pay which
operates under Tangaza Pesa brand.
Many Kenyans are however unaware of how the
MVNOs interact with mobile network operators such as
Safaricom, Airtel, Orange and Yu mobile, all of whom
have been ordered by the regulator to share excess
capacity with the new licensees.
Already, Airtel Kenya has led the way, offering its
capacity to the three new firms with other operators
expected to follow suit.“This new license category
is among the benefits accrued from commission’s
adoption of the unified licensing framework (ULF)
in 2008. The ULF collapsed all the technology
specific licenses into three categories: Network
Facilities provider, Application service provider and
content service provider with the aim to harness the
technological opportunities presented by convergence,”
said Francis Wangusi, director general, CAK.
Although MVNOs are obviously a new phenomenon
in this region, other countries such as Australia have
as many as 50 companies acting as virtual network
operators.
What is a Mobile Virtual Network Operator?
Mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) - also referred
as Mobile other licensed operator (MOLO) - is a company
that offers network services to customers but has no
network infrastructure of its own, but rather depends on
MNOs for support.
other countries such as Australia have as many as 50 companies
acting as virtual network operators.
www.cio.co.ke
SpecialFEATURE
The first country to introduce a MVNO was
Denmark which licensed Tele2, originally an
ISP in 1993 which later rolled out to other
markets afterwards.
A MVNO does thus have to enter into business contracts
with mobile network operators to use their spectrum
license with the MNO acting as a producer and the MOLO as
wholesalers.
After entering into such agreements, MVNOs can at will
provide the range of services offered by MNO’s such as
voice, data, SMS and mobile money. Already, Kenya’s three
licensees have said they plan to exploit all these avenues.
This leaves the MNO to simply provide three functions,
namely: transmission, switching and network elements.
The first country to introduce a MVNO was Denmark which
licensed Tele2, originally an ISP in 1993 which later rolled out
to other markets afterwards.
UK’s Virgin Mobile was however the first commercially
viable MVNO having been licensed in 1999 and later
expanded to US as Virgin Mobile USA with the latter being
acquired for $483 million by Sprint Nextel.
Closer home, South Africa is leading the way with several
companies, including Virgin Mobile, already operating in this
market.
During a recent MVNO industry summit, players called
for more stakeholder consultations. “The MVNO Summit
provides the insight for Regulators, MNOs, prospective
MVNOs and associates.... highly recommended for African
regulators and Operators,” said Kwame Baah-Acheamfuor,
National Communications Authority, Ghana.
Benefits
To the telecom industry MVNOs lead to more innovative,
value-added services to end users as they challenge MNO’s
for more customers and ensure more loyalty, thereby leading
to lower prices and more options.
MVNO’s also assist MNOs use underutilized capacity
in various service provisions bringing in specialization in
areas such as data and mobile pay which could help end
monopolies by reducing market domination.
In Kenya for example, mobile money is expected to see
more competition with the entry of Kenya’s largest bank
Equity Bank and an existing player within the market,
Tangaza Pesa, also expected to further raffle the market
largely controlled by Safaricom’s M-Pesa.
Already, Safaricom has been compelled to share its mobile
money infrastructure with its competitors, a boost for new
entrants who will not have to invest resources in getting
agents with the likes of Finserve and Mobile Pay likely to ride
on their parent company’s infrastructure.
For MNOs, MVNOs are an avenue for them to monetize in
various services they are not good at by providing excess
capacity for the new operators to customize attractive
services.
“This excess network capacity can therefore be made
accessible to MVNOs who are often smaller but innovative
enterprises with the capacity to attract subscribers by
targeting niche market segments to address user specific
needs,” said Wangusi.
Challenges
The decision by CAK has however not been received well
with a number of players already protesting the directive to
share infrastructure and the cost of the MVNO license.
Safaricom has protested sharing of its infrastructure which
it says it has invested heavily on while Orange Kenya says
that the Kshs 100,000 license fee is too low and unfair as the
MVNO will be competing against other players who coughed
an arm and tooth to launch services. Apart from the license
cost, it is also reported that Orange Kenya last week wrote
a letter to the CAK protesting the issuance of licenses to the
three MVNOs in the absence of contractual guidelines on how
the new operators should engage and carry out business.
“We are not opposed to the MVNOs. However we have
written to the regulator seeking clarification on specific
issues such as the lack of framework that guide the operators
and the MVNOs when entering into contracts,” Mickael
Ghossein, CEO, Orange Kenya was quoted as telling Business
Daily.
The protest come despite assurances from Wangusi who
while issuing the licenses said that the commission had
already developed guidelines that would act as safeguards to
the end users on the quality of service, billing and customer
service. He had promised that the guidelines would be
available on the CAK website in the coming days but were yet
to be displayed by the publication of this article.
“The guidelines further outline how the requirements,
interconnection, termination of licenses and access to MNO
facilities among other issues.”
CAK says the market for MVNOs is open even to existing
application service providers and is now encouraging
partnerships among MNO’s and any potential MVNOs so as
to create synergies in providing customer centric and niche
services to the public.
www.cio.co.ke
Pictorial
(L-R) Chase Bank Head Brand and Corporate Affairs
Magdalene Mulandi, hands over a cheque of Ksh
3.87million to m:lab East Africa Manager John Kamweti
in support of the PIVOT East 2014 startups competition.
Airtel Kenya MD Adil El Youssefi (Right) introduces
himself to a ‘SportsPesa’ agent who is also an Airtel
Money agent along Aga Khan Walk.
(L-R) Jason Finlayson, Director Security Risk Solutions;
Loren Bosch, Head of Managed Services, AccessKenya
& Internet Solutions and Fayyazz Ayoub, Director,
Security Testing at Security Risk Solutions chat during
the launch of the Managed Security Services solution
recently
Seated from LEFT: Jeremy Ngunze the CBA Bank Kenya
CEO, Joan Kariuki the M-PESA Product Manager, Danny
Mucira the Multichoice Kenya General Manager and
Felix Kyengo the GOtv General Manager (standing)
display the partnership documents moments after the
signing ceremony. Safaricom, CBA and Multichoice
have launched a decoder financing option to ensure
Kenyans catch 2014 FIFA World Cup action.
www.cio.co.ke
NewAPPOINTMENTS
Adil El Yousseffi
Mr Youssefi joins Airtel from the Millicom
group in Ghana where he has been the General Manager since June 2012. He joined the
Millicom Group in 2008 as Senior Advisor
to the Chief Officer Asia in Sri Lanka. In
2009, he joined the Group’s operations in
Chad as deputy general manager and was
appointed general manager one year later.
Prior to joining Millicom, Mr Youssefi
worked for British Telecommunications and
Philips Consumer Electronics. He holds an
MBA from INSEAD in France and an M. Sc.
in Engineering from ENSEIRB in Bordeaux,
France.
Lucy Quist
Airtel recently announced the appointment of Ms Lucy Quist as MD for Airtel
Ghana. Ms Quist, a Ghanaian national, has
strong experience in telecoms industry in
Ghana and across Africa, joining Airtel from
Vodafone Ghana where she has been the Director for the Enterprise Business Unit. She
joined Vodafone Ghana in 2011 as Head of
Strategy & Planning and Managing Director
of Vodafone’s Wholesale Business. In 2008,
she joined Millicom International Cellular
(Tigo), as Head of Business Development
for Africa and as Head of Northern Sector in
Ghana before becoming the Chief Marketing
Officer in the DRC.
Ms. Quist started her career in 1994 in
automotive engineering with Ford Motor
Company, working her way through design
engineering, manufacturing and project
management roles in the UK, Germany
and Portugal. She later became a Change
Manager at the Royal Bank of Scotland in
London as part of the RBS-ABN AMRO
Operations merger team. Lucy is a Chartered Electrical and Electronics Engineer,
holds a first class Bachelor of Engineering
degree and an MBA from INSEAD. As MD
for Airtel’s business in Ghana, Ms Quist’s
technical and business acumen, industry experience and in country perspective will play
a pivotal role in driving the next phase of the
company’s journey outside the traditional
consumer arena.
Roshi Motman
Millicom has announced the appointment of Roshi Motman as its new GM at
Tigo Ghana. Ms Motman took up the her
new role on April 1. Roshi joined Tigo after
almost 10 years with various companies in
the Kinnevik Group, a key investor in Millicom where she progressed in a variety of
management roles at Tele2 in Sweden covering product management, sales and most
recently customer operations.
www.cio.co.ke
Prior to Tele2, Motman was responsible
for the development of mobile entertainment at Modern Times Group, parent
company of TV channel Viasat. She studied
Electrical Engineering and Business Development at Chalmers University in Göteborg,
Sweden.
ProductREVIEW
Lilian Mutegi
ASUS TRANSFORMER
T100
The Excellence is never out of reach with the ASUS
Transformer Book T100. Entertainment is never out of focus.
The affordable ASUS Transformer Book T100 gives you the
chance to create your own mobile laptop dynamic, so you
never have to compromise again. Go where you want to
go to with the new ASUS Transformer Book T100 as it is
modern, portable and advanced with the new technology
SPECIFICATIONS
Screen: 10 inches
Weight: 1.2lbs
Processor: Intel atom
Memory: Internal: 32GB or 64GB of
internal storage that can be expandable with a microSD
Operating System: Windows 8
Body and design
Just like any other device in the Transformer
range, the ASUS T100 can serve as both
a 10-inch tablet or as a notebook though
it’s slightly smaller than a notebook. It is
detached by pressing a dock on the key
board, with one hand and simply pulling
the screen from its bed with the other and it
automatically becomes a tablet. The screen
has the touch effect and an option for a
virtual keyboard. The display and keyboard
are covered with grey plastic and seem
convincing when held.
The T100′s edges curve towards the front,
which is the best solution for devices that
are more often used in hand than set up at
a desk or on your lap. Because this and the
other device dimensions, the consumer may
be motivated to use the Transformer Book
T100 more frequently as a tablet and seldom
as a notebook, connected to a physical
keyboard. When using it as a tablet however,
the keyboard has four rubber pads that
enable it to stand on any surface in a stable
form.
However, working with the virtual keyboard
may become a little bit hectic since it
occupies half the screen, making it a little
bit harder to log into some sites. The screen
however has the rotation effect, meaning
one can use the tablet in both landscape
and portrait form.
Apart from the USB 3.0 port which is on the
keyboard dock, all other connectors are
lined up along the edges of the screen, that
is the tablet. These include the combined
sound jacks, a micro-HDMI connector for
external displays, and a micro-USB port for
charging. The Asus T100 has no back-facing
camera, which is not a slight shortcoming.
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Weighing 544 grams, the Transformer Book
T100 is one of the lighter 10-inch tablets with
Windows 8.1. however, its dimensions of
264 x 170 x 10.4 mm make it not one of the
slimmer ones. Still, despite its dimensions,
the device leaves a convincing impression
and is not as difficult to hold as it might
seem at first. In short, it’s heavy enough to
“eventually” feel uncomfortable when you’re
holding it.
The entire device’s body has been crafted
out of plastic with a slightly rough texture
which makes the tablet cling to the palm
easily (or any other surface). And thanks to
the textured cover, it is easy to determine if
you’re holding the tablet the wrong way up
just by feeling it.
ProductREVIEW
DISPLAY
KEYBOARD
The keyboard which is detachable from the main screen is a
great idea as it helps in making work easier. However, even
with the keyboard, there are activities that require the owner
to use the screen. The keyboard keys are densely distributed
on the key board and a little bit tiny thereby making it hectic
for the user when typing loads of work.
On the other hand, something interesting about the virtual
keyboard is that it gives the user an option of about three
forms of the keyboard.
The Asus Transformer Book T100 comes
with a 1366 x 768-pixel IPS display, which
provides a humble pixel density of 148
ppi on a 10.1-inch diagonal. Still, the user
interface of Windows 8.1, Microsoft Design
Style looks remarkably sharp with good
contrast and vivid color on this display. The
low pixel density favors the functionality
of Windows desktop mode, given that the
window edges, as well as the control key
which manages the windows, are not too
tiny to be “aimed at” with the tip of the
finger.
Still, when text in a smaller or slimmer font
is displayed, the detail ceases to be sharp.
The difference in relation to tablets with
an evidently greater pixel density than the
Transformer Book T100 is visible with the
naked eye.
Conclusion
Though a little bit heavy, it is a device that one can
move around with as it can fit in the handbag or
even a small bag. Asus has an upper hand in that
it was among the first companies to have offered
such devices with above-average performance at
a reasonable price. The Transformer Book T100 is
also a device which has more pros than cons. Asus
Transformer T100 also comes with a cover/case if
one needs it. The product is found in various ASUS
outlets at a cost of Kshs 47,000 (USD 547), an amount
which could be affordable to most students and
most people who need to work and stay connected
throughout the day.
The keyboard dock has a very useful full-sized USB 3.0 hub.
An incredible array of peripheral devices can be connected
via USB to this 2-in-1 - like any printer, an additional USB hub,
a mouse or even a larger keyboard. It’s also interesting to
note that for one to use the USB hub, one has to connect the
tablet with the keyboard.
PERFORMANCE AND
BATTERY LIFE
The new generation of the Atom processor (Bay Trail
architecture) in this device shows that combined with 2GB of
RAM, it can offer great performance in all aspects of everyday
usage (Internet, multimedia, documents). All this with almost
no heating up, which is why the Transformer Book T100 is as
“quiet”. The Transformer Book T100 comes with 32GB or 64GB
of internal storage, which can be expanded with microSD
cards. If you mainly use this 2-in-1 as a tablet, then you will
surely find this capacity limiting with time.
Low power consumption is praiseworthy, as the device
provides over 8 hours of battery life (the battery is in-built
inside the screen). On the other hand, the recharging takes
quite a long time and despite the fact that batteries of
competitive models are recharged much faster, this great
battery life is perhaps the tablet’s biggest selling point. The
battery life however depends on what you are doing with
the machine - if one is watching movies or videos or playing
games, or even surfing on the internet, the period it stays
on will take more time unlike the user who just uses it for
typing. On that note, the device comes with the full suite of
Microsoft Office 2013. The touchpad effect is however not
very comfortable as well as the fact that you also have to add
a little effort when clicking on the touch pad buttons.
www.cio.co.ke
CIOPROFILE
Mr Hu Xin,
CTO,
ZTE Corporation
www.cio.co.ke
CIOPROFILE
Michael Ouma
Public private model will enhance
efficiency of Kenya’s LTE network
Mr Hu Xin is ZTE Corporations’s Chief Technology Officer or CTO for
Southern African region, which covers over 10 countries. In this role – which
puts him in charge of sales and marketing activities in locations as diverse
as Angola to Somalia to Burindi – Mr Xin is definitely a busy man. CIO East
Africa recently caught up with him in the office, just before he left for tour of
duty to another country. Below are excerpts of our conversation:
What does your job involve?
ZTE has offered me valuable time. Before I was sent abroad, I
was just an engineer but after these 5 years, together – me and
my company ZTE - has grown a lot and opened my view for the
international market. This year, our focus is on three directions
– CT which involves partnering with regional telecoms
operators; ICT which focuses on partnerships with government
solutions, industries (like energy), education, public utilities,
transportation while terminals (or devices) is the third area.
Our terminals business used not to be an independent unit
but is now an independent division. We have now developed
a clear strategy looking at either low-end, middle-end or highend consumer segment of the population. This is meant to
ensure that the devices we bring to the market are high quality
and meet consumer expectations.
As the CTO, what kind of issues and challenges are most
commonly reported by clients about ZTE devices? How
are you working to address those challenges?
The target for ZTE’s technical team is always to satisfy
our customers by not only offering the best solutions and
devices but also creating sustainability and values for them.
So our challenges mainly come from the process of mutual
communication and understanding of creating or customizing
the solutions for them. The ZTE team always welcomes these
challenges and works harder with more creativity because we
understand this is best chance to improve the solution for the
customer.
In order to increase your market-share in the region,
what kind of investments is ZTE putting up in Africa to
ensure that as many people as possible get access to your
devices and solutions?
Africa is one of the most important markets with high potential
to ZTE. As of now, ZTE has established more than 60 branches
in Africa. In fact, you can always find ZTE people’s friendly
smile in each country of Africa, which also ensure that our
customers can get to know the latest ZTE solution and product
promptly. Having and keeping all the branches running
smoothly is in itself a very big investment. For the bigger
picture, ZTE is devoting 10% of annual revenue (more than
USD 14 billion each year) into R&D so that our customers and
Africa can benefit from the tailored solutions we develop for
them. Moreover, ZTE has also established regional call center,
logistic center, training center and joint venture of PV module
manufacturing in Africa. ZTE will keep on increasing the
investment in Africa so that all the customers as well as African
people can benefit from the efficiency and openness brought
by ZTE’s ICT solutions.
In other markets ZTE is known for pushing high-end
mobile handsets. In view of this, what type of technology
are you planning to push in this region for users to access
best quality mobile communication services? Which
models of smartphones are you pushing in this region or
do you believe are most ideal and have greatest marketshare in this region?
ZTE’s high end terminal brand “Nubia” is Chinese First Lady’s
Choice due to its brilliant design and quality. The handset,
especially smartphone, market in this area is very important
to ZTE. For this reason, ZTE will introduce a complete product
line covering high end, middle end and low end to give our
customers in this area more better options.
In other markets, ZTE has launched LTE / 4G enabled
devices. Kenya is yet to have an LTE network. What
model would you like to see adopted for Kenya’s LTE /
4G network once deployed? What are its advantages and
benefits to users?
Traditionally, a nation-wide LTE network is established
by mobile operators. Yet now, Kenya government is also
considering the public-private or PPP mode of introducing LTE
network. As ZTE, we believe both business models will benefit
Kenya’s people in the aspect of enabling high-speed mobile
broadband internet. The operator-to-build model can greatly
ensure competition, leading to affordable tariffs for Kenya’s
people. On the other hand, since an LTE network needs huge
investment, this model might cause overlay investment. The
PPP model tends to increase the efficiency of the investment
and ZTE also believes the government will work out a way to
control the tariffs.
www.cio.co.ke
Cover Cloud is the future
of ERPs
According to a recent study by research firm Gartner
the adoption of cloud ERP 2013 through to 2023 has the
potential to replace the aging core ERP system with almost
half of organizations interviewed saying they planned to
move within the next 5 years.
www.cio.co.ke
Cover
Cloud is the future of ERPs
New trends in successful
ERP implementation
By Lilian Mutegi
Vivian Ashioya, Application Sales Manager, Oracle
With East African market becoming less tolerant of big expensive
monolithic implementations of traditional ERPs, providers of these
solutions are changing by offering customers choice and flexibility
with the most comprehensive, modern, flexible and secure portfolio of
solutions.
Whether customers need a fully integrated suite or
best-in-class modules, the companies deliver cloud
and on-premise ERP solutions designed for the largest
organizations as well as growing midsize enterprises.
With cloud solutions, the payment model is
subscription based, enabling the customers to turn this
into an Operational Expenditure (Opex) rather than a
Capital expenditure (Capex) cost allowing for financial
flexibility and predictable cost that go along with a
modular, pay-as-you-go approach.
However, ERP User Interface has rapidly evolved to
improve the way users input, access and retrieve data.
In an interview with CIO East Africa, Vivian Ashioya,
application sales manager, Oracle said: “Oracle has
totally redesigned its application usability interface
through focused customer workshops which has
resulted in significant productivity and usability
improvement and enhancements to native user
interface into HTML web-based User Interfaces focusing
on, Enhanced Mobility – Gesture Support, Intuitive look
and feel with richer component interactions such as
tables with Column Reorder, Resize, Detach, Scroll and
new components; Time Picker, Menu, Accordion etc.”
Ms Ashioya explained that Oracle offers complete
role-based user experience tailored for unique needs
- from the boardroom to the front lines – connecting
users with a proactive list of what they need to get
done, the information they need to make effective
decisions, guidance on how to execute tasks, and quick
access to the people who can help them get the job
done.
Companies offering ERP solutions employ the use
of sensors placed throughout the enterprise that
ERP User Interface has rapidly evolved to improve the way users
input, access and retrieve data
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Cover
automatically collect different kinds of data.
Such integrations include integration with
biometric devices with HR to capture employees’
attendance data, integration with RFID devices
with the inventory and supply chain modules, integration
with the weigh-bridge devices to collect details of
tonnage in the logistics and value chain modules among
others.
purchases the license to the software and has the option
of customizing it according to its needs. Also, with
traditional ERP implementation, large- and mid-sized
companies are able to gain control over the software
and not have to change their internal processes to fit the
ERP system. Also, traditional ERP offers more stability
because it’s not dependent on the reliability of the
Internet to function.
ERPs are evolving to a point where customers
can nowadays even access these solutions via their
cellphones. To give the mobile workforce easy access to
mission-critical information, organisations like Oracle
offer a wide range of out-of-the-box mobile applications,
as well as the option of leveraging the Oracle Mobile
Platform to develop their own mobile applications.
However, traditional ERP methods generally require
a large up-front investment, which can be difficult for
many smaller businesses. With SaaS deployments, the
up-front costs are smaller although there are ongoing
annual payments. Also, the traditional ERP installation
can be highly complex, especially the integration of many
different internal applications under a single system.
However, data on any device is of no use unless it
can be turned into insight. To ensure this is possible,
Oracle’s Business Intelligence (BI) Mobile gives a full
range of BI functionally, from interactive dashboards to
location intelligence, and lets the client initiate business
processes right from their mobile device.
According to James Gicheru, Line of Business Manager
– DCS at Dimension Data East Africa, adoption of Cloud
ERP in the region is limited due to customer education
and cloud Software as a Service challenges.
There still exist advantages of traditional ERP
implementation which involves hosting the system
internally. These include the fact that the company
“Typically SME’s wanting to implement ERP systems
are considering Cloud ERP as it offers a better ROI,” noted
Gicheru.
James Gicheru, Line of Business Manager – DCS, Dimension Data East Africa
SME’s wanting to implement ERP systems are considering Cloud
ERP as it offers a better ROI,
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Cover
What is cloud ERP?
Cloud ERP is the advancement of enterprise resource
planning (ERP) to utilize cloud computing platforms
and services thereby enabling businesses to achieve
the various activities such as purchasing and inventory
management, finance and human capital management
without necessarily purchasing any hardware or
software.
Why migrate to cloud ERP
The reasons as to why a company would prefer
to move to the Cloud ERP are both motivated by
efficiency as well as reducing budgets.
Players in the defense and aerospace sectors where
there are tighter project schedules and aggressive
launch dates and decreasing budgets are for example
likely to look for a solution that is both scalable and
complies with laid down thresholds.
This brings us to the advantages of the cloud ERP
over the aging core systems that continue to be used in
a majority of companies.
One clear merit for going the Cloud ERP route
is usually the ease and quick deployment which
according to the nature of the company could range
from just a few days to a maximum of 90 days. Even
more fulfilling is that there is no time spent debating on
what hardware and software to purchase.
Going by the previous statement, there is no
hardware purchase or servers to install or any new
employees to hire just to keep the ERP systems in
check thus saving the company money.
After establishing the right Cloud ERP provider and
setting the systems up, it is also very easy to upgrade
new versions of software most of which will just
happen instantaneously resulting in enhancement of
the product.
Configuring or reconfiguring of hosted ERPs can also
be done quickly.
Finally the business can also be able to achieve
security safeguards and thus ensure that the
organization’s data remains safe without investing in
data center security.
there is no hardware purchase or servers to install or any new
employees to hire just to keep the ERP systems in check
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Cover
Who are industry leaders?
A number of companies have already taken a leap in
this segment including Microsoft, Oracle, SAP, NetSuite
and Infor.
Microsoft for example is also planning the hosting
of its ERP suite - the Microsoft’s Dynamics AX 2012 R3
- due in May 2014 on the Windows Azure months after
it hosted the Dynamics GP and Dynamics NAV ERP
products in June last year.
This would mean that only one of Microsoft’s
Dynamics ERP offerings - the Dynamics SL - is not on the
Windows Azure.
Oracle on the other hand has a suite that has in it
the latest in social, mobile and analytic technologies.
The Oracle ERP cloud, Fusion, runs on the pluggable,
independent container functionality that allows a
scalable and secure multitenant model.
It has various offerings including software as a service
(SaaS) with complete ERP Services including financials,
planning and budgeting, risk and controls management,
procurement and sourcing, inventory and cost
management, product master data management, and
project portfolio management.
SAP which is already known for developing ERPs that
control complex manufacturing functions has its cloud
ERP dubbed HANA which combines fast computing and
data retrieval.
Recently, SAP added its Business suite on the HANA in
what SAP said will provide its customers with improved
“flexibility, user experience and rapid pace of innovation”
through more choice and simplicity in deployment.
What to look out while choosing a
cloud ERP
With so many companies launching products in this
front, the secret lies in knowing what factors to examine
in a particular ERP Cloud offering. Some of the factors to
consider are whether the SaaS ERP option as a managed
service will be maintained by the vendor or have to be
administered by the business, thereby losing the various
advantages that come with cloud ERP.
Another relevant question is whether your business
needs a multi-tenant SaaS and which providers have
such solutions.
Whichever option one decides to take in the selection
of an ERP, it’s crucial to remember that it will affect
the organisation’s flexibility, agility, control and come
with cost implications. It is thus important that buyers
analyze business needs and understand whether a cloud
solution can support the entire organization, or if it’s
better to go with a departmental rollout. Companies
should also ensure that their chosen cloud solution
offers seamless data sharing and integration with other
complementary applications on the platform.
Another important consideration while chosing the
various options is understanding software pricing and
delivery so as to enter into contracts that favor the
business. The general assumption that cloud contracts
are easy to navigate coupled by shrewd pricing can
reverse the benefits over traditional software.
flexibility, user experience and rapid pace of innovation”
through more choice and simplicity in deployment
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OPINION
Tyrus KAMAU
Cyber Security
Threat Preparedness: Are we?
Two subjects have rocked the IT news in the
last couple of weeks; end of life for Microsoft’s
Windows XP and OpenSSL’s ‘heartbleed’ 0-day
vulnerability. Now, a lot has been written about
the above with professionals providing in-depth
analysis and possible solutions.
Regarding Windows XP, the curtain fell on its support
and what became painfully obvious was the fact that
over 80% of ATM machines run on this particular operating system (OS). This meant that Microsoft would not be
providing security updates and as such, users of this OS
would either have to upgrade to a supported version or
opt for another system all together. There are inherent
risks of running an unsupported system which could
lead to data theft and system compromise among other
problems. Banks have found themselves in an interesting position, pleading with Microsoft to extend the
lifetime for the support but the tech giant doesn’t seem
to warm up to this idea.
OpenSSL is a software used by a large percentage of
webservers and other applications to generate what
are known as Secure Socket Layer (SSL) certificates
and keys. A certificate is basically a form of identifier
for websites to prove their legitimacy. This is normally
characterized by the “HTTPS” on your browser’s URL
bar. It could also be preceded by a green bar indicating
what is known as “Extended Validation” for really secure
websites, mostly banking and e-commerce. Now what
was discovered was a software bug which could lead
to several things among them leakage of sensitive data
regarding the web server. The severity of this bug is such
that it leaves no trace once an attack has been propagated.
Now let’s tie it together. Locally, we are definitely
largely affected by the two scenarios and what is even
more worrying is our response. For the Windows XP part,
there’s really not much to be done. However, CBK and
the Kenya Banker’s Association (KBA) have remained
OpenSSL is a software used by a
large percentage of webservers and
other applications to generate what are
known as Secure Socket Layer (SSL)
certificates and keys
silent as always. In the past, their approach has been
rather reactionary, case in point being the ATM skimming
charade from 2012.
What clearly lacks is an active banking Computer
Incidence & Response Team (CIRT) to take a proactive
role in advising the sector in these matters. In equal
measure, several banks which run the OpenSSL application together with a handful of other service providers
are clearly vulnerable to the exploit. Closed disclosures
(where you inform the client of the vulnerability) don’t
seem to bear any fruits in this market, either due to limited knowledge by the stakeholders or sheer ignorance
of the imminent threats.
The National Cyber Security Master plan which was
released to the public about three weeks ago for comments addresses this concern in depth. The strategy
decentralizes the roles of the National CIRT by incorporating various sector CIRTS e.g Telecommunications,
Health, Academic, Banking and so on.
Despite its pending implementation, stakeholders
need to regroup and strategize on how best to implement these initiatives way before the master plan comes
to life. As a country which boasts of having a firm grasp
as a technology-driven economy, we cannot take a perfunctory approach in dealing with cyber security threats.
Academic institutions also now need to build research
capabilities to best feed the industry which has a unique
positioning in the technology ecosystem.
Finally, I believe the CAK (Communications Authority
of Kenya) has a huge role to play in addressing the CIRT
initiative seeing that TESPOK has already gone ahead
of the pack. With reports such as “Cyber Usalama”, it’s
a good starting point. The aim should now be real-time
detection and faster turnaround times in providing
patches and solutions. What I’m proposing here is anything but notional given the fact that as a country, we
seek to be the model for the rest of Africa in matters ICT.
www.cio.co.ke
ConnectedKENYA
Lillian MUTEGI
After sixth edition,
Connected Kenya goes regional next year
The last Connected Kenya summit, the sixth edition of
the Summit and the last before the event is transformed
to cover the whole East African region in future, saw key
players in the ICT sector come together to propose ways
to mitigate and break barriers that to various challenges
facing the sector.
A brief background on the annual event: Connected Kenya Summit is a brainchild of the ICT
Authority and was first held in 2009. Since then,
it has been held at the Coast. The event aims at
establishing a platform for collaboration, capacity
building and knowledge sharing between government and the ICT industry with a view to linking
and hastening implementation of government IT
projects to world class standards
Among key projects that have been initiated
from previous summits include Kenya’s Open Data
Initiative, the Huduma Centres and the development of a National Information Security Policy.
This year’s event attracted delegates from the
East African Community, with regional delegates
being Jean Philbert Nsengimana, Minister of Youth
and ICT, Rwanda; John Nasasira, Minister of Communications, Science and Technology, Uganda as
well as Eng Juma Stephen Lugga, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Telecommunications and Postal
Services, Republic of South Sudan.
Hon John Nasasira, congratulated Kenya for the
launch of the Smart Kenya Masterplan while Eng
Juma Stephen Lugga commended Kenya on the
positive steps the country has made in ICT, adding
that plans are underway to work with Kenya to
help his country to create a regulatory body.
Held under the theme “Breaking the Barriers”,
the summit delivered valuable insights from the
industry’s top leaders and facilitated best practice
sharing between executives crucial to drive innovation and growth.
Among the key sessions was the Regional InterMinisterial Committee discussing how to
make the idea of Integrated Shared Services a
reality in East Africa. There were also discussions on other matters including Public
Private Partnerships (PPPs), Cybersecurity and
Big Data Analytics, Social Mobile Analytics
www.cio.co.ke
and Cloud (SMAC), Imagineering education and
healthcare among others.
In an interview with CIO East Africa, Dr Gilbert
Saggia, country lead, Oracle, said the summit gives
a great platform to share ideas that are public
sector-related and also offers a chance for the various players in the industry to exchange ideas.
“The summit helps in capacity building, advising
the government on how IT is used in policy making.
Participation is about the bigger framework of
ICT policy, value in having dialog as well as what
is the general direction in which the government
is headed and build capacity around that,” said
Saggia.
The government on the other hand laid down
the various projects it has outlined to help the
growth of industry, with a focus on working with
the East African Community to lower the roaming
charges across the region.
Among the key commitments given by the
Government - through Principal Secretary in the
Ministry of ICT, Joseph Tiampati during his closing
remarks - included developing a digital policy to
guide proper data utilization in government for
informed decision making. The document will help
those trying to understand implications of emerging technologies such as Social media, mobile and
cloud.
Tiampati added that the government is committed to fast-tracking draft bills and other pending
regulations to enhance ICT development, with a
key commitment being to engage in dialogue that
will to guide PPPs involving ICT projects.
The summit helps in capacity building,
advising the government on how IT is
used in policy making
OPINION
Chris WEN
Cybercrime:
A Threat For Modern Day Businesses
Picture a world where 300million computers and mobile
devices are connected to the internet. Next, visualize yourself
having a business - among many - that’s digitally connected.
Now clearly the opportunities of gaining from this sort of
hyper connectivity are immense.
But behind all the advantages that come with a networked system lies the biggest threat commonly known
as cybercrime. This worldwide threat is most prevalent
in developing countries like Kenya. According to a report
from the Kaspersky Security Network (KSN) for the first
quarter of 2013, Kenya ranked 115 on a list of countries
prone to web-based threats. The report also indicates
that Kenya is ranked at position 80 in terms of countries
where hosting services are used by cybercriminals.
In 2012, research by Deloitte noted that banks in East
Africa alone lost about Kshs 14 billion to fraudsters who
capitalized on the existing weak security systems. What
is more worrying is that in April 2013, Kenyan domains
belonging to key services providers such as Google,
Microsoft, LinkedIn and Kaspersky among others were
compromised by a Bangladesh hacker. A lot of users on
the networks were redirected to the hacker’s site which
indicated that the sites had been hacked. Although there
hasn’t been any comprehensive study to establish how
Kenyan public and private institutions have secured their
information and businesses’ security systems, majority
do not see their organizational data as a valuable asset
which can be prone to serious cyber threats.
Efficient framework:A considerable number of businesses don’t have a Policy and Data protection framework and this is what leads them to be prone because a
business that doesn’t have a watertight protection policy
is bound to be a target for cyber criminals. Organizations’
IT specialists with direction from CIOs need to come up
with an efficient, effective and innovative framework
that consists of 5 core functions. These include aspects
such as identifying, protecting, detecting, responding
and recovering. All of these can offer a high-level strategic view of an organization’s management of a cyber
security threat. These four principles form the framework
profile which will signify the outcomes that a particular
system of the organization has achieved or is expected,
A considerable number of businesses
don’t have a Policy and Data protection
framework
as identified in the said categories. The policy here acts
as a form of risk assessment platform at the same time
helping the organizations manage the risk.
Training:Most times computers are not to blame
for cyber flaws, meaning that people are becoming the
weakest link. In this case and for many organizations, it
would be safe to say that employees are a major threat
to cyber security. In most cases, you’ll find employees
transferring work files to and from home in as much as it
is against the HR policies. This situation breeds a threat
since their computers may have a virus at some point.
When this virus spreads as a result of bringing their
machines to work, the organizations information and
data will in most cases be eventually affected. Situations
like this can only be alleviated if employees are trained
on the risks and security principles. The rationale is that
if employees don’t understand how criminals are working and how they can be targeted, they can’t be on the
lookout for them.
Tight network through Cloud Computing: Questions abound about whether cloud storage can be a
solution to cybercrime. Indeed, by limiting solid state
access points, there is a mathematical probability that
the security web is stronger. With larger professionals,
web-networks services such as Asus’s cloud web storage
organizations are assured of a strong architecture that
reduces the threat posed by hackers. Despite the fact
that lots of people and organizations are still reluctant
to trust these third-party storage services, evidence does
seem to support the idea that dedicated cloud-based
security is a step in the right direction. Cyber crimes are
real and the idea that “it can never happen to me” is
misleading. It’s therefore crucial that cyber threats be
taken seriously and not seen as random events because
they can affect any organization, pulling all of its assets
down. Granted we are advancing technologically but
government plus corporates need to work together to
ensure that the fight against cybercrime doesn’t hurt
businesses.
(The author is the ASUS Country product manager for
Kenya)
www.cio.co.ke
OPINION
Nyawira MURIUKI
The Paradox:
Innovation vs Best Practices
If you took a hiatus from the tech industry for a few days
or weeks, you will definitely wake up to a totally new world
as far as technology is concerned. Or perhaps you will
simply go about your business every day, none the wiser.
The rate at which this area is evolving constantly
leaves minds spinning, trying to keep up with the pace.
A case in point: just the other day, a hypertensioninducing vulnerability fondly named ‘Heartbleed’ was
discovered in a message transmission protocol that is
frequently used in cryptography. It was revealed that
the protocol can apparently be waylaid and tricked
into giving up its secrets without the hacker leaving a
trace of ever having been in the henhouse. Wait, it gets
worse. Any encrypted information that may have been
collected beforehand can be decrypted with the keys
stolen via Heartbleed. Basically, it is a case of the horse
having already left the barn. The only guarantee of security going forward is to patch the breach and change all
passwords.
their business, believing that their information transmission was secure?
So why should Heartbleed make your heart skip a
beat? Well, much as it was revealed that Android smartphones and tablets are equally vulnerable, it should not
turn into a crisis at an individual level; at least not unless you’re in the business of trading corporate secrets
or planning on partaking in criminal activities.
I have to wonder what this means for cloud computing, it’s continued adoption and whether companies
have policies in place that define the kind of information that is made accessible online. This is coming up at
a time when even telecommunications companies are
getting into the business of offering cloud hosting services and we all know how much information is already
available through their servers.
On a sober note though, the thought that an individual can access encryption keys and other data from any
organisation’s server without a trace is not something
one would want to mull over. There’s all sorts of information that once accessed can be dangerously placed
in the wrong hands. We’re talking about passwords to
various bank transactions, government agency records,
even something as seemingly innocent as telephone
call logs.
Much as the tech world feigned surprise that an
American security agency had sat on the knowledge
about the vulnerability for close to two years, it does
make one wonder how seriously organisations take
best practices. How many actually implement these
‘best practice theories’ such as regularly testing systems
for security breaches or backing up information that no
longer requires to be accessed frequently? Better yet,
how did the security agency supposedly discover the
bug so long ago while the rest of the world went on with
It is ironic that as much as the tech world claims not
to have been in the know about Heartbleed, an article
on the top threats to cloud computing, featured on
InfoWorld and following the RSA Conference in San
Francisco in 2013, mentioned a research paper by the
Cloud Security Alliance presented in November 2011.
The research paper described the concept of a virtual
machine using a side channel, timing information to
extract private cryptographic keys. This sounds very
much like the sneaky 64 kilobytes-data leaking style
that Heartbleed employs. It seems that the vulnerability
and its possible existence was not a secret after all.
All in all, these developments present a push-pull,
one-step-forward-three-steps-back process for a
company trying to keep up with and incorporate new
technologies while trying to protect their systems from
breaches. The result is a very delicate balance between
adopting relevant innovative technologies while maintaining best practices.
These recent revelations have emphasised the gap
that lies between taking on emerging technologies and
ensuring information security. A deadlock of sorts.
www.cio.co.ke
So why should Heartbleed make
your heart skip a beat?
OPINION
Peter MUYA
How to make
Enterprise Architecture projects a success
The alignment of business and IT is top of the list of motivation
for an organizations’ desire to embark on Enterprise Architecture
(EA) journey. Other reasons for having an EA agenda are to support
change and strengthen organizational adaptability to change.
However, in spite of the huge interest in EA it turns out
that 66% of EA projects did not fulfil expectations. Why
would the very initiative that is supposed to safeguard
the connection between business and technology be the
catalyst to an abysmal business / technology outcome?
EA project - unlike a system implementation project
- has really no tangible outcome. While a system can be
used by the business to post a journal, recruit an employee, disburse funds or enrol a student, EA outputs are
a bunch of documents and models that only make sense
to the core EA team. Therefore, architects have a much
more difficult situation to justify an EA project in the first
place or to make a case for resuscitating one that is in
the ICU. How then can these mistakes be avoided in the
first place in order for an organization to have a higher
success rate of EA project? Below are various ways:
Appropriate of Sponsorship: Architects need three
tools to do a good job - access, leverage and funds. Lack
of access to appropriate stakeholders, wrong placement
in the value chain, lack of access to the right information
and lack of funding are all ingredients of an initiative
doomed to fail. The initiative must identify who is required, what level of engagement, what is their expected
contribution, how much is to be spent on the initiative
and where the right information for the initiative will be
found.
Appropriate Hire: Incumbent’s inability to translate
technology into simple business outcomes, and the
inability to listen, communicate, present and market
infectious enthusiasm for new technologies. EA initiative
must be led by skills that are purely non-technical. You
need a generalist (one who knows a little about a lot)
rather than a specialist (one who knows a lot about a
little) to lead successful EA projects.
Measure EA: Too much focus on producing diagrams
and matrices without focus on producing frequent,
meaningful and measureable business outcomes can
lead to fatigue and shift of focus from value to process.
A prospective homeowner’s core utility is not diagrams
but a dwelling. As long as the architect cannot show a
dwelling, then the homeowner’s need is not met. Focus
on measurable utilities in the eyes of the business.
EA is not about tools and frameworks: There are
over 80 frameworks available and an equivalent number
of tools to be used in an EA project. Spending too much
time on selecting the right ones ignores the important
business which is to use them. A blended use and
simplified methodology that is easily understood by the
stakeholders will drive the initiative faster.
EA is not IT: Most EA programs are initiated by IT and
never progress beyond the technology domain. They are
limited to standardization, roadmap solid engineering
practice but won’t align such with business goals to deliver business led technology innovation. When that happens, the fire that was ignited in onboarding the C-level
in the project is quickly extinguished. EA, though uses IT,
is not about IT and should not be led by an IT agenda.
Think out of the box about “Enterprise”: “Enterprise” does not necessarily mean the entire enterprise. It
means stepping back and taking a look at the higherlevel context before making a decision. Moving architecture to the real enterprise level requires a mature and
committed organization. In conclusion, consider these
two motivations, which are outcomes of an EA project,
being presented to board of directors:
a. “We plan to spend USD 2Mto implement a CRM
system”
b. “We plan to invest USD 2M to deliver superior
customer service and products through a single
view of the customer”
Which of these two statements demonstrate the footprint of an architect who has walked the 8 steps listed
above?
Peter Muya, IT consultant
(www.pticonsulting.co.ke)
66% of EA projects did not fulfil
expectations
www.cio.co.ke
Second OPINION
Sam M MWANGI
Making a case
for Kenya’s new National Digital IDs
Essentially, any ATM debit or credit card you obtain from your
bank is substantially more sophisticated and secure than the
government-issued national identity cards. The card would
either have a chip or a magnetic stripe.
A Chip Card contains an embedded microchip that
encrypts card holder information into a unique code
that significantly increases transaction and account
data security when used at a chip-enabled terminal,
and makes card cloning and fraud more difficult.
A magnetic stripe card is a type of card capable
of storing data by modifying the magnetism of tiny
iron-based magnetic particles on a band of magnetic
material on the card. The magnetic stripe, sometimes
called swipe card or magstripe, is read by swiping
past a magnetic reading head. Though not as secure
as the chip, the magnetic stripe is cost effective and
easier to roll out.
The Kenyan Government will soon be issuing
citizens with new identity cards in fresh registration
initiative that will cost the exchequer approximately
Kshs 8 billion. The super ID card will contain biometric
information — each person’s unique biological markers — as well as social security and national insurance
details. This cannot be over emphasized considering
the current security situation and in some ways, has
been long overdue.
With modern technology, forging a national ID has
never been easier. All a forger needs to do is scan
a genuine ID, import it into Photoshop, change the
name, birth date, and picture, and print to photo
paper on a color printer, then laminate it all together.
One has to be very keen to tell the difference. Apart
from identity theft, the other disadvantage of the current IDs is the fact that they cannot be used to store
any other data other than a person’s identity details.
Imagine a scenario where an electronic ID card has
information such as your blood group, allergies, profession and so on. Such information could really help
in case of an emergency situation. The card would
easily double up as a driver’s license, voting card,
public library card or passport.
As we look at East Africa regional integration, an
electronic or digital identification card model would
form an essential foundation to seamless movement
of citizens of the member states.
Digital ID cards work on the concept of radio
www.cio.co.ke
frequency identification (RFID) technology. RFID, as
the name implies, uses radio waves as a medium to
transmit information. An RFID tag stores data and, using electromagnetic forces for power, communicates
that data to a device that interprets it. The ID card
has passive RFID chip, has no battery and no internal
power source. Rather it sits completely inert in the
card, waiting to be read. Data stored within an RFID
microchip waits to be read.
Once a digital ID card is in proximity to a card reader, the microchip’s antenna receives electromagnetic
energy from an RFID reader’s antenna. Using power
harvested from the reader’s electromagnetic field, the
RFID microchip sends radio waves back to the reader.
The reader picks up the microchip’s radio waves and
interprets the frequencies as meaningful data. The
reader can pick information from a microchip from a
distance of upto 20 feet.
Looking at the examples globally, mandatory
nationwide identification systems have been implemented in a number of countries including Argentina,
Belgium, Colombia, Germany, Italy, Peru, Estonia and
Spain. While these schemes vary by country, individuals are typically assigned an ID number, which is used
for a broad range of identification purposes. Large
amounts of personal data such as name, birth date,
place of birth, gender, eye color, height, current address, photograph, and other information is linked to
this ID number and stored in a centralized database.
Estonia has one the most highly-developed
national ID card system. Much more than simply a
legal picture ID, the mandatory national card serves
as the digital access card for all of Estonia’s secure eservices. The chip on the card carries embedded files
which, using 2048-bit public key encryption, enable
it to be used as definitive proof of ID in an electronic
environment.
A magnetic stripe card is a type
of card capable of storing data by
modifying the magnetism
OPINION
Ellen MARCIA
Of missing Flight
MH370 and technology’s limitations
The disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 has presented
two tales of modern technology. The limitations of tracking
and communications devices have allowed the plane to
mysteriously disappear along with its 227 passengers and 12
crew members for over 40 days now.
In an era of gadgets, internet, robots, self driven cars
and instant communication, the public has been surprised to learn that radar and satellites are not all seeing,
cell phone locations aren’t always traceable and key
data about the plane is only recorded, not transmitted in
real time to the ground. It is still possible – although rare
– for an airliner to seemingly vanish.
In the absence of any definitive answer, conspiracy
theorists have emerged with explanations of their own,
however implausible, from supernatural intervention
to the influence of the Illuminati. The search continues
for the missing Malaysian passenger plane, using just
about every tool available to narrow down the possible
locations where the Boeing 777-200ER could have went
down. The causes of the plane’s disappearance are still
as mysterious as when the plane first lost radar contact.
The most chilling thing about this is the fact the plane
seemingly vanished without a trace. The captain, who
had more than 18,000 hours of flight time, gave no warning, issued no mayday. There was no indication anything
was amiss. This is not terribly unusual, because a flight
crew’s first priority in an emergency is dealing with the
situation at hand.
It is a misconception that airline pilots are in constant
communication with air traffic control, or that planes
are constantly watched on radar. Once a plane is more
than 100 or 150 miles from shore, radar no longer works.
It simply doesn’t have the range. At that point, civilian
aircraft communicate largely by high-frequency radio.
The flight crew checks in at fixed “reporting points” along
the way, providing the plane’s position, air speed, and
altitude. Many commercial aircraft have an emergency
locator beacon that the flight crew can trigger in an
instant. It also activates under certain circumstances,
such as impact with water – though it isn’t effective at
great depths. In the event of a crash, there is an Emer-
It is a misconception that airline pilots
are in constant communication with
air traffic control, or that planes are
constantly watched on radar.
gency Location Transmitter that sends a distress signal
automatically upon immersion. Then, the “Black Box”
which is located at the tail of the aircraft and designed to
survive a crash and immersion, sends its own emergency
locator signal.
The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported that the aircraft
continued to send “pings” to the Inmarsat satellites for
upto 4 after its last transponder position. The paper
said that these confirmed that the plane was moving
and the final ping was sent from over water at what was
described as a normal cruising altitude. It added that it
was unclear why the pings stopped.
While some debris has been found in recent days,
the airplanes flying overhead had to rely on other
methods to retrieve anything spotted in the water. This
was achieved by dropping GPS locator buoys or other
signaling devices, so ships below can later retrieve the
pieces of debris and determine if they were related to
Flight MH370.
In the sea, ships relied on various methods to aid in
the search for MH370. While some ships have been used
to retrieve pieces of debris spotted by planes, others
have been tasked with the role of searching below sea
level, in hopes of locating the flight data recorder, also
known as the “Black Box.” While satellites have been
able to capture imagery of the designated search area in
the southern Indian Ocean where the plane is believed
to have gone down, the truth is, the reach of our contemporary technology has its limitations.
The sophisticated technology is now the focus of
attention due to the incident. It’s extraordinary that in
this age of Internet Things, modern technology has so
far failed to locate the Malaysian airliner. Weeks after
losing contact, nobody knows for sure the details of its
disappearance.
Whatever the conclusion to the mystery of MH370, let’s
hope that the incident will spur the aviation industry to
accelerate the development of new systems that will in
future provide more integrated, robust and secure approach to monitor commercial flights.
www.cio.co.ke
HardTALK
Robert YAWE
No Clouds, No Rain,
No Food
The inspiration for this issue’s article is the failed
rain in Texas that has led to the collapse of the
beef industry and also the extended drought
in Australia that has decimated hundreds of
thousands of livestock, now deadstock.
So the rain that poured in Nairobi over the Easter
Weekend was a blessing, it also brought back the
memory of a statement by President Kibaki (I refuse to use the term former or past) that we should
never curse the rain even if it carries off a bridge as
it can be rebuilt.
If there are no clouds, short of a miracle, there
cannot be rain. If there is no rain, the crops and
animals will die and therefore we shall have no
food, whose final result needs not be elaborated.
The technology world has gone fully cloud as we
go full circle, back to centralised processing and
storage just like the good old days of the awesome
mainframe, IBM is re-establishing its central position so confidently that they are planning to sell off
their PC server division.
Bear with me an old man reminiscing of the
good old days where the centre of power was
clearly known by all- be it governance, responsibility or blame - a comfort zone that many of the
younger generation have little appreciation, but
not for long.
Social media, hosted email, virtual desktops and
virtual cash are all recipients of the Cloud, not an
acronym but literally the white fluffy stuff in the sky
that occasionally goes devilishly dark.
We throw our most inner secrets up into it, we
entrust it with our most critical business contacts
and we base entire business models around it, but
like in the ones that come and go we never sit to
think what would happen if it blew away.
What is this Cloud, where does it reside, who
owns it, who is responsible for it and how
does it work? These are questions that we
asked a few years ago but today we take it for
granted like we do the packet of milk on the
supermarket shelf.
www.cio.co.ke
In 1998, it became clear to the Western world
that life as they knew it was about to come to a
crushing halt all because someone forgot - or did
they? - that the century would turn and the two
digits allocated for the year in VCRs, microwave
cookers, 1G mobile devices, telephone switches,
aircrafts and satellites in space would be insufficient.
Fortunately for the world, the Asian continent
still had the skills and manpower that still understood the so-called old programming languages
which the west had stopped teaching as archaic
subjects.
Today, in the west, children under 10 are learning programming skills while here we want to issue
them with game stations.
We as a nation and region are hurtling in the
same direction, but unfortunately, we neither have
the resources of the west nor the leisure of lowly
paid and highly skilled Asians (they have become
middle class nations).
Instead of us building skills, knowledge and
expertise in the development of Cloud systems, so
that it can rain locally, we have found it expedient to build a pipeline to a dam fed from rains in
a distant location as building dams is seen as an
unnecessary inconvenience.
As one wise man once said “the hens will come
home to roost” and we shall have no one else to
blame but ourselves. That is why as we write policy
papers, let us take into consideration the need for
local Cloud systems and knowledge dams instead
of plagiarising content off foreign Clouds.
What is this Cloud, where does it
reside, who owns it, who is responsible
for it and how does it work?
View POINT
SosPeter OPONDO
Dictionary.com defines an unsung hero as “a person who makes
a substantive yet unrecognized contribution; a person whose
bravery is unknown or unacknowledged.”Sounds like IT to me.
Why IT is any firm’s
unsung hero
Unfortunately for the IT team, when things are going
well, they are not always recognized. IT can sometimes be
a forgotten function within the firm.
When does IT receive attention? It is the small minority
of time that something is broken or not working properly.
It’s not intentional - but it’s the nature of the behind-thescenes services that IT provides.
The reality is that the IT team spends most of its time
keeping the firm’s infrastructure running smoothly, so
that CEOs and other staff can do their jobs anytime and
anywhere. There are several factors involved in keeping all
of these moving and accessible at all times. And, it is truly
a 24/7 role. As CEOs increase use of their mobile devices
to conduct businesses from the boardrooms and client
meetings around the world, IT is keeping busy making
sure that those functions can be carried out seamlessly.
The biggest takeaway is this: a massive evolution is
happening in technology and the role of IT is being transformed
Long gone are the days
when IT was seen as an
“administrative expense.
along with it. IT is no longer the service provider, but a
strategic enabler and trusted adviser responsible for
empowering law firms to innovate and remain competitive. That is a lot pressure! There is also a limited bank of
time and resources that can be directed toward keeping
up with the technological changes. Perhaps most importantly, IT has to figure out how to keep all these moving
parts in balance.
By now you have already figured out the “what”
involved in this change – mobile devices and mobile
apps, BYOD, cloud services, big data analytics, and social
technologies. But the “how” aspect of this change proves
to be a bit more challenging, which includes actually
creating this technical foundation for the mobile, digital,
and cloud applications that your business now requires
to stay competitive.
Long gone are the days when IT was seen as an “administrative expense.” Business firms that fail to leverage
new technologies and empower their IT professionals are
likely to be left behind by customers and competitors.
Like many roles within the service firm, the role of the IT
team has changed dramatically over the past few years.
www.cio.co.ke
OPINION
Delano LONGWE
Cheap Dreams
From the inception of the East African
Community’s newly enhanced structure,
many citizens have yearned for the promise
of a “new” tomorrow full of exciting ways of
accessing new business opportunities and
markets.
One of the key drivers to the realization of this
vision has been the burgeoning appetite for new
and unique IT services across the region with an ever
growing number of “aha” moments coming to even
the most conservative of East African organizations.
The upside of this is that the economic effects hit the
bottom line in an increasingly predictable manner
regardless of the types of technology deployed as
long as there is to some extent a level of proficiency at
the project level.
This brings us to our next question. Are we going to
substitute quality for quantity in the seeming morass
of potential solutions going forward, will we settle for
the status quo of the traditional number one position,
bragging rights and price wars which whittle out even
the most ardent of market solution providers in a never ending war of attrition where the net effect leaves
only one winner, or will we join forces to cooperate on
common standards, practices and platforms that lead
to an inherently more peaceful ,communicative and
profitable society?
The story is told of a gold prospector in the US’ Wild
West who dug around his farm with basic tools for
many years with no yield and diminishing savings. He
eventually gave up and sold his farm. The new buyer
willing to invest more in better equipment struck gold
in the first week of mining. Apparently the farmer was
a mere 1 foot away from the largest vein of gold ore in
the region.
Could it be that we are short-changing ourselves
and future generations by adopting the cheap dreams
strategy of trying to do as much as possible with as
little as possible? The challenge for today’s CIO is
to dream big in Technicolor and project his or her
visions at 8k, while utilizing the correct predictive
analytics models to define where the ‘gold ore’ lies in
his organization.
This is where we come to the concept of Data Mining and Data Warehousing. Our modern organizations
swim in vast seas of underutilized and even sometimes unrecognized data. We call this ‘Dark Data’. Its
information which if properly captured and processed
www.cio.co.ke
could hold the secrets to your organization’s next big
thing.
The latest trend in Enterprise computing is the
sudden rise of the content repository as organizations
tap into the ability to leverage metadata and vast seas
of information to come up with relevant, actionable
business information. A good example of this is where
in some countries because of the clinical repositories,
patient records are able to follow the patients around
to various health organizations and institutions.
Imagine a day where when Grandma comes to
town, she doesn’t have to do further tests or carry
big sets of results around the place. The world would
certainly have become a happier place.
We then stare through the looking glass in an entirely different way as it’s no longer about how cheap
can we get the solution for but more about what awesome intrinsic value and yield we can bring to society
as a whole by implementing big dream solutions.
The common trend though is that every so often,
a CIO will have that one very vivid dream and try to
capture it in a project plan or strategic direction that
gets shot down by the day-to-day business of babysitting systems and keeping the lights on. Let’s dream
big again.
The Writer is Territory Sales Account Manager, Hitachi
Data Systems
The latest trend in Enterprise
computing is the sudden rise of the
content repository as organizations tap
into the ability to leverage metadata and
vast seas of information to come up with
relevant, actionable business information
Last WORD
Dennis MBUVI
Transaction Failed
April 2, 2014, is a day I remember well, or rather, an evening
that I remember quite well, having retired to bed early for
the sole reason that I did not have power at my place. It did
not help that I went to bed hungry. I did not want to put my
well-manicured fingers at risk, in the name of finding a well
sharpened knife in my pitch-dark kitchen. I doubt that the
scar from such an endeavour would make for good talk at a
fireside chat story at the annual Connected Kenya event.
The cause of all my troubles can be traced to a single
failure. Being a typical last-minute Kenyan, I had waited
long enough before topping up my power units. This
proves that the ‘B’ I scored in Engineering Economics
back in campus was just that, a letter. Reorder and order
levels are not things I have made a habit to implement
in my day to day life. I reorder anything when it gets to
zero, or even past zero and someone is on phone with a
number of threats if payment is not made.
So here I was, with zero units of electricity hoping that
I could easily replenish these units. I did what a normal
Kenyan would do: I took out my Safaricom line, and went
straight to the M-Pesa menu. I then sent Ksh 4,500 to an
application that enables me make a variety of transactions on my smartphone. Safaricom responded that the
transaction had failed. I repeated the transaction, which
this time went through, and I awaited a response.
I waited, took a break from waiting, resumed waiting, took another break, and nothing. I logged on to
Twitter, and searched for M-Pesa. Elsewhere in town,
a friend tweeted that he was stuck at an M-Pesa kiosk
exchanging stares with the attendant in the dark. He had
attempted to withdraw money and the transaction had
virtually left his phone, but never arrived at the agent’s
phone. There were lots of other complaints of similar
nature.
About this time, Safaricom, which had been saying
there was no problem with M-Pesa, came to the realisation that something was sinister. A few minutes later,
the firm realized that it was having some sort of network
failure which was affecting M-Pesa, calls and data for a
it looked like a number of
e-commerce systems were failing,
falling like dominoes.
sizeable number of its clients.
At this point, I was already seeing reports of other
failures beyond Safaricom’s network. Someone at Nakumatt was claiming that they were stuck in a long queue
at one of the branches while the staff manning the till
were having some sort of problem with the tills, hence
were not processing transactions.
Another acquaintance was stuck somewhere outside
a KCB ATM, which seemed to be offline and could not
dispense the cash they needed to head to their next
destination.
From where I was seated, in pitch darkness, it looked
like a number of e-commerce systems were failing, falling like dominoes. It looks like our budding e-commerce
system is highly dependent on a single provider. And a
slight stumble by this provider meant that everyone was
now stumbling.
For those of you who have watched Mr. Bean, you
remember the skit where he flicks a light switch and
plunges the whole city in darkness. Seems our IT systems are highly dependent on the resilience of a single
provider. While the said provider has invested quite a
lot and actually has a highly resilient network, things
might take a stumble once in a while, necessitating the
need for a hot failover, alongside abilities of systems to
quickly recover from errors.
It took the provider I was paying 2 days to reconcile
the transactions from the fateful evening.
At the same time, the experience also showed how far
commerce has come to rely on IT systems in the country,
which I am sure is a good thing. My friends who love
spending time in ATM queues should embrace these
more convenient and safer payment systems.
www.cio.co.ke
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