Sote Hub Kenya,recently Launched is already making Impact
Sote Hub in Kenya, a recently launched Technology Innovation hub located at Voi is already making impact following their ability to support startups in southern Kenya.According to their blog post,
Over the past months, the hub has housed many workshops seeing the sprouting of startup companies, in a relatively quiet rural set up. There were sixteen start-ups on this day battling for top spot. The panel of jury was made of some of the top brains in the tech ecosystem including John Paul Community Manager at iHub, Ahmed Maawy, CEO Swahili Box, Milica Radovic, CEO iTKonnect, Serbia, Jakub Simek and Ivana Ulicna, Pontis Foundation, Slovakia. The chief guests were Hon Joyce Lay, Women representative and Madam Jemimah Tuja, CEC Education, Taita Taveta County. Also in attendance were representatives from SOKO Community, Equity Bank and Biashara Centre
By 8am, the hub was bursting with expectant crowds. What a grueling season. Every startup had 5 minutes to convince the judges that they are ready for seed funding. The ultimate winners were Recycle Afrika, a company that solves the e-waste menace through ingenious conversion to usable functional electronics including power bank and car tracker, Rogim designs, a creative agency for cutting edge advertisement and design solutions, Re-decor which uses 3D printer to redesign cultural artifacts’ and Cladika with an ecommerce mobile app. The four startups get seed funding of up to 2000 euros, incubation at the Hub and partnerships opportunities. Three others will be considered by December.
Hon. Joyce Lay, emphasized the need for young people and the citizenry, to shift focus from employment and think of entrepreneurship as the viable alternative. She assured the startups of numerous funding sources available at both county and national levels.
Equity bank will be the banking partner for the hub and the startups.
The Hub’s Director, Mr. David Ogiga noted that the major aim of the centre was to incubate top best ideas from the Sote ICT project and the community, at least 15 on an annual basis and called for more support and endorsements from other organizations.
What a milestone for the Hub!
We wish them the very best!
