Can Nairobi Become The Next Silicon Valley?
This blog post is prompted by an article I saw (first) on Twitter and then on White African’s blog about the potential for Nairobi to become a Silicon Valley. I read the article twice (because quite frankly, I was stunned) by the insinuation and I decided to make my points about the post on my own blog.
The basic tenet of the article seems to be that a Silicon-Valley-like “place” can “spring” up anywhere in the world if the right people (namely a combination of nerds and financiers) are willing to re-locate to a particular city. The article (which you should read for yourselves) then goes on to say that in order for a city like Nairobi to recreate itself into a potential Silicon Valley, it should follow the example set by Israel (another claim, which I found to be stunning). Why on earth would you say Israel??
Anyone who has lived in New York City or any other American city that has a high Jewish population would know that the cultural, religious and economic links between Israel and America are like no other place in the world. Many American Jews go back and forth between the two countries, they have dual citizenship, many financial firms on Wall Street have Jewish founders, at any top ivy league school you are bound to find many Jewish students. I’m not surprised at all that Israel, with it’s close links to American universities, Wall street and Washington, would become a high-tech center. To think that Kenyans, who have none of these cultural ties to America, can replicate this same system in Nairobi sounds rather naive to me.
The second point I wanted to make is that getting people to live in certain cities is not an easy thing to do. The cities themselves have to offer certain amenities, otherwise, these top-level people just won’t go there. There’s a reason that cities like San Francisco, New York and Boston attract these high level people. Yes, these cities have great universities, but they also have great amenities like good infrastructure, nice restaurants, museums, clean streets, bohemian coffee shops, etc, etc…I mean heck… there’s a reason you won’t find these high-tech centers even in places in Mobile, Alabama!
The third point I wanted to make is that people can make all sorts of claims about Nairobi becoming a high-tech center, but at the end of the day, it doesn’t really matter what is said or whether you or I or someone else thinks that it has the potential to become a Silicon Valley. As I keep saying all the time, Skype was created by two software engineers in Estonia. Most people have probably never even heard of Estonia, but it doesn’t matter. Their invention was so innovative and became such a worldwide phenomenon that ebay, a company in Silicon Valley, found out about it, paid billions for it and I think those guys are still living in Estonia.
So, these Kenyan tech guys need to stop talking about how brilliant they are or how innovative they can become if only this or that happened…..If they have the skill set (as they keep claiming they do) — then they should simply go ahead and invent the next Skype or the next Twitter or the next Facebook and someone will surely discover them.
It’s not about IHub or TedX or ICANN or whatever other conferences they seem to waste so much time attending….it’s about what you create and whether or not it can be used by people around the world.
Over To you….
[...] Can Nairobi Become The Next Silicon Valley? [KenyanEntrepreneur] – Pain & Suffering [Like Chapaa] – Kenyan civil society went to sleep [...]
There are two types of geeks/nerds in this world.
Those who spend their time marveling at the possibilities, reading up on all the cutting edge gizmos(which they can’t afford) and waxing lyrical about the next Silicon Valley on Valley Road. That kind of geek is the one that led you to write this article.
Then there are the geeks who spend their time looking for real solutions to real problems. That kind of geek is the one who will spend time on his Pentium 3 computer making a car security lock that is activated by mobile(remember him in the news?)
Point is to learn how to separate the dreamers from the doers in this entrepreneurship field.
…The terms Silicon Valley,Alley and other variants actually exist in every nerds head regardless of geography. make it happen-from mind to matter and Alohanani? it’s you and you’ve just changed the world by creating your own ‘Silicon whatever-you-want-to-call-it-wherever’.
KE: You are no different from these techies. Come back to Kenya and build something instead of wasting time blogging aka making noise. You are a noise maker. What difference have you made since you started blogging? What value are you adding to the Kenyan society? Zip! So come off your high horse and help build the country. Come back to Kenya and be part of the change you want to see!
Yeke Yeke:
I’m not sure they even have the coding skills. If I based it on what I’m seeing & reading (they like to talk about themselves) — their coding skills would be similar to what a 16 year old American high school student could do or if you’re looking for a cheaper alternative, what millions of young Indian coders can do.
They are two kinds of coders today:
1) Those who are willing to do the grunt work. i.e. the basic coding that’s boring, tedious and not very fancy (& here I’d say that the Indians really dominate) and
2) The real cahuna’s. i.e. those who are using algorithms and other complex coding skills to create real companies. e.g. Google, Skype, etc, etc.
The Kenyans techies need to stop fooling themselves. They’re a little below the Indians and I say this because the Indians will willingly code for you if you pay them a small sum, but the Kenyans will show off, talk big, but won’t be willing to do the grunt work/ coding (or if they agree to do it, their prices will be way above what an Indian with better skills will charge). So, why bother using them?
The problem with this strategy is that they don’t have the skills to run with the big cahuna’s and so their only customer are Kenyan companies that are ending up with pathetic looking websites (& only because many of these Kenyan companies have yet to discover the millions of Indians who can do a better job for half the price).
Meanwhile, the Indians, who are willing to do the grunt work are getting customers from all over the world.
@KE
I doubt we can become a mini-Bangalore. We have very few geek entrepreneurs. Kenyans geeks want “stable” employment at large organizations. And we can’t import geeks because they’re quite happy in their country.
KenyanEntreprenuer, sad that few have looked at your post, read and digested what you were pointing out. Have followed your work for a couple of years but have not commented until today.
We seem to have an abundance of “thinking” and “ideas” talent but a dearth of people putting their ideas into action.
When Mama Mbogo harvests her sukuma wiki, she doesn’t wait for someone else to try and sell it for her. You guys with software development skills, quit talking/blogging and develop and market applications that the world needs. You have the coding skills, what holds you back? Don’t tell me bandwidth or finance, given your skills, sacrificing sleep is something you should be willing to do.
Look at what’s happening in the US, Western and Eastern Europe! Have a broadband connection, will code and try my luck.
All the best
Annonymouse:
I read both articles and this was my take on it. I suggest you read my piece (again) on the historical and cultural links between Israel and America and then maybe you’ll see why I said that the Israeli model is not feasible. Copying India’s model would seem to be more feasible.
KE – you need to read and understand the two articles linked by whiteAfrican before commenting on his story. Once you read the articles you will clearly understand what he is referring to as the Israeli innovation model. Otherwise, it seems like you are writing on a topic you don’t understand very well. These two articles answer all the questions you are asking. Your post should take whiteafrican’s conversation to the next level and not naively drag it back. You sound naive in your criticism. Please read the two articles:Paul Graham’s essay and Trevor Williams article on Start-Up Nation’. After you read both of these and understand what they are talking about, please re-post this blog with corrections.
PanAfricanist:
I suppose we need to define what a successful IT center would look like. I see what you are saying about the growth of mobile technology, but that technology is not being produced by Kenyans, which is fine because it’s making life and business easier and more efficient, but none of those products were invented by Kenyans (Mpesa was created by an IT firm in England).
So, trying to compare Nairobi to Silicon Valley or even to Tel Aviv is too much of a stretch, but could it be a mini-Bangalore?
Annon – you don’t think so, but why not? with all those young, English speaking Kenyans, why couldn’t it become a mini-Bangalore and that would be a success.
I don’t think the skill set to create companies like Google or Facebook exists in Kenya (or in many other parts of the world for that matter) When it comes to IT innovation, America is still far ahead of everyone else. That’s why I said India is a far better comparison and model to follow than Israel.
Basically, my frustration came about after I started following a lot of these guys on Twitter. I just thought they were over-selling themselves and their abilities and were confusing creating a simple website and doing simple coding with real innovation. It’s not.
KE – Good points made and I agreed that over-optimistic projections of an IT-nirvana in Kenya is overblown but is that the characteristic of most IT entrepreneurs the world over – check the ridiculous frenzy over the Mac IPad. I think there are some very attractive IT opportunities in Kenya driven by several factors:
- Large and increasingly savy mobile users that use mobile to access to web
- Huge and rapidly growing supply of trained IT professionals (from all kinds of colleges and Universities)
- Poor infrastructure (I know some improvements on main roads but almost everything other infrastructure option: landlines, rail, rural roads, city traffic, maritime transport, power supply have serious problems) which creates opportunities for IT.
- Some success stories – Mobile service, Mpesa, fibre-optic (prices still too high though!), competitive ISP/IT service market, widening credit/ATM/Mpesa market, a few successful web initiatives such as the legal website that has uploaded all legal cases in Kenya – an incredible resource.
In short, in black Africa with the exception of Ghana and possibly Nigeria, cannot see any other country with the potential to grow a substantial IT industry except Kenya. Again, I am cautiously optimistic that the Kenyan IT industry could see a breakthrough in the near future. Over to you Bwana.
In order for Nairobi to become a Silicon Valley (fat chance), we need to have thousands of Kenyan ubergeeks with business savvy. Those 2 traits are very difficult to find in a person but you’ll find them in people like Gates, Ellison, and Jobs.
Kenyans are obsessed with employment so we don’t have enough tech entrepreneurs to create a Bangalore, leave alone a Silicon Valley. Importing ubergeek expatriates with business savvy isn’t an option since such people are spoilt for choice and will therefore not live in Africa, or even in Mobile, Alabama!
Boss Major:
Did we read the same article and did you read my response? Perhaps you should read both again.
Like I mentioned in my second paragraph, saying that Kenya should follow the Israel model is naive on many levels and fails to take into account the things I clearly point out, which you either missed or simply ignored, but everyone has their own opinions on different issues.
And it’s not bashing Kenya. I’ve been following these tech guys on Twitter and quite frankly, their bravado has not been matched by any sort of practical developments that I can see. Again, I ask: what have they created? Name something.
You totally missed the point of the article.
He never suggested that “nerds and financiers” should move from their origins to a place like Nairobi. That idea was quickly dismissed as it’s not a viable model for Nairobi. Rather, he emphasized that they readjust their growth strategies for start-ups. And this is done by establishing networks with the people in the Silicon Valleys of our world who can then help them take their companies to the next level. So it’s not about Google and Microsoft moving to places all over Africa, but rather Africa moving to the Valley.
Stop taking every opportunity to bash Kenya.
Kudos. Views very close to my own. What we tend to neglect is the power of the target market to decide the winners. USA for now is the key decider of who wins in the global economic competition in various modes including Tech. Africa does not have the consumer wealth (and infrastructure) to support multiple fortune 500 level companies as does the actual silicone valley, so the deciding market must necessarily be the USA. So the question becomes, can kenyan Techies make product winners for The US market. SA has made products that are global winners. Can Kenyans?