 Welcome back to Y254 Business Tuesday. My name is Mary Mesava and today we are talking matters innovation and entrepreneurship in digital space. Now, Gena CS Margaret Kobiya officially handed over the State Department for Youth to the Ministry of ICT. This comes after President Huru Kenyatta announced that the youth affairs was moving to the ICT docket in the recent Cabinet reshuffle. Youths make at least 60% of the Kenyan population. Now, I don't know why the move of the Department to the ICT Ministry. But to help me discuss this matters technopreneurship among the youths is brand why there are found convenience design limited. Kariwisana brand. Yes, yes. Now let's just jump into that point where the youth affairs department was moved to ICT. Why? Why did the government do that? What does it mean? What does it mean when the president reaches such a decision to move the department to the Ministry of ICT? First of all, thank you for having me. Yes. And on to the discussion, I believe that the government believes or basically the trend that the future of employment is in the digital space on the internet or any innovation. And therefore having the ICT Ministry directly interacting with technology and the internet, I believe it's therefore potential to have the Ministry directing youth affairs. But basically, you know, when you hear technopreneurship, you think of technology and entrepreneurship. But what does it actually mean? What does technopreneurship mean? Actually, technopreneurship is not much different from the usual entrepreneurship. It's only that it refers to a niche of entrepreneurship whereby you discover a technological related idea on the internet and then you commercialize it. So unlike the traditional form of entrepreneurship whereby maybe you may decide to set up a hardware or you set up a kiosk, technopreneurship does not require all those things. It just requires the internet. So what's the difference? What's the difference between all the new? So there's a lot of differences. But I think the loudest is with regard to the capital. For example, with the old entrepreneurship, you require fixed capital. Maybe the first thing you may require is an office or a shop, something physical. But for tech, all you need is your computer, be it a desktop or a laptop and connection to the internet. So you set up your business online? Yeah, basically you set up your business online. So it's kind of an e-commerce? Not necessarily e-commerce. Not necessarily e-commerce. E-commerce is just one part of technopreneurship. So technopreneurship actually is wide. Yes, okay. So what do you need to begin or to become a technopreneur? Like any business, you need an idea. And I think technopreneurship much requires an idea than the old entrepreneurship. Because now in the old, you just realize that, for example in agriculture, people just say that every human has to eat. And therefore you're not investing in agriculture because you have noted an itch, but because of the fundamental laws of humanity. But for entrepreneurship, you have to identify an idea. For example, you've mentioned Uba in your news and how they sold their business to Umato in India. So Uba each discovered that people had a challenge, especially as the world is becoming more busier. They had a challenge getting to food kiosks and cafeteria. And so they chipped in and provided a platform to connect the hoteliers and the consumers. So essentially the first thing you need is an idea. Idea then what else? Then from there, you may need skills. For example, essentially on the internet you need to have taken skills, for example programming. Even if you're not a good programmer, you need to get someone who is good in programming. So maybe you can merge up a partner and launch your technology business. So there's a lot of programming, a lot of coding involved, a lot of creating websites. That's one beach. So you can actually use Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, all those social media platforms when it comes to techno-pronorship. Or is it necessarily website and all those apps? No, when you're using Facebook to do business, basically Facebook is the other one who are in techno-pronorship. Okay, that's the difference. Because people get confused actually when you mention techno-pronorship, they're thinking it's just your Facebook page and your Twitter page and your Instagram. Or actually it's creating a whole thing from scratch, right? Okay, now having a Facebook page and Instagram account or being on LinkedIn, that is just a component. And it will come in under the marketing of your techno idea. But now, for example, Facebook have already invested in the communication idea for techno-pronorship. And therefore, maybe for you to specialize, you can decide, let me come up with my own Facebook to connect older people, just older people. So now that will be your own gap in techno-pronia. Okay, as per youth, where do we stand when it comes to techno-pronorship? Because are we really embraced or are we just lacking behind? We are sitting on this gold mine instead of embracing it and maximizing it. We actually have embraced it as Kenyans and Africa, especially Kenyans and Nigeria. You are continually and massively investing in techno-pronorship. For example, you may find that in Kenya there are hundreds of startups that are launched. And by the way, when you launch your business as a techno-pronorship, it is called a startup. But now in the old entrepreneurship, it is just a business. So now you find that a lot of Kenyans and youths have invested in startups. And if you want to view some, you just need to watch the funding shows, like this safari program for youths and KCB to JJR. Some of those you will find that they are funding those ideas. And you find that there are hundreds of people who are applying those hundreds of ideas. So that means we need more innovation hubs. Because I am aware of Ihab, Nailab, so we need such innovations. Exactly. But now those Ihab and Nailab, you find that they work as incubation centers. That's another component of techno-pronorship. Now you go with your idea. For example, you realize that in the media maybe there is no one who is specializing in making documentaries. And you want to make documentaries. And then you sell them under video on demand, like views us or something. And so you go to Nailab and you tell them that you have this idea but you don't have capital or resources. So they will host you in the offices and nurture you until your idea goes to the market. And whether some of those challenges, when one wants to venture into such a thing, what are some of the challenges? I wouldn't say capital is a challenge much because now capital, mostly it comes at a later stage. Because now the first challenge is for you to begin. Beginning? Yeah, beginning. Beginning a tech startup is not something easy. And for example, you have to have skills. And if you don't have those skills, you have to look for someone competent who have those skills. And now the next thing is perseverance. Because now you realize that most of those ideas and startups, they may take up to five years before they turn a profit. And therefore if you don't have perseverance to survive under economic hardships, you may give up along the way. The other thing is management. Because now you may find that you are good in programming. So you can structure software. But now you are poor in marketing. So you develop your program and you complete it. But then you stay with it in your house or in your office. No one is using it because they didn't market it. And actually that's a very big problem, marketing. Marketing is a challenge. Yes, apart from marketing and other challenges, what are the easiest hacks for a beginner? Easiest hacks for a beginner. Nowadays the hacks are very many. Because now if you decide to launch let's say a mobile app, mobile app will do a particular thing. Nowadays we have something called drag and drop platforms for making an application that cuts the cost of the traditional mobile development by almost 80%. And so the first hack you may decide to look for site platforms and you accelerate your project. The second hack is instead of focusing on completing your program, you may decide to first of all have something called an MVP, a minimum viable product. And take it to the market and see if the market will respond to your idea and if there is someone who is interested. If there is none, perhaps then you don't invest your resources in such a time and money. When it comes to technology, how is Kenya performing when it comes to technology and investing technology in the digital express? Because I know Kenya is leading somewhere in Nigeria because you had mentioned Nigeria. How is it performing so far? I cannot treat Kenya on a scale of 1 to 10 but qualitatively I can say we are on the right track. And for you to know that we are on the right track, we just need to look at the number of startups we have and if you go to, you mentioned Nailab. If you go to Nailab and I have, you realize that there are a lot of startups which shows you that there is a market for technology and it shows that we are continually adapting tech startups. So it's a bright future for us. Very bright. We all need to embrace it. Yes, yes. And as we finalize this, how did you begin as a founder for convenience design limited? We just shared your journey and how people can contact you and what you do. So personally I began the long way of learning to code. I had to learn to code. Before now I started up the venture. So now after I learned design and then programming, now I learned business marketing and management and then from there you make your website. After website goes live and you do the optimization such as search engine optimization and then you now create Facebook pages, Instagram pages and start sharing your services. And now when you realize that maybe there is something here people are buying your services now we proceed and register as a company. So now that has been two years since I began. You can mention your company and how people can reach you. So I founded convenience designs limited. You can find us at convenience.co.ke and the business number is 0743-750-385 On Instagram, on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn we are called convenience designs. So we can actually agree that technology and the digital space is such a gold mine. Wide and gold mine. So final comments to Kimalizia. I would like to tell anyone who has an idea, an idea to never give up because now in my line of business I've come across individuals who have brilliant ideas but now because now you can't be in the industry alone. So you realize that you have your idea but there's another one in the market. So you give up. You give up after investing. For example someone who invested 10,000 at the initial stage of designing your software but now before we proceeded to develop the development they gave up under the fear of competition. So I would like to tell anyone who wants to venture into entrepreneurship never give up, do not give up. Just make sure you do your market analysis clearly before you even invest your resources so that by the time you are going to invest your time in design and software development you are already sure that no matter the competition you have something unique. Yes. Well thank you so much Bryan. That was Bryan where there are founder convenience designs limited. Now we can agree that this topic is so what. So we will continue this discussion part two of this discussion we will be discussing why the foreigners are really running up to the digital space the Kenyan digital space and why they are investing so much and even opportunities where you can actually venture into. So join me next Tuesday for this discussion but for now let us leave it at that point. Yes. My name is Miriam Masawa. Thank you so much for staying with me here on business Tuesday. Good night and God bless you.