Category Archives: alvaro

Pepsi to Kenya?

. Nairumour that after an absence of many years, Pepsi will re-enter the Kenyan market in the near future to resume battle with Coca Cola, possibly through their South African partners. If so, it will cap a great year for investment to the country, and that despite 2008 being a relatively tough year for investors and companies, with the post-election violence, business disruption, high fuel and energy prices, depressed consumer spending, P & P madness (pirates and politicians) collapsing stockbrokers, there was a steady flow of new investments and new products that happened this year.

Re-cap of some notable ones

Banking
– Takeovers concluded – Ecobank take over of EABS, and Stanbic merger with CFC (now CFCStanbic)
– UBA licensed (2009)
– Gulf African and First Community (Shariah banking kicks off)

Beverages
– Summit Lager a new beer from Keroche Industries
– East African Breweries launched Alvaro (malted soft drink)
– Coca Cola launched Novidia (another malted soft drink) and also started selling Minute maid
– KETEPA launched Safari Iced Tea

Communications
– WPP buys into Scangroup
– 2008 saw the launch of two new mobile operators – Orange (France Telkom) and Yu (Essar/Econet) to battle Safaricom and a re-energized Zain
– Altech buys into KDN
– A long-running fight over one(EASSY)submarine cable, gave birth to three different ones being laid to Mombasa
– Wananchi launched Zuku (TV, Broadband, Phone)

Transport, Energy & Manufacturing
– Tiger brands buying into Haco
– An investment in the Kenya Oil Refinery at Mombasa was still under battle between Libyan and Indian Investors
– Jinchuan (China) to bail out Tiomin?
– Mirambo and PD Toll to salvage the Rift Valley Railways
– Delta Airlines (USA – but postponed to 2009)
– Air Arabia started flights to Kenya

Tourism
– Libyans took over the Grand (Laico) Regency
– The Tribe opens.

Exits
– Chevron (Caltex) sold out – bought by Total
– Unilever (de-listing from the NSE)
– Roy Puffet from rift Valley Railways

Kutwa Tuesday: Sam’s Kids


They may be called Barack, Michelle, Obama, or other creative names, but many of these new kids born and given fabulous American
baby Obama names were conceived as a result of Uncle Sam’s bungled election debacle in December 2007.

Opportunities

Airbus University Challenge: the Airbus
Fly Your Ideas challenge is open to university students around the world with ideas on the future of aviation and improving its environmental position. Prizes are €30,000 and deadline is 1st December 2008

Georgetown Fellowships Apply for the Georgetown University Law Center’s Global Health Law Fellowship Program. D/L is February 16 2009

Kenya Content Conference Tandaa 08 a local content conference sponsored by the Kenya ICT Board takes place on November 14 2008.

Kenya’s Top Women The Business Daily invites you to nominate Kenya’s Top 40 women under 40. send their names, contracts and reasons why they are worthy (in less than 500 words) to top40under40@nation.co.ke by 30th November

Government of Kenya jobs:
– Judiciary 25 resident magistrates. D/L 21/11
– Electoral commission of Kenya – 39 district election coordinators

Biz brief’s

Co-Op IPO: is 1/3 of the way to target with just 3 days to go optimistic about the Co-Op IPO. transaction advisers have now released cash flow and share price projections that should have been in the Co-Op Prospectus. what happens if they fall short – will D&B pay C-op for the shortfall? Is there a last minute investor who will get preferential terms to bridge the gap? The prospectus states that in the event that this minimum amount is not attained, approval may be sought from the Authority to proceed with the listing of the existing shares and any Offer Shares that are subscribed under the Offer.

I got an SMS (as did other Co-op customers) inviting me to take part, but the application desks/tents still look rather forlorn

Equity – HF: November 4 was not just Obama day, but also the date when the Housing Finance and Equity Bank deals should have been completed

Foreign Investors Tough times for the former Rift Valley Railways and Tiomin who continue to flounder: Tiomin’s latest statement notes. …. the Government of Kenya has not completed the remaining bureaucratic steps required for the transaction to close…..Tiomin’s management shares our investors’ extreme frustration at this unreasonable delay….. Tiomin has acted in good faith and we are very disappointed….. If the closing continues to be delayed, we will consider terminating the MOU on the grounds of unreasonable delay….. Tiomin will issue another press release when further material information is available. Pity they have no local defenders

Geothermal prospects : two companies are scoping in Eburu (gilgil) and Menengai for geothermal energy

Brew turf Coca Cola launch minute maid juices in Kenya (what happens to 5 alive) as EABL launch Alvaro in Uganda

Sat-TV: DSTV will launch pre-paid scratch cards, following in the footsteps of rival GTV who are reaping from the ongoing English premier league

Insurance by M-Pesa: Madison Insurance now accepting insurance installment payments by M-Pesa following Old Mutual, which enabled investment, plan payments

Radio Standard Group prematurely possible radio investment worth Kshs 250 million as KISS FM parent Radio Africa rolls out their 4th radio station – XFM (rock music)

EABL 2008 AGM

The 86th annual general meeting (AGM) of East African Breweries was held on 30/10/08 at Safari Park Hotel. The actual meeting business (passing of accounts, election of directors, and approval of auditors) all took about 10 minutes. There was only one question on the accounts and the rest of the meeting was left to a myriad of shareholder questions.

Why Financial Markets Crashed: The meeting began with a talk from the former chairman of the Nairobi Stock exchange Kibuga Kariithi (Director Afrika Investment Bank). He traced a path of American economic exuberance, greedy investment bankers, sub-prime-mortgages, careless insurers which all led to a liquidity crunch and loss of confidence in the markets – eventually reached Kenya

He exhorted EABL shareholders that their company was strong, with growing sales, profits, products and almost 7 billion shillings in the bank. He said the market would remain so for a few more months, maybe with a few more bank crashes, but the fundamentals of EABL and other companies were strong and this was a time for shareholders not to panic or sell, but to consider buying more shares.

Mini-controversies:

  • Crap Calendar: One of the goodies handed out was a (single-sheet) wall calendar. Which was not well received by several shareholders. It was called, cheap, not in keeping with the image of the company, not as good as the one which was given to distributors, and eventually, even the chairman had to admit that it was a poor quality item.
  • End for Chami?: Mr. Chami is a (small) shareholder in almost every listed company and a feature at almost all NSE-listed company AGM’s held. He unusually is the first to ask any questions and almost all directors know him. He usually asks but occasionally hits the mark. Today he got off to a bad start giving a 5 minutes speech that led to a round of boos by shareholders. When he finally got to asking questions, he was challenged by the Chairman on the accuracy and validity of his questions – and told not to waste the time of the other 700 shareholders present if he had no questions. Hope it does not spread to other meetings

Mr. Chami

Trivia some questions asked by shareholders

  • Start with prayers
  • More environmental plans; will consider energy savings from steam and have participated in forestry activities in Ndakaini and may look at (the) Mau when government sorts out the matter
  • Unclaimed dividend: a bill has been prepared on unclaimed assets that will soon be in parliament after which companies will get guidelines on compliance
  • Is Alvaro alcoholic? No it is not
  • Can dividend be cashed at banks?
  • Give more bonus shares please?
  • Give more dividend to long term shareholders – asked by an old lady who has been a shareholder for 35 years)
  • Can we have cheaper AGM’s? e.g have the meetings at a venue like Kasarani Stadium and serve African foods, not expensive hotel foods that give high blood pressure!

Goodies: T-shirt, Calendar (see above), Safari Park Lunch box [with meat (big chicken slice, cake, beef & cheese sandwich) fruit (banana, apple), drinks (yoghurt, alvaro, water, orange juice)]

Lunch on the controversial calendar

Kutwa Tuesday: Reverse Safaricom IPO and other such tales

Safaricom needs a reverse stock split to get rid of their unhappy shareholders.
– Anyone who has less than 10,000 shares by December should be paid off by the Government or Vodafone at the IPO price of 5 shillings or market price, whichever is lower at the end of the year. Investors will not sell their shares at a loss and the least they can do is recoup their money from this mess (excluding their loans)

Kenol tweak: 36.67 million shares change hands worth 3.3 billion shillings on Friday. Meanwhile kenol/kobil stations have the most expensive fuel in Nairobi. Diesel has hit 101 shilling per litre ($1.55), while petrol is at 108, that’s about 6 shillings more than my station of choice.

Cola tweak: After enduring a difficult first quarter, coca cola is having a bit of a tumble in the second quarter due to to EABL’s Alvaro – at least in urban areas where it has become the non-alcoholic drink of choice for many previous soda (and juice) sippers. Coke has unleashed another multi-million shilling giveaway promotion to win back customers


alvaro cases at Nakumatt

Celtel tweak – More celtel confusion; The ink is not dry on posters for their newest promotion and already the terms have changed (for the better) [for customers to get free calls will now cost 65/= ($1) a day down from 99/=].

August will be a significant month for the mobile sector as Celtel switches to the Zain brand, Safaricom release their first quarterly results after the IPO, and Econet should finaly/hopefuly roll out operations.

Media tweaks: All journalists and correspondents practicing in Kenya must be registered with the Media Council of Kenya – and to do so they must each pay Kshs. 2,000, while foreign journalists will have to pay 10,000 ($154) per year [those on short term assignment of up to 3 months pay 5,000]. Amounts due by 30/9. Television radio and newspaper organizations also have to pay a quarterly fee depending on the number of media outlets

– Standard tweaks Two weeks after the launch of the new Standard, their strap line of the standard has changed;


new standard at launch


standard yesterday

Sunday Nation tweaks now has the best of best of Whispers – favorite columns of the late humorist Wahome Mutahi and some articles of the New York Times

From the blogs
– Pointer for Access Kenya shareholders to read
– There are only 60 lions (adult) in the Mara – but that’s an improvement by 50% from year 2001
– How bad are things for those who took IPO loans for Safaricom? Ssembonge shows that small investors are hurting more than bigger borrowers.
– Cautionary tales on life insurance from Tujuane
– Peer pressure: tales of GDP growth of rates of 8% in Ghana and
21% in Angola
– Link to a puff piece in memory of the former finance minister
-US Airways to remove all in-seat movies from their planes, while Emirates is targeting to remove all paper (in-flight magazines and publications) to save a ton of weight on the new A380 (to compensate for a ton of water for showers in first class (from airliners.net)

Opportunities

African Banker Awards. deadline for nominations if 31 July in the following categories: African Banker of the Year, African Bank of the Year, African Investment Bank, Best Development Bank in Africa, African Microfinance Bank, Best Issuing House, Most Innovative Bank, Deal of the Year, Socially Responsible Bank of the Year, Best Global Bank in Africa, Award for Gender Sensitivity

Jobs
from the daily papers last week
– Aircraft Leasing Services: captains, first officers for Embarer 135. als@als.co.ke
– HR director at Housing Finance. Apply through deloitte esd@deloitte.co.ke by 1/8
– MD of KCB Rwanda. Apply to recruitement@kcb.co.ke by 8/8
– KPMG Uganda: Internal Audit Services manager, Senior Internal Auditor, Internal auditor, forensic auditors. Apply to talentrecruit@kpmg.co.ke by 1/8
– Corporate affairs manager of Nation media group.
– Independent sales agents at Standard Chartered Bank. Apply to Susan.Ombati@ke.standardchartered.com by 31/7

Others vacancies at Kencall, Kenya Airways, and Family Bank [Credit officer, Procurement Officer, Works Officer, Accountant, Accounts Assistant, Administrative Assistant, Assistant Manager, Audit Manager, Branch Accountant]

Beach plots too good to be true? Lots of land available in Mombasa for real estate investment from Datkit agents including 3 acres creek in new Nyali with 120m sea frontage, 1.3 acres over looking Nyali golf club, 5 acre lots in kikambala, 14 acre beach plot next to Neptune beach, 25 acre beach plot next to kaskazi hotel with 168m beach front, 1/3 acre residential plots in shanzu (2nd row from beach)