Category Archives: entrepreneurship

A to Z Chat with Michael Joseph

Ten days before he retires as CEO of Safaricom, Michael Joseph gave a talk at the Nairobi iHub on his ten years at the helm of the company, on the day to day job, and the up’s & down’s of the job in taking the company from a literal zero to hero.

A recap

Beginning:

  • Safaricom started with (inherited) 17,000 customers, 9 cell sites in Nairobi no billing system, switch in Extelecom House, 5 Vodafone employees and 55 Safaricom staff deployed from Telkom (not chosen) – all working in a 3 bedroom flat at Norfolk Towers. Has little cash (started with $20 million from Vodafone, and paid $10 million for a switch leaving the balance for salaries & rents) and launched on 23 October 200 (Saturday) and on Monday morning network collapsed (blamed on IT person).

Crazy Kenyans: 

  • This was a theme in his talk of marketing in Kenya.
  • Family & friends the average Kenyan calls 2.3 people, a fact he pointed out to his France Telecom (Orange) counterpart when they launched a family & friends promotion in which orange customers could call 5 people for 1 shilling per minute. The (forever) promo has since been discontinued.
  • Free credit – a promotion to give away all the subscribers Kshs 200 free credit was a major mistake and after it was bungled by an IT person in Dubai, led to 5 days of congestion. Lesson learnt – don’t surprise customers.
  • When okoa jahazi was launched, 1.7 million applied, even those who had credit and didn’t need it (crazy Kenyans love new things)

Fibre:

  • Media don’t understand it, people expect after companies invested millions of dollars in undersea cables, internet prices would drop by 90% the next day. They still have to have a redundant network, and a network is pensive to maintain. They have 4 cables to Mombasa, and every day (Chinese) road contractors are cutting fibre without any punishment. Since 3 cables land at the same point in Mombasa, they will land points in Kilifi and Dar es Salaam for redundancy.
  • He regrets not investing in metro fibre 4 years ago, which they are now leasing.

Growth:

  • Expectations: Safaricom expected to have 400,000 customers in 5 years, with about 50% of the market (against Kencell’s 50%). Had their first million customers in 2003, second in 2004, and by growing ½ million customers a month, is now a billion-dollar company.
  • The company growing at 20 – 25% a year; he used to report to 2 owners, now has over 700,000 (including his secretary ) who bought shares expecting the price to triple to 20 shillings. Safaricom has to balance their needs and revenue, and are still investing (they have the only 3G network in Kenya despite what their competitors say) while competing with Zain/Airtel’s subsidized/risky price cuts, and Essar who have petroleum and steel.
  • Competition: the battle with Zain/Airtel is being won: their subscriber numbers have not dropped – and while revenue has dropped, minutes (usage) has gone up as has traffic into the network and they will watch their costs.
  • Finances: With the first $20m spent, they had to borrow money. They were to get a Belgium export credit loan if they bought equipment from Siemens, but since shareholders would not sign guarantees, Safaricom had to pledge their network (which at the time was not strong enough to manage their subscriber base, but when he signed equipment was shipped and this took away their congestion problems (at that time)
  • Green initiatives: They are greener now than before, have 60 sites running on wind power (backed by generator). Their main concern is not their data equipment, but for air conditioning to cool batteries, so are always looking at new ways to cool the batteries – e.g. bury batteries in the ground, and new (but pricey) batteries from Canada that don’t have to be cooled. Their HQ has smart systems, so lights go off when no one is in the room. They can do more, but local wind generator cost $80,000, and the ones from India that cost $20,000 are easily toppled by Kenya’s wind gusts. They are looking at solar sites, but again need air conditioning for batteries.
  • Investment decisions: They would start in Nairobi and Mombasa then looked at expanding the market. They measure ROI every six months, expect payback form a base station in 1 year – and 80% payback in 6 months. While they outsource physical maintenance – towers, lights, fencing, fuel, power remains a big cost – they have 5,000 generators to run when electricity (KPLC) cuts off.
  • Outsourcing strategy: he is not a fan of this as outsourcing partners don’t reinvest until they have to. He said Bharti Airtel EBITDA in India is down from 45% to 35% this year because they outsourced a lot of key costs, which are now coming back. Safaricom may outsource network management, but not outsource customer care because quality will drop.

Innovation:

  • They have a team of 40 people who spend time looking around the world for new ideas, and with the Vodafone group e.g. sambaza was already in Sudan & Egypt – and have had great successes like Sambaza, Okoa Jahazi, M-Pesa and M-Kesho.
  • Innovation without disruption says the company is very innovative in the mobile space and they innovate to make money, not for innovation space, as his goal is to deliver to shareholders. He takes pride that the company has won international awards, in Silicon Valley, not the UN.
  • Local developers when vendors want to sell new ideas, Kenyans write to them with their new great ideas, -but everyone has to sign their legal waiver to protect the company from being sued.
  • On revenue share, his belief is that Safaricom should get the lion’s share – developers will be using their airtime, customers, marketing, distributors and collection method so it should be 80:20; if you want to keep 80%, go to Zain. But sometimes people can get good splits with Safaricom e.g. he did not believe ring back tones would make money, so mistakenly signed a deal that gave most of the money to developers.
  • Safaricom has not stolen anybody ideas – they have been sued a few times and won every time because they document everything. Also, many ideas belong to nobody, and while someone claims they invented m-kesho is his (MJ) personal idea – and Safaricom have enjoined themselves alongside Equity Bank, who are being sued by an inventor.

Key decisions:

  • Pre-paid billing: could not afford a post-paid billing system, so they opted to go for pre-paid customers and bought a (cheaper) prepaid system that cost $200,000 – in hindsight was a key decision.
    Per second billing: he made the decision to bill per second even though per minute billing generated 20 – 25% more per call. He did not have scientific proof but had seen it in South America and felt his market was the mwananchi (ordinary person) who would use airtime in small increments.
  • Customer service: was free & 24/7 – which was a good decision because people don’t read phone instructions booklets. it was not very expensive and they hired 200 university graduates. People then were even calling from Kencell and today people still call to ask how to send SMS.
  • Guiding principle – do it because it makes financial sense. Safaricom needs to be seen as a Kenyan company, with all their spend is in Kenya, unlike their competitors who are purely foreign-owned. If Safaricom, has to outsource, he insists that the company have to have an office in Nairobi or he won’t buy from them. He mentioned Karanja Macharia of Mobile Planet has done very well by being a local partner and who won over foreign SMS firms.


Leadership

  • Best advice was from a boss in Scotland – a leader has to make decisions, don’t be afraid to make them, (e.g. asking people to leave the company) and if you’re right 7 out of 10 are right, you are doing well. He considers himself a benevolent dictator, who while he consults internally, makes the decision, he sees external consultants having no responsibility for their advice. He admits he has made wrong decisions (as an engineer in charge of marketing for the company)
  • When a competitor changes your business plans: don’t panic, and reassure your people; they had studied airtel in Sri Lanka and saw how they came in with low prices and ‘destroyed’ the industry to a level that the government had to intervene. They have had a measured response – they could have dropped prices further, but their promotions are working.
  • Lessons learnt: (i) you won’t learn anything from a book (ii) have absolute integrity (iii) lead from the front – being a leader is not about being seeing at team building exercises or having your name on the door (iv) research – if you don’t know what you’re doing, act like you know

M-Pesa: 

  • Vodafone won £1 million DFID (UK) award for deepening financial penetration for the unbanked, which they also had to match financially – and they were to develop a system for the disbursement and repayment of microfinance loans. They tested in Thika for 6 months and realized that it had more potential as a money transfer tool, and they launched M-pesa in March 2007.
  • M-pesa success has not come from technology, but from the distribution network –(20,000) points around the country

Role of government: 

  • GoK should play an enabling not punitive role as a regulator. But what is enabling about getting a license? Vodafone paid $55m for a license to operate in Kenya and another $25m for 3G. Their competitors have failed to beat Safaricom and run to the government to complain about Safaricom’s dominance. Safaricom opposed the CCK regulatory rules as unfair – and he wondered why EABL, Bidco and Kenya Airways (all with 80-90% e) were not subject to such rules – and why the government was sending the wrong signal to investors by seeming to crack down on Safaricom
  • Right regulator: ICT is going to create jobs, and has a good PS now, but GoK has to pick the right people to run the industry, not people who happen to be married to a relative of the president or come from his town (he said he told this to Kibaki and got a good laugh).
  • Kenya as a BPO centre: Kenya should be careful about investing heavily in this as a pillar of vision 2030 as this as it is l very fickle, and there is no loyalty you’re the flavour today, but what happens tomorrow? Can’t rely on time zone and English speaking skills, as companies will still take away their business to the next country to offer an incentive or when things go wrong. E.g. Delta air moved their outsourced customer service from India back to the US, when customers complained they could not understand the CS agents

Safaricom vs. Banks:

  • M-pesa is unregulated; when they got into it, there was no law covering that, but they sought and got ‘blessing’ from the mobile and banking regulators.
  • Big (foreign) multinational banks who had shut down rural branches abandoning their customer opposed m-pesa and fought in government & parliament and would have succeeded till he persuaded acting finance minister John Michuki to green light m-pesa.
  • M-kesho allows people to save in small increments, and get interest immediately is a revolutionary product (he came up with), and in 3 months new 700,000 savings accounts, (which was more than all the saving accounts that existed in the country – and money that was not there has moved from the informal to the formal banking sector). On M-kesho had to partner with a bank (did not want to hold people deposit/too much regulation) and signed on with Equity Bank who have nationwide reach to make it work and took the risk. This exclusive deal which ends in May 2011
  • Warning to banks: he has told the banking community that retail banking will disappear in 10 years time. Customers will not go there (to brick & mortar branches) except for loans, as ordinary banking will be on the mobile phone whose convenience is unprecedented. E.g. The biggest transaction days for M-pesa are when schools reopen (previously people would be queuing in banking halls for expensive money orders)

Social Media:

  • He is not a fan of social media because people can take advantage of anonymity to write lies about him. He is not on Facebook or Twitter, but his successor is, and the company uses these tools a lot for marketing.
  • SMS is a very dangerous phenomenon – and during Kenya election violence, they found many of the hate messages did not originate in Kenya, (came from South Africa). Safaricom responded by ending out peace SMS to subscribers, which was also controversial

Venture Capital in Nairobi – VC101

A talk on venture capital (VC) was given by Vincent Kouwenhoven and Brian Hirman of the eVA (eVentures Africa Fund BV) at the iHub in Nairobi. They both have about 15 years experience in VC and enumerated the criteria the fund uses for investments including that target companies in Africa should have profitable track records (not start-up’s) to qualify for VC investments of between 25,000 and 250,000 Euros (~Kshs 2.5 million to Kshs 25 million).

The fund was launched in January 2010, and in the ½ year they have invested in 5-6 companies. The founders are seasoned travelers in Africa and their interest was piqued by observations they made over the last three years including;
1. Chinese investment interest in Ghana and Kenya
2. Arrival of fibre optic cables
3. More African returnees returning from the Diaspora who were setting up their own companies (it’s a good sign). They have been exposed to Kenya for many years and sense that entreprenual spirit in Nairobi is very good as are competence levels in high technology sectors.

– All their investment are active in the digital scene – whether mobile, internet, communication platforms – and include a leading internet company in Ghana, while in Kenya, they have Jumuika, Ratio Magazine, and the latest deal signed today is for an investment in Verviant (w/ Liko Agosta better known for Pesapal)

– They invest growth funding in companies and try and cultivate a healthy portfolio, unlike other VC’s who make several weak investments in the hope that one or two will payoff and offset the failures. Their investment clearly spells out the use of proceeds/funds which can vary, but ideally should not be for increased salaries or other debt repayment (unless to retire expensive debt). They also mentioned that their investment criteria is a guide, not cast in stone (e.g. Jumuika was a startup)

– They get involved in the operations of the company; whether marketing, technology, financial, entrepreneurship, HR policies. They act as a sounding board and advise owners (use skype a lot) on how to scale up e.g. when they get traction, how to set up customer care capacity

– They seek out committed entrepreneurs – not part timers, or people with one good idea they have not developed, or people with a dozen ideas (not focused). They want to invest in people with the gut and belief to start a business and are willing to eat bread & water to hack it put (not one who relies luck) – and who also enjoy what they are doing. Other “no no’s” include people who ask for too much money that dilutes their equity (EVA want founders to retain at least 51% at all timea), or which enables them to run the business without risk for two years (i.e. with the VC’s funding)

– On exit strategy their preferred rout is a buyout of the company within 3 to 7 years by multi-national or larger company. In cases where an investor may not be ready to sell, the VC can sell their stake to another VC.

Youthful Tantrum

The saga at the Youth Fund continues at the board hit back at the Minister of Youth Affairs for ‘re-appointing’ the ‘previous CEO’ to his previous post. And the nightly news have duly shown two CEO’s show up at the Fund office, each claiming authority to run the Fund – one backed by the Board of Directors, one sacked by the Board (and reappointed by the Minister)

For a month now the CEO has had the upper hand in the media making rounds that he had single-handedly stopped the Fund from engaging in a financing deal with Canadian group Enablis – one which the Fund would have been better served by channeling these funds through local commercial banks

Now the board has hit back with a hard-hitting statement giving reasons why they had fired the CEO including that he was insubordinate, misused resources (over-claimed imprest, attend training for fun), took trips to his distant home in northern Kenya under the guise of making official trips in his government allocated car), inflated procurement contracts, among other things.

The government inspector appears to agree with the board in most of the allegations against the CEO; but their recommendation is also curious: they don’t say the CEO should be sacked, instead – “…the audit team noted the board had lost faith and trust in the CEO and that they cannot continue to work together as a team. The only prudent action by the minister is to separate the two.”

This brings to mind a similar stand-off a few years ago at Consolidated Bank of Kenya where the Board said the would not renew the contract of the CEO and asked the Minister to appoint a new CEO. However the cards were flipped on the Board and they were all sacked, while the CEO was re-appointed to a new contract

This time around the stakes are different. The board appears stronger and the Minister not as powerful; in fact, she is under siege from her own assistant ministers and the Board who used comments against her this week in the media including ‘lying, crying, comical’. So how will this one end? How should it end?

Skunkworks: Nairobi September 29

The latest Skunkworks was held on September 29 2009 at Teleposta Towers Nairobi. The focus of the tech group this week was on Tech & Entrepreneurship and four speakers were chosen to provide their insight on the new business models they are developing in Kenya. This comes at a time when the fibre cable initially considered the greatest thing since sliced bread has become a corporate product with targets to break-even before cheap internet costs can be passed on. The fibre is just one arm, so it was good to hear techpreneurs talk not just about revolutionary business but grappling and scaling numerous challenges of running such businesses in this part of Africa – i.e. business registration, financing, staffing, patenting, winning contracts, succeeding and making money

skunkworks panel


full disclosure – I correspond with Liko, drink with Kahenya and Joshua arranges some advertising at this site

1. Liko Agosta – Founder and CEO of Verviant a leading web developing firm and BPO provider talked about:
Startup financing: He started his company with savings, then family & friends, and finally banks
company strengths: include having a good team (20 staff in Kenya), good track record (measured by repeat business they get), interacting with customers, good customer service (including fixing up products for their customers that other companies had previously messed up)
customers: – have contracts with companies in the USA, Canada, Europe, New Zealand, and South Africa
– show companies how they can save money e.g. Africa online, akamba, instead of having staffed offices all around t company waiting for people to bring them money, have a platform that does this cheaper
watch cash – many business fail because they are under-capitalized, entrepreneurs should save money and keep costs low because it can sometimes take many months for them to get paid
– advises tech companies to focus on mid size products and contracts; this is because cash flow kills many Kenyan companies and this is likely to happen when if serving large contracts whose payments are spaced out
new product: pesapal will allow Kenyans to pay online via mpesa or zap for products and services from vetted merchants. It will also store transaction details details for 7 years, and comes with a readily available API, and pre-built components. More details on pesapal availed at verviant site on October 2.

2. Caroline Juma is the managing director of KCR – which stands for Kenya computer resources. She talked about her company which does human resources for IT professionals exclusively.
education or experience don’t always matter: while some companies ask for job candidates with advanced degrees or who have several years experience to fill positions, she sometimes finds that the best person may be one who is still in school, or who does not have the work experience. She looks at what they have done; KCR can test/examine what their skills are and will vouch for them to companies to employ them as IT professionals. IT professionals should show initiative, and work on projects that will enhance their career prospects not just learn outdated VB in university
don’t wait for governments: Kenya is not known for IT and call centers will not save the day. People should stop waiting for the government to do things in outsourcing, fibre etc. But governments don’t do that they only crate policy.
KCR is free IT professionals can place their CV’s with KCR for free, there is no charge, unlike with other placement companies
IT conference upcoming KCR will be involved in an Aitech conference in November in Nairobi on business match-making

3. Kahenya Kamunyu – CEO, ViRN Instruments. Involved with Zuqka, previously worked for BT, Yahoo, Sanyo Business, and Sony Playstation. Currently developing smart ideas and providing Venture Capital to small enterprises. Kahenya has been coding since he was 13 years old and gave a talk on his entrepreneurship and employment history from South Africa, UK, Japan and finally in Kenya, and the lessons he has picked up along the way:

boot-strap: be frugal, pay bills, and put whatever cash is left aback in the business. Businesses that are under-capitalized and will fail
More education produces bad developers! college kids write better program than senior engineer with degrees; his is because kids write code without rules, while company programmers can only write within the parameters/box set by the company
business is fun
what?! if you’re single you’ll never make money – get a wife/husband.
have a wish list: these targets let you know where you are going and give you targets to work for
look after your health don’t over-work yourself or get tired. Work smarter
give back to community: tithe, get involved in non-profits, help others – this is because what goes around comes around, and you may be the one in need of a helping hand next time
debt is bad: do not start a business when in debt, you will go deeper into debt and have to sell off assets
on partnerships: set the rules before you go into partnerships
Kenya is not friendly to start-ups it is very hard to start a business and expensive. It would also be nice if there were incentives for local companies. E.g. Vodacom in South Africa has a super low tariff for start-up businesses that use their products, why not Safaricom? Also banks are not friendly in lending to star-ups.
banking secret you can use a patent to get a bank loan
small is better many entrepreneurs chase one big multi year contract, but it is better to serve several small contracts. The big contract may pay one, and replace you with someone cheaper, while the small ones, diversify the risk, provide for better cash flow, and the happy customers whose expectations are easier to meet, will grow and stay your loyal customers of many years big fish =small fry, small fish= big fry
high tech not the answer many young people go into high tech industry because its the in-thing, cool, sexy now, but internet has expiry date, while people will always eat food.its unfortunate some entrepreneurs are too proud to go into mundane (non-tech) industries that are more sustainable in the long run-
Kenyans should invest in R&D talk to customers, observe competitors. Many Kenyan companies don’t do this and fail owing to bad idea/false assumptions i.e. build it and they will come.

4. Joshua Wanyama: Founder and CEO of Pamoja Media, and a TED fellow, helps companies strategize their online presence to make money.
company strategies (i) interactive strategy (ii) creative development (iii) media buying & placements online
niche is getting companies aiming to advertise to Africans e.g western union
understand marketing: easy to get a meeting in Kenya, much harder in the US
keep learning: learn through reading, searching online & in libraries, networking, associating with smart people. He has learnt more about business from reading after his education
use web tools: he runs a web based company that has several components – all online including e-mail, ad server, sales leads, finance (payroll) and project management> can this also be retransferred to a farmer or fisherman?
opportunities Kenya
– include online services, e-commerce, procurement and local content
– It’s time to walk the talk in Africa; in a country like Kenya only 20% of the top 100 sites ranked by alexa for Kenya are Kenyan companies. We need to retain more people within our domain, and keep traffic generated within Kenya
– thanks to m-pesa’s success, it’s now easier for Kenyan mobile development companies to get funding from abroad
– Mentioned other companies doing exciting things online including: Preciss,
Ushahidi, Verviant, Nyeri Online, Jumuika and Mama Mikes
keys to success for Kenyans online
– tell our success stories better
Ease the way of doing business: it has taken him several months to register his business in Kenya as well as to open a bank account for the company in Kenya. There seem to be difficulties for companies that have overseas-based directors or partners, and he has only been able to open an account with the help of a lawyer
– Cultivate a culture of entrepreneurship. Financing entrepreneurs is risky business the world over with expectations that 40% of business will fail, 40% will break even and 20% will bring in rewards
– companies should do R&D and follow through on these because one year from now the company or its products may not be relevant

Tujuane: Transforming from Employee to Employer

Tujuane is a network with almost 3,000 worldwide members, it is an offshoot of Nairobist that was founded in 2006, by a group of ex-Boston graduates who chanced on a means to network and interact beyond Facebook-type connections, but with actual get-togethers and network forums. It has almost 3,000 members including 45 in Kampala, and Dar es Salaam each who communicate and share through newsletter, listing of theirs businesses, a book club soma, surveys and meet-ups.

On November 21 in Nairobi, they held a mixer – or a networking event dubbed The Road from Employee to Employer with an address by Dr. Mulengani Katwalo, the director of theInstitute for Strategy & Competitiveness (ISC) at the Strathmore Business School.


Dr. Katwalo – Photo courtesy of EGM

His talk centered on what local entrepreneurs/business owners can change to enable them to succeed in business. Success is not about starting a business – as anyone can find business plan on the Internet – with the unfortunate result that that 60 – 70% of entrepreneurs fail in the first year. This is because they behave like athletes who try to go from starting to running, but who don’t warm up first:

Entrepreneurs can make changes in six areas to ease the transformation

1. Training/skills development: Many entrepreneurs may have the drive, and the money but lack some skills, necessary to understand customers, and make a transition to understand their business/industry to take it to the next level. They should engage in short courses, but more important they should contribute to the agenda of education. E.g. by working with universities to set the learning curriculum for business such as the local tourism sector.

2. Innovation : Entrepreneurs do not engage in research & development (R&D)(by show of hands no one in the room was engaged in R&D departments/capacities) – and there are no budgets for new ideas and creations. Entrepreneurs need to embrace the process of buying and selling knowledge. If you have a good idea and cannot use, can you sell it?. The developed world is about exchange of ideas, not just goods & services. We need to convert ideas into cold hard cash.
– Entrepreneurs should know there is nothing wrong with copying, benchmarking, or reverse engineering. E.g. the Nyayo Car may have succeeded if it had been built in collaboration with a Japanese company and with just a Kenyan name. That’s how Tata rose to become a world leader in the sector. Presently there’s still a local mindset that doing imitation is inferior.
– In business, be brave enough to learn, pick an idea and use it. The patent for kyondo (baskets) is owned in Japan, and when you see Japanese tourists taking photos, a lot of them act as blueprints for products
– Innovation is crucial, but its not about going to the lab only – its about getting new ideas and converting them into products and services e.g. in Kenyan hospitals, while equipment is new, there has been no innovation in service
– Entrepreneurs should not stop innovating: Once you make enough money – the tendency is for many to move to big (Karen) houses, buy big cars, get new wives etc. They don’t create legacies that sustain wealth, so that every generation has to start over again.

3. Culture: There is a bad (local) attitude and perception that needs to change specially in regards of treatment of customers. This bad Matatu treatment towards customers, as though entrepreneurs are doing them a favour is bad for business. Entrepreneurs do not owe customers a favour – they are providing a service, which customers are paying for. Until our customer service changes to reflect this change in attitude, we will always be second best. In other countries, even if someone doesn’t like you, they will serve you and take your money – and ensure you (as a customer) keep coming back.
– Customer acquisition skills are poor – entrepreneurs do not keep up with innovation in the industry, they don’t read much. There’s a lazy tendency to finish work, go to bar and then sleep. To be a world-class entrepreneur, you must make sacrifices, take make deliberate efforts such as take courses to develop management skills and read books otherwise they will always remain second best.

4 Neighborhoods If you don’t know your market, you will always be the village beauty Entrepreneurs need to know what opportunities exist beyond their neighborhoods or they will never take advantage of them. Do you look at your market as the Westlands area (a Nairobi suburb) or the 100 million + people in the greater East Africa – Congo, S. Sudan, Somalia? Only those that have eyes, can see the market, like the South Africans who have invested here in Kenya.
– It’s also a perception issue, when you see people – do you see market or problems – what is your attitude towards expansion? Exporting to Europe? etc.

5 Cooperation or competition – This is an increasing trend in the business world to cooperate rather than compete – because not all your competitors are your enemies. This can also work in knowledge exchange (there’s appears to be a marketing understanding in Nakumatt and Tuskys, though both supermarkets, are not competitors as they target different clientele

6. Cooperation – working in networks (like Tujuane, clusters, create linkages, exchanges etc. as individual businesses do not exist in isolation – so entrepreneurs should network with related companies. We had a stimulating group discussions in which participants listed reasons for joining a network as among others – get contacts in the industry, socializing [with like minded people] as they are very busy, Learn new ideas[raises competition], Synergy, Pooling of resources/barter of services & goods, learn new opportunities and for moral support [e.g. for freelancers who work from home]