Category Archives: Nairobi Jobs

Award Season Part Trois

Following on part II

The Anzisha Prize for young Africans (15-20 yrs) who have solved a problem /challenges in their community (via @kenyanpundit)

The Android App competition. in the X.com dev. challenge participants can win prizes of up to $25,000. D/L is 14 May.

The 2nd eLearning Africa Photo Competition runs through April 21.

Facebook’s first hire in Africa – will be a growth manager in Nigeria (via @bellanaija)

The 2011 Freedom to Create Prize main prize and imprisoned artist prize is open to 15 July (via @Kwani)

Various jobs at Google East Africa .

iHub Mentorship program. D/L is 6 April.

Partial scholarships available to attend the 4th Global Forum on Innovation & Entrepreneurship. D/L is April 1

Kenya Government Science & Technology scholarships (29) to study in China, for undergraduates and postgraduates in engineering, medicine, computer science, and pharmacy. D/L April 7.

Connected Kenya Vision 2030 ICT awards from the Kenya ICT Board.

Maisha Filmlab with free screenwriting directing camera sound and production workshops in East Africa. (via @mkaigwa)

Mass Challenge a $1 million start up competition (via @egm_photo)

Panos Eastern Africa media fellowships. D/ L April 6.

Strathmore University’s Mobile Academy . D/L 31 March

Winners of the Nokia Idea storm will have their ideas developed into phone apps. D/L is April 14.

TEDGlobal 2011 takes place in Edinburgh, Scotland in July 2011. It moves from traditional Oxford this and 75 places available, and D/L is April 4.

Africa Youth Trust Young Women Leaders funded by the UN Women Governance and Gender Programme. D/L April 15.

Modern careers: Someone got hired via twitter

Sports: The Watamu Triathlon takes place April 9 & 10 at the Kenya coast. D/L April 4.


Photo is from a blog tracking a Cairo to Cape 12,000 kilometre bicycle expedition (equivalent to 4 Tour de Frances in 4 months). It’s now complete after a tough stint in Kenya.

Award Season Part Deux

This is a continuation of a series highlighting some open awards, that may be about to close in the next few weeks.

The Acumen Fund East Africa Fellows Program aimed at entrepreneurs or people working on ground breaking programs with social impact in east Africa and will receive training in leadership , and is modeled around an executive MBA. D/L is 15 April for launch in July 2011

The Africagrowth Institute 2011 SMME Awards that recognizes small, medium or micro enterprise (SMME)companies that are growing sustainably and contributing to economic growth. D/L is 30 June

(For Women): The Anita Borg Agent Award for ladies who demonstrate use of technology to change lives. Sponsored by Google, it has prizes of $5,000 in travel reimbursement to attend the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing. D/L is May 2

(For Women): The annual Business Daily Top 40 Women Under 40 award series in Kenya that recognizes women achievers in the world of business. D/L is 10 April.

The Diageo Africa Business Reporting Awards that recognize outstanding journalists, editors, blogs, and other media that feature coverage of the African businesses scene. D/L is 27 March.

(For Writers): The Golden Baobab Prize for Literature is a Pan-African literary award. Details here.

The Nestle Prize that recognizes projects in the fields of nutrition, clean water, or rural development that create shared value. D/L is 30 June.

The Shuttleworth Foundation for people ready to commit to undertake social change through innovation. They review applications in May 2011 for September intake.

(For Journalists): The United Nations journalism fellows program Dag Hammarskjöld Scholarship Fund program aimed at developing country journalists with an interest in international affairs and winners get to travel to and report on the United Nations from New York. D/L is 6 April.

(For Writers): The World Bank Essay competition open to people aged 18 – 25 to write about youth migration. Details here but the deadline is tomorrow – 17 March.

EDIT: PIVOT 25 competition for developers in June 2011 with prize money of up to $75,000. Deadline is April 15.

The Nairobi Stock Exchange young investors challenge whose registration period is on-going through April.

Any other awards that can be highlighted here?

VC Coffee Chat

On Monday June 28 at the iHub in Nairobi there will be a talk on venture capital, in continuation of a series of events that bring together local financiers and entrepreneurs.

In preparation for that, we had a chat with Eline Blaauboer of TBL Mirror Fund which is a Dutch venture capital fund that has made four investments in Kenya and are also branching around East Africa.

The Fund invests a minimum of EUR 100,000(~Kshs 10 million) taking minority stakes in companies that show fast growth and the potential to be market leaders. They look for well-managed ambitious and visionary SME’s and TBL invests in all sectors particularly where the partners have extensive industry knowledge, as a VC focused on a specific sector is not sustainable here yet. It’s interesting to note that, while it is said in local banking that women are not ambitious enough to dream big and attract large funding, ½ of their investee are women-led companies

Related
– TBN are hiring both an investment manager and an investment analyst.
– On Monday June 28 at the iHub in Nairobi there will be a VC 101 event with a talk on venture capital given by Vincent Kouwenhoven of the EVA Fund
– Recap of recent VC activity in the region by Ratio-Magazine.

Urban Inflation Index September 2009

(i) Tracking changes in the three months since June 2009, and approximately one year and two years ago
(ii) also the job/other opportunities column is back

Gotten cheaper
Communications: leading mobile company Safaricom this week launched Super Ongea, a zoning tariff that eases congestion on the network by offering different rates from the then low 8 shillings per minute (now the high) to as low as 80 cents per minute. This they hope will ease congestion on the network and also hold on to some customers who are flocking to the cheaper new provider Yu (Essar telecom) who have very low rates. Zain and Orange have gone slow on the marketing front, and this week the Orange CEO called for an end to price wars. The new Safaricom tariff does not affect data or money transfer of which Safaricom is getting a stranglehold with m-pesa and 3G. Safaricom is big seller of mobile phones, modems, and laptop computers, going full blast in data at the expense of retail ISP’s while M-Pesa utilization has taken on a life of its own that makes Kenyans wonder how life was before mobile money transfers started three years ago.

Foreign Exchange: 1 US$ equals Kshs. 75.93 compared to 77.94 three months ago.

About the same
Fuel: A litre of petrol is Kshs 80.9 (~$4.79/gal) up 11% in 3 months, 1@% cheaper than a year ago and 10.5% above two years ago, so relatively unchanged as thin fuel margins still continue from the price drop of about a year ago that wiped off Triton

Entertainment: A bottle of Tusker beer (at local pub) is Kshs. 120 down from 130 three months ago. Prices seem to have stabilized though and with English football season on now, bars will not be changing prices anytime soon. East African Breweries year-end results showed that beer volumes were up just 1% for Kenya

Gotten more expensive
Staple Food: Maize flour which is used to make Ugali that is eaten by a majority of Kenyans daily. A 2 kg. Unga pack at Uchumi today costs Kshs. 84, 9% cheaper than 3 months, 15% up from a year ago, and 68% up in two years ago. Already there is worry about a grain shortage in the next few months, and the country may have to import some maize while awaiting the harvest from local farmers near the end of the year

Other food item: Sugar (2 kg. Mumias pack) is Kshs. 200 up 14% in 3 months, 38% in 1 year, 33% in 2 years, though it’s hard to say if sugar shortages are genuine or artificial; the annual importation exercise is a tug of war between politicians, tax man and importers.

Electricity/utilities: this month’s bill is Kshs 1,900 compared to 1,500 from three months ago. Still I can’t complain since compared to what some residents pay . The electricity rationing seems to have ended but at a cost since the new electricity is generated from more expensive thermal sources. The clean energy planned for Kenya- wind (Turkana, kengen) and sugar (Mumias), and mini-hydro’s (KTDA) will take a while to be felt in our bills.

Water rationing is still on going and the Nairobi water company said bills would increase from July 2009 onwards by about 50%.

Opportunities
most from the daily papers this week

SME Funding/Solutions
– For software developers from Microsoft through Local innovation centres unverified
– The Esther Passaris Grant is a monthly grant for Entrepreneurs. of between Kshs. 50,000 to 100,000 unverified
– Ongoing business plan competition jitihada closes 23/9
– Toolkit for learning: the IFC SME Toolkit Kenya

Jobs
– finally a blog -related job makes the newspapers – The British high commission in Nairobi is hiring a communications support officer part of whose job will include supporting the post webmaster in developing & maintain website, including the high commissioner’s blog through regular updates and site moderation. d/l is 23/9 and applications by snail mail only.
– Central Bank of Kenya : Accountants/ Financial Analysts, Finance Officers, Network Engineer, Network Administrator, Analyst/Programmer, Assistant Director: Policy Development And Research, Assistant Director, Academic Affairs, Finance Manager (2), Assistant Finance Manager (2), Internal Audit And Risk (manager, assistant manager, officer) and other jobs. D/L 25/9
– Equity Bank: Assistant HR Manager- Training & Development, Assistant HR- Services Manager D/L 19/9
– Apprentice engineers (20) at KPLC recruitment@kplc.co.ke by 7/10
– KIPPRA jobs not online Economists in Infrastructure & Economic Services (3 positions), Senior Analyst/Analyst, Assistant Analyst, Analyst, Assistant Analyst apply to admin @ kippra.or.ke by 21/9
– Safaricom : Senior customer systems analyst , senior manager – financial systems & analysis , principal accountant – treasury planning D/L 23/9

Tenders
The Kenya Government has asked all ministries, agencies, parastatals to e-mail in soft copes of any tenders or procurement notices they advertise in the newspaper. This will be displayed at a government procurement portal.

Despite Safaricom’s controversial, no frills, AGM, Kengen, the company with the second largest shareholder register (216,000) after Safaricom, is not going to let its members go home empty handed. They have a tender at their site for
supply of agm goods & services that closes on 24/9

Travel: Emirate Airlines have launched world cup travel packages for fans wishing to attend the 2010 world cup in south Africa; these combine air travel, hotel bookings in Johannesburg, cape town & Durban, and ground transport to stadiums.

Week on Twitter (September 11)

Another re-cap of a week full of Twitter – @bankelele posts which included issues like – more innovative loans from Equity Bank, why do Kenyan companies make such large PDFs? The fibre cable has reached Mandera in remote Northern Kenya, but piped water is yet to get there, police dogs sniff grass, Zimbabwe ministers text like teenagers, how to get through to safaricom’s notoriously inaccessible customer service, mobile companies know how to keep Kenyan ministers happy, Kenyans laugh at their failings, pre-paid internet gets cheaper, another bank to list at the Nairobi stock exchange while another joins twitter, more awards for women, more jobs at the central bank of Kenya, and the UNEP toys with Kenya

– @TChenya @KumekuchaChris was just at Equity Bank; amazed they have loans for water tanks http://bit.ly/AoYg4
– This #Safaricom portal is going to be the Kenya borg http://portal.safaricom.com…
– Do cops favour their own matatus, leading to traffic jams for other motorists? http://www.coastweek.com/32…
– R/T @baldaufji #Zimbabwe minister text messages leaked http://bit.ly/2KkUIx U c the strait jacket vakuru [old man] is being given 2 wear
– The koinange family starts development of the parking lot next to kencom Nairobi
– Just registered to get my Safaricom dividend by cellphone m-pesa in November @saitonne m-pesa dividend registration ongoing around the country till 30 September, mostly at supermarkets – which one is near you?
– Cold call from a bank offering an unsecured personal loan at 24%!
– @egm_photo @jmugambi its soooo wrong for fibre cable to reach mandera before piped water!
– Gabon09 election resembles kenya08 but little concern in Kenya
– #TPF3 Tanzania is 0-2: EABL endears itself to that beer market
– (Sad to hear) R/t @estoni #samburu insecurity rife, tourist vans attacked, some travel companies are canceling Kenya safaris
– @kainvestor the most blatant on-going copy cat is ‘citi shuttle’ aping ‘citi hoppa’ with same green, same routes #thuo should do something
– (i) #shagslife a police dog from anti-stock theft unit just tracked down some stolen bales of hay to a nearby compound (ii) Hay and fencing was ‘stolen’ from farm of local MP last night. @coldtusker, this police lassie did an impressive job over many KM
– More bank for twitter @Standardbankgrp the official account for #stanbic (found at @kainvestor)
– R/t @saitonne are you stuck trying to call #Safaricom customer care 100 number? Try adding some zero’s and no’s e.g. 1000055
– R/t @kachwanya Yu to launch money transfer service on October 1. (Now where’s telkom, been almost 5 years in the making?)
– Watching morning news – #Safaricom seem to trend #CSR projects to home area of sitting communication minister
– Family bank march to listing at Nairobi stock ex @nsekenya on with plans for share split and rights issue pending approval
– you know you’re Kenyan goes viral (i) #youknowyourekenyan when you understand (and agree with) Francis atwoli (ii) #youknowyourekenyan cause your “najivunia kuwa mkenya” cap is made in china

– NHC rescinds sale of houses to 102 #madaraka estate residents (for non-payment?) while NSSF threatens to repossess some tassia-embakasi plots
– @ kainvestor how do Kenyan corporations create such huge huge PDF? E.g. quarterlies from NSE site (i) Mabati Rolling Mills half year results (large PDF) http://tinyurl.com/ldyk22 (ii) @kainvestor #KenGenPIBO information memorandum dead D link on site at http://www.kengen.co.ke/PIBO/
– Nominate an African woman achiever for a Graca Machel award http://www.civicus.org/media/Graca_Machel_Initiative_Call.pdf D/L 30/9
– R/T @gishungwa @shiroh: Central bank of Kenya is hiring http://tinyurl.com/lu6bbo
– @inexes @shiroh while standard chartered will take divas to South Africa for shopping for $1,000, family bank has week-long trip in October for business customers for $2,000
– Eh @intelligensia, plans underway to (dredge &) raise the water level of masinga dam by 1.5 metres
– New Zain Kenya unlimited pre-paid internet bundles costing $3 per day, or $30 per month
– NTV’s Rita Tinina on GoK begging UNEP for Mau Cash http://bit.ly/2m8BUu (look for a toy truck near end of vid)