CIO100: IT Industry Congregates in Naivasha for Annual Awards

In a press briefing in which the event was officially unveiled this Monday, the organisers of unveiled a list of 100 companies who together with their CIOs will be awarded the CIO100 honour, which has now become an industry’s most sought after accolade in the region.

CIO East Africa CEO Harry Harry told journalists at the press briefing that more than 600 companies from Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda and Ethiopia participated in this year’s competition, with entries from all the economic verticals including Education, Health, Logistics, Banking and Financial Services, Insurance and Agriculture. The event will also see the announcement of the CIO of the year and the CIO Leaderships Awards.

In attendance at the press briefing were officials from sponsor organisations including Microsoft 4Africa, Total Solutions Ltd, Eaton Corporation, Soliton Telmec, Dimension Data EA, and SEACOM. The other sponsors of the event but were not present at the press briefing included DellEMC, Veeam, Isyx, Protec, and Intel Security among others.

Some of the shortlisted companies include Stima Sacco, Pwani Oil, Madison Insurance, East African Breweries, National Law Reporting, Nakumatt Holdings, HassConsult, Natinal Women Council, Mabati Rollings, Kyambogo University, Apollo Investment Corporation and Ministry of Education.

“This year’s CIO100 Symposium and awards has all the signs of being the best we have ever heard,” said Andrew Karanja, the Event Director, CIO100 Symposium. “We have received very good support from our partners and sponsors and we have one of the best lineup of speakers we have ever assembled,” he continued.

This year, the event will for the first time feature a startup pitch session held in collaboration with DEMO Africa, dubbed DEMO Africa Traction. The Traction session will see enterprise-focused startups from the DEMO Africa pool pitch directly to technology buyers and consumers. “We are excited to expose some of our alumni to CIOs and other senior IT professionals at the CIO100 Symposium,” said Mbugua Njihia, the DEMO Africa Event Director. “This is in line with our continuous effort to provide support services to our alumni,” he noted.

Some of the key speakers include Dr James Mwangi – Group CEO of Equity Group, Nicholas Nesbitt – General Manager of IBM East Africa, Isaiah Okoth – CEO of Rift Valley Railways, Said Rechchard – General Manager of DellEMC, South East Africa. Some of the high profile CIOs coming include Jack Maina – CIO of Britam, Steve Njenga – CIO of Barclays Bank (Kenya), George Njuguna – CIO of HF Group, Innocent Huhizi – CIO of AB Bank (Rwanda), Nizar Tundai – CIO of DTB Bank.

Some of the startups that will feature in the Traction event include Duma Works, Able Wireless, InsureAfrica, AccessMobile and Lipisha Limited.