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Wrap-Up: Our pick of main stories, Wednesday February 25, 2015
It’s already mid-week as we close the day with exciting news in the IT arena from locally hosted content gaining…
It’s already mid-week as we close the day with exciting news in the IT arena from locally hosted content gaining traction in Africa to Orange Kenya and Greenlight Planet signing an MoU to provide solar lighting to millions of Kenyan households. Read on…
Locally hosted content gains traction in Africa
Kenyan ISPs and cloud service providers are working to convince local businesses to host websites within the country, taking advantage of faster access to content. Many businesses continue to host their sites outside the country, but the tide is slowing turning in favor of local providers. Kenyan cloud service company Angani, for example, is receiving numerous requests from companies to have their websites hosted locally. The company is currently managing over 20,000 email accounts and a few thousand websites, said Angani CEO Phares Kariuki.
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Orange Kenya, Greenlight Planet to provide solar lighting to Kenyans
It is estimated that about 73 per cent of Kenyans live within 1-kilometre (0.6 miles) distance of a power transformer, yet only 18 per cent are connected to the grid. At its most basic level, Africa’s energy poverty means there is often no electricity to power lights to study or to work at night. It also means no access to safer electric cooking and heating, powered health centres, or electricity to run a business.
It is in regards to this that Orange Kenya and Greenlight Planet Kenya, designers of the Sun King line of solar home lighting solutions, have launched a strategic partnership to provide clean, safe and affordable solar lighting to millions of Kenyan homes in areas that have limited access to electricity.
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Nairobi to host East Africa digital marketing summit
Nairobi is set to host the second annual East Africa digital Marketing Summit & Show, an annual event designed to bring together key players in the digital marketing space from the East African region.
The Digital Fair to be held on 9th and 10th April 2015 congregates digital marketing companies, communication and marketing managers in both public and private sector and providers of digital products and services under one roof to showcase the latest digital trends at a time when the online audience has been on a meteoric rise occasioned by increased penetration of internet enabled phones.
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Local ICT start-ups to benefit from innovation showcase
The ICT Authority has today announced that Kenya will hold the inaugural ICT Innovation forum, bringing together novel technology-based ideas, solutions and practices on the 2nd -3rd March, 2015 at KICC, Nairobi.
The forum which has a national outlook will have President Uhuru Kenyatta as chief gueast.
The event, which will bring together ICT innovators, investors, development agencies, academia, multi-nationals and local entrepreneurs is organised through a consortium of public and private players will discuss challenges facing Kenyan innovators and opportunities.
Buyers to acquire new Lumia devices cheaply after Microsoft, Jumia deal
A partnership between Jumia and Microsoft will see the latest two Lumia smartphones, the Microsoft Lumia 435 and Microsoft Lumia 532, offered at a discounted price of Kshs 8,700. The phones launched today are now available in Kenya for Kshs 10,200 and Kshs 11,750 respectively.
But through the deal between Microsoft and Jumia; which for the first time allows people to purchase Lumia devices online via Jumia. The Lumia 435 and Lumia 532 can be bought for Kshs 8700. The devices are available in black and white countrywide across Kenya.