Three days ago 157 people lost their lives in my worst nightmare. Just six minutes after takeoff, Ethiopian Airlines flight 302 heading for Nairobi, crashed near Bishoftu, Ethiopia after a struggle by the pilots to gain control of the aircraft. Initial reports predictably focused on the safety record of the airline (we see you Financial Times) and the number of Western lives affected or lost (a fail). However, just 48 hours later outlets like The Points Guy, The Atlantic, and NewsOne quickly called BS on the hierarchical value of lives evident in early reports
Oluwatoyin Yetunde Sanni is a Nigerian based Software Developer currently working with Andela. How did you get involved in technology I’ve always enjoyed taking things apart, figuring out how they worked and then putting them back together again. I was introduced to a computer very early. I remember opening my first yahoo account when I was barely 12 years and this was the era when the Internet was not a luxury as it is now. Even though I earned a degree in Computer Science [from the University of Ilorin]. But
The oddest part about being a Zimbabwean millennial is that for your benefit you grew up having to look beyond Zimbabwe to achieve any form of a normal livelihood. This is still largely a present and painful reality, families, remain scattered across the world, torn apart by circumstances that merely happened to them. Despite that which we had no control or say over, I’m happy to say in our post-Mugabe dispensation; I can see Zimbabwe through a different lens — contentious point at varying degrees depending on who you talk
A long overdue article on the immense black entrepreneurial talent in the UK tech scene. Here we feature founders across sectors as diverse as beauty, event discovery, medicine, artificial intelligence, and IOT. Some have raised money, others are bootstrapping, some are running large agencies, others lean teams. Celebrate their stories. Sharmadean Reid @sharmadeanreid What more can be said about Sharmadean Reid? The founder of WAH nails an amazing salon in West London that integrates technology across the customer experience, she also is the co-founder of futuregirlcorp.com an events organization to support young female
On a trip to Uganda for a friends wedding, I took a random stroll through Kampala. I’d never been before and wanted to get a feel for the city. If I was hoping to escape work, the universe had other ideas. The first left I glance I see the familiar logo of Andela. Running POCIT, there are certain amazing companies and organizations you consistently hear about, Andela being foremost among them. With existing investors including Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, GV, and Spark Capital, their reputation proceeded them. I had to see
Five years ago I was leading strategic partnerships for a World Bank agricultural research institution. I was “living my best life”, travelling all over the world and making an “impact” — at least that’s what I thought until I found myself on a rooftop in Nairobi, Kenya with a filmmaker, a designer, and a restaurateur who would change my life forever. That night, inspired by the courage, drive, and resilience of my peers I realized that disrupting the narrative on Africa in a way that did not involve “selling poverty”
This is a collaboration with onchek.com, a platform that helps you shop luxury fashion from Africa [You can purchase all the looks worn via their site]. They spoke to Software Engineer Iheanyi Ekechukwu, someone who should be familiar with POCIT audiences. He featured as one of our very first spotlights all the way back in 2015! Here he talks about his style, his fashion inclinations and of course some tech talk. Enjoy. It was about 9 AM, right before it started raining, that Iheanyi walked into the studio, wearing layers
I’m ecstatic for the new Marvel movie Black Panther, which opens this Friday. For me, it’s much less about watching another action movie — my favorite genre of film — or getting to see what happens next in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It’s much more personal than that. Black Panther means a lot because I finally, after 31 years on this earth, I get to see a black superhero star in a major franchise film. That’s not to say I haven’t loved every iteration of Superman, Batman, Ironman and the
According to The Knights Foundation report: Diversifying Investments, just 1.1 percent of the $71.4 trillion assets under management across the world is in the hands of women and minority-owned firms. We all know entrepreneurship is hard, but starting a business across Africa is particularly hard given the restraints presented by developing nations. It is a gift and a curse in that new problems call for different solutions [from the Western World], but it can be challenging facing the barriers that impact scale and success. These barriers include: Limited access to
by Steve D. Amara (@amarast) Diversity is less discussed on the East side of the Atlantic, mainly because European countries approach the topic very differently from each other. Nonetheless, major tech hubs have seen some brilliant startups founded people of color, tackling a variety of issues from urban logistics in European capitals to financial inclusion in Emerging Markets. Below are some that really caught our attention. African Markets African Markets is a provider of information and data dedicated to African stock markets. A very comprehensive platform, launched by 30-year-old Cameroonian
