Greening the Silicon Savannah
Palo Alto and Bangalore may soon have to make room for Nairobi at the top of the tech startup world. Kenya, the setting for such success stories as M-PESA, is making a name for itself as the center of the “Silicon Savannah
”. This growth is supported by incubators, investment and policy – an ecosystem of actors committed to capturing opportunities in a promising field.
Today, the Climate Innovation Center (CIC), the first of its kind in the world, opens its doors to Kenyan startups hoping to also make waves in climate technology sectors. infoDev’s feasibility studies estimate that such companies can create up to 4,600 direct and indirect jobs over 5 years and over 24,000 within 10 years, but they require substantial support to realize this potential. To this end, the World Bank’s infoDev, in partnership with the governments of Denmark and the UK, engaged with Kenyan entrepreneurs, policymakers and financiers to determine what climate technology ventures need in order to flourish as their counterparts in other industries have done. In short, they seem to be: financing, business advisory services , networks and policies that support innovative entrepreneurship.