The Challenges and Opportunities in Africa: Story of Ola Orekunrin MD Flying Doctors

''... I was able to learn a great lesson-when you need something people tend to avoid you but when you don't need anything and seem to be making profit, they tend to become your best friend.''

I have seen many young Africans living outside the continent always complaining about the lack of infrastructures, security and all sorts  in Africa but never thought of taking a step and seeing the opportunity in the difficulty.

I love every bit of this sentence, when I listen to Ola Orekunrin's interview; because it is something I usually say to people around me, ''be a person of influence'', anyway that's by the way.

I have this feel that anything healthcare is definitely going to be expensive so the more I think of what this lady has done, the more I'm thrilled by her achievement. The truth is, the excitement of entrepreneurship is in solving problems; but wanting to solve a capital intensive problem without having no-money or little money sure wouldn't even be close to exciting.

So what has Dr. Ola Orekunrin done with Flying Doctors , they basically provide air ambulance service in Nigeria conveying critically ill patients to where they can get suitable level of care, the closest air ambulance Nigerians could get before now, was either from South Africa, Kenya or Uganda. Which is quiet surprising bearing in mind the wealth in Nigeria.

To venture into this, you need many things going for you, after crossing the capital hurdle, you will need the personnel to make this functional, and most of all, the patronage. Convincing companies and the government is definitely no mean feat, talk less of convincing moderately wealthy Nigerians- which when it comes to do with health, they do not like taking chances, they prefer going with trusted hands.

Ola Orekunrin has a touching story of the inspiration that led to Flying Doctors, she said her sister fell ill while she was on holiday in Lagos, and they needed an air ambulance service to take her back to England, and they closest one they could get was in far away South Africa and while it was getting organized her sister died. After discussing with a couple of friends she decided to go ahead and set it up, seeing it was lacking in Nigeria. This explains why, even with the difficult conditions, she has still ventured into this, and achieving good success.

As many will know, starting a business in Nigeria isn’t for the faint-hearted. Ola Orekunrin, and in 2009 at 23 years of age, she started by selling off her few belongings, and in no time she ran out of money, but she still weather the storm, and was able to secure license for operation,, get the leases for aircrafts, and was able to setup a team of people to work with; a team of people that weren’t paid salary, but just believed in the dream and worked based on sheer inspiration.

Note To Self: This is one of the lessons I’ve learnt in business, to always work with people who believe in my vision). When she started they were doing 1 flight every 3 months, which wouldn’t have meant there wasn’t enough income to run the business. But has more people became aware of Flying Doctors, the frequency of patronage increased to around 2 flights every week, and now they have moved into their own place and now rented a hangar and they aren’t even 3 years in operation yet.

Ola Orekunrin believes one of the keys to running a business is to be blessed to have the right people around you that can help translate your vision to reality.

Deolu Adesanya: Shares the opinion of an enterprising mind. He believes in Africa. Most of all, He believes in YOU. He loves o regularly speak and write about the private sector and sustainable development countries. he is a PHD researcher in Entrepreneurship at the University of Leicester. He also carries out business consulting services. He is a Christian. He blogs regularly for CreativityTurf.com

The Imbalance Reports On Africa By Major Media Firms In Europe

I have a great passion for the continent of Africa to grow and become the envy of all. We all know that there are challenges like bad leadership and all sort but the focus of only strife, war and poverty by media firms in Europe makes me fractious.

Going through the website of one of major media firms in Europe, I found out that the only time I see them put any news about Africa on the first page or as breaking news on their website is only when bad event occurs in any of the African countries. Many of these foreign correspondents covering news about Africa have little knowledge of the culture, tradition or even language that makes the continent dynamic, they and their superiors already have a stereotype image about Africa and also I particularly believe their superiors will tell them ''Bring negative news because that's what people want to read about them''.

Events like poverty , the problem in Somalia, the shooting of mine workers in South Africa, the bomb blast in Nigeria, the problem in Ivory Coast and lots more.

The question that comes to mind: Is it that there is nothing good coming out of the continent outside poverty, war and corruption to be reported?. Now I am of the opinion that their focus is on strife and not the rebirth of its cities.

Africa And The Opportunities

Previous post on my views on Africa received many commendation from readers of this blog. This gives me the zeal to shine more lights on this emerging market in a challenging world.

''I don't think Africa will ever come out of the dungeon till will build the generation of Africa entrepreneurs that will define the jobs, create income, create revenue and build people  and sustaining business that will pay the taxes to grow Africa''. Particularly impressed with these words of Kola Karim and I think it's worth sharing the video.

All have been said about the challenges and problems this continent face but no matter all that we said we can only move the continent forward through zeal, and entrepreneurship that will build the people. The key factors for the developed economies are Infrastructures, financial system and consumer goods.

The drivers of these advanced economies will also be the key drivers of Africa that we all want. The limiting factor in the growth of Africa is the aforementioned drivers also here lies the opportunities for entrepreneurship.

The reality is that Africa is the future of opportunities and the time is now.

Watch the video!!!!!!

Africa And The Growth Of Call Centre Outsourcing Business In Asia

Customer satisfaction is seen as the backbone of any business all because of the obvious reasons. If you treat them well they become loyal to the brand and come back in their hundreds.

Many large corporations in the UK and America moved their call centre to Asia most especially India. Its relatively cheaper for them in terms of remunerations for call agents and not to forget that better infrastructure and well plan business  processes are put in place in this countries. Many large corporations also want to enhance their market share in the Asian pacific countries.

In the past few years, India has been call-centre capital of the world with many companies taking their call centre arm to the country which was particularly based on cost reduction strategy by these firms. Last year, Philippine took the leadership position as call centre hub in the world with estimated 400,000 call centre agents compared to 300,000 in India. Philippine took the position not only because it was becoming difficult for some Americans or British to understand the Indian accent but also of the close affinity of Filipinos to America (they have decent American accent).

Though India may have lost some of these business to its neighbours, the outsourcing of this centres to India has created lots of entrepreneurs in India in the area business process , creating customer focus IT Solutions, businesses that focuses on better pronunciation of English words and also export some of the lesson learnt to other Asia countries to mention a few.

AFRICA:

Lots of African countries speak good and clear English not only that UK colonize many of them its however surprising why none of this corporation never look at Africa as a place to outsource some of these call centres. France also colonize lots of countries in Africa and those guys speak good french. Why many of these large firms never look at Africa at all for any of these business is however shocking.

Countries in Africa have the manpower , knowledge and the skill to excel in this small arm (call centre) of a large corporation. This countries and firms always see Africa only has a continent that lives in abject poverty and all they think they need do is  just to send  financial aids and give lectures on political process and corruption not for business.

Bringing business to Africa not financial aids will emancipate the people and also create entrepreneurs and eventually reduce their so called financial aids. 

Jeff Bezos Classic Strategy For Amazon: “We're Going To Be Unprofitable For A Long Time. And That's Our Strategy”

I have personally noticed a trend that; when a successful company courts too much attention, one way or the other it will come back to affect them, even if the fundamentals and operations of the company still remains strong. Take for example, IBM, Microsoft, Yahoo, MySpace, even Google and more recently Facebook (even though nothing has changed between the time the company went public and now, but the value of the company has halved).

Look at the mighty success Apple, with the release of the iPhone 5, when you read what the critics have to say about it, the iPhone 5’s undoing is that Apple is such a success, that although this particular iPhone meets our extremely high expectations for it, it didn’t beat our extremely high expectations hence the disappointment (What an overly successful company/product has caused for itself). I think what the PR guys at Apple should do, is to lower the expectation of the market, then they would always stun us.

The Amazon Story:

Here in lies the love I have for Jeff Bezos; Amazon is one company that is doing absolutely great, without courting any attention from the public. I will tell you the truth, a person that decides to sacrifice current revenue in order to reap higher profits in the future, is sure a wise person. Info has it that, Jeff Bezos has been subsidizing the cost of the Kindle Fire for as much as $50 on each sold, in order to gain a foothold in the market for tablets, and in doing this he expects an initial loss. And it is working; everybody on the train when I’m commuting back home is seen reading something on his or her kindle, (I   suspect they are all reading “Fifty Shades of Grey” though).

Amazon.com was founded in 1994, when Jeff Bezos decided to quit his lucrative and secure job to own his business. He said he wrote the business plan for Amazon.com after making a cross-country trip from New York to Seattle. After which he decided to invite 300 friends and acquaintances to test the site, he was satisfied with their feedbacks. Jeff Bezos decided to take the site live and, within the space of a month, the company had sold books in all 50 states in America and in 45 countries. Within two months of starting, he had sold books worth over $20,000 a week. The success of the new start-up Amazon.com had ruffled a few industry leaders like Barnes & Noble and Borders, and they fought back, using their ready presence in the industry to muscle the small company out of the online book market. But Jeff Bezos disclosed his strategy to Inc in 1997: 'we're going to be unprofitable for a long time. And that's our strategy’.

Very few people are ready to leave their comfort zone, as the saying goes “no risk, no reward”. I will advice you take that daring first step today, the first step is usually the hardest but you just have to believe yourself and take the step, if Jeff had stayed back at his job, let say he even rose to become the CEO, he sure wouldn’t be worth up to $1 billion, (even the very famous GE CEO Jack Welch’s net-worth isn’t up to a billion) but Jeff Bezos is the 26th richest person in the world, with a staggering $21 billion to his name.

If one person can read this and be spurred to take that step, then I would have achieved what I set out to do, which is to inspire/push/guide/encourage you, to be daring and take that step to become who you want to be.

Deolu Adesanya: Shares the opinion of an enterprising mind. He believes Ideas and Innovation change the world. He believes in Africa. Most of all, He believes in YOU. He loves to regularly speak and write about the private sector and sustainable development in developing countries. He is a PhD researcher in entrepreneurship at the University of Leicester. He also carries out business consulting services. He is a Christian. He is also fashion conscious. He blog regularly at CreativityTurf.com 

The New Lumia 920 Is It A Game Changer For Nokia?

The launch of the new Nokia Lumia series may have come too late but still a step forward. The Finnish company has been living in the shadows of Apple and Samsung for a long time now with no innovation or entrance into the Smartphone market which is the crave of many phone users around the world.

The Features:

1) A full screen of 4.3-inch

2) 1.5 gigahertz

3) Dual-core processor and 8 megapixel camera

The Lumia 920 can be recharged wirelessly and has a touch screen that is very sensitive. It also gives tap on buildings to reveal names of  restaurants and shops in the building. I think this is absolutely the best so far in terms of feature (hardware) in the market.

The question been raised now is that can this actually save the Finnish company? It also surprising that this launch did not excite shareholders or the market because few hours after, Nokia shares fell almost 13%.

If the Lumia phone do not win over some customers of Apple and Samsung who have around 85% of the Smartphone market, this may eventually be the demise of the great Nokia company.

Africa The Place of Abundance

Following up on yesterday's post on doing business in Africa, this is an interview granted by the richest man in Africa and the 51st richest in the world according to Forbes list 2011 valued at $13.8billion. He is a self-made billionaire out of Africa and not wealth acquired through inheritance. 

A note to Africa sceptics this man Aliko Dangote the chairman and CEO of Dangote Group has 100% of its business in Africa and built it until becoming the 51st richest man in the world.

Africa The Destination

Stories written about Africa and doing business in Africa are full of misconception without proper understanding of the prevailing business environment. It is however funny when many Africa countries are classified as third world nations while the continent itself is classified as emerging market what a contradiction.....

The Africa that I know has abundance of opportunities and untapped potentials with very few foreign companies taking advantage of these potentials. Over 70% of the continents population are under 40 years of age with vibrancy, energy, talents and drive to excel which is what every firm will love to have in its workforce.  This is the continent that has 7 out of the 10 fastest growing economy in the world. Governments in Africa are working really hard to make the continent the destination for investors despite negative reports about the continent.

Investing in Africa will not only cushion the effects of the Euro crisis on companies balance sheet but it is also massive consumer market.

Why Africa:

a) It is the only continent that is rich in natural resources with countries like Nigeria, Angola, Libya and recently Ghana in oil, Platinum and diamond in South Africa, cocoa in Ivory coast and many more.

b) IMF has predicted that the continent will grow more significantly in the coming years. With many African countries working to enhance the business environment and making it easier to do business.

c) Africa is the fastest growing telephony market with over 600 million subscribers still growing and over 50% of the population not connected and waiting.

d) Africa is the only continent apart from some part of Asia that grew during the global economic recession in 2009 and even get better in  2012.

e) When the spending power of Europeans and Americans are falling, the spending power of Africans is increasing with increase in the middle class of over 250 million people.

The Testament:

Lots of multinational firms took advantage of this abundant opportunities and have never looked back since then or regretted taking that investment decision.

Guinness Nigeria a subsidiary of Diageo Plc UK is the second largest market in the world is expected to outperform United Kingdom market by 2014  according to research carried out by Renaissance Capital in 2011. In addition more than 45% of the company's global sales is from Sub -Saharan Africa. In recent announcement from Diageo Plc, Nigeria is the biggest market for Guinness foreign extra stout in the world overtaking the home country Ireland with the country having 6% of its global income.

PZ Cussons manufacturer of healthcare products and consumer goods started its African subsidiary in 19th century and now Africa is its largest market. The consumer spending in Europe is falling while the consumer spending is ever increasing with lots of places in Africa yet to be invested into by the firm.

Investors Guide:

Doing business in Nigeria: Nigerian Investment Promotion Commission

Doing Business in Ghana: Ghana Investment Promotion Centre

Doing Business in Kenya:  Kenya Investment Authority

Barclays Bank Second Investigation

Barclays bank after being investigated and fined over £290m in the Libor scandal case and have to pay over £450m on mis-selling products to customers have find itself in another pitfall over its transaction in 2007. This latest investigation is about the funds raised from investors in Abu Dhabi and Qatar sovereign wealth funds just after the financial crisis.

The previous LIBOR investigation claims some causalities which includes the CEO Robert Diamond and the Chairman which will leave soon. This probe is about disclosure of the fees the bank intends to pay the Qatari authority. The 7 billion pounds raised from the middle east helps it to weather the storm in 2007 and eventually avoided any bailout funds from the UK government.

The bank however has appointed Antony Jenkins who runs Barclays Retail and Business Banking has the new chief executive with a basic salary of £1.1m and a performance bonus of up to 250% of his salary. The new CEO takes over at a very difficult time when the bank is facing a running battle with regulators as well as its reputation been damaged.

This series of investigation into the banks will however have a significant impact on its profit for the second half of the year.

The Sacking of Founders by Shareholders

by Michael Durwin

This is also a huge reason why so many companies falter: you've just replaced the visionary leader. It almost every case of a founder-CEO being replaced, it is at the behest of the shareholders and board. Why? Greed. They simply want the company to get bigger and make money. Unfortunately, once you removed the visionary, you remove the vision. You replace him with, as the article says, ''An individual skilled to manage the growth''. Why does this person need to replace the founder? Let's call this guy the Growth Manager.

The growth manager wasn't smart or clever enough to come up with the business, he didn't have the [passion to grow it from nothing into a successful company. His only skill is his ability to squeeze out profits and manage resources issues' great skill, but not one that will lead to real , long term growth, just immediate dividends. Look at two recent turnovers: apple and Twitter.

All the founders are out of leadership roles at Twitter or out all together Instead they have Dick. What has Dick overseen? Censorship, advertising ,sponsored links and recommendations, and mass user departures.

Apple ousted Steve Jobs and replaced him with a bean counter named John Sculley because they wanted to ''limit (Jobs) ability to launch expensive forays into untested products''. What happened? Disaster one of those expensive forays was a new operating system which Jobs launched at NEXT. Once Apple's board smartened up and brought Jobs back, he continued to launch expensive forays into untested products'' which became the iPod, iphone, iPad, MacAir. Now the company is bigger than Exxon.

Does a start-up need a Growth Manager once it gets big enough? Absolutely but that person should be an advisor and partner to the visionary that gave birth to the company. That person has special skills and experience that the founder-CEO does not. But to replace a visionary leader with a visionless business manager is to remove the Soul from the company, without which it will die. It's a far smarter move to teach the visionary how to manage growth and take on managerial responsibilities to let the CEO do what he has always done best: envision, inspire and lead.

If Mark Zuckerberg is ever ousted from Facebook, you will see a rapid decline within the first year. The same goes for Richard Branson. He may not be managing the companies day to day but his vision and charisma make it one of the coolest most successful brands around.

Culled from Inc.com

Open Forum: Why do Private Firms Go Public?

Looking at a catalogue of companies like Facebook, Groupon, Vonage and Pet.com going public after much hyped but eventually did not live up to the expectation. Why then do founders/entrepreneurs go public apart from raising more funds which can still be raised without going public.

Let us discuss this.

Going Public a Blessing or Curse for Facebook?

Having spent the weekend reading through the whole story about facebook shares downward trend since going public. The thoughts that comes to mind now is that going public a blessing or curse to Facebook? The raising of IPO by Facebook about 3 months ago came with lots of pump and pageantry with every investor hoping to get their grip on the shares while some investors also expressing their concerns about revenue and sustainability of the social media company. Their fears is becoming reality going by the constant fall in its shares since the 'public show'.

The first phase of lock up period was over last week which allowed the (institutional) investors to hold or sell their shares. It is no more news that after lock up periods ends, most company's share price usually goes down which is also evident in the case of Facebook Inc. and making Facebook the second worst IPO performer in history after lock up period ends with a sharp decline from $38 down to $19.87after lock up.

I overheard a discussion about the impact of share prices on the performance. I think in the real sense there is no significant impact of the company's share price on a company performance if the company keeps making profit and does not run out of cash but having said that, a constant fall in share price makes it easier for the firms to be a target for hostile takeovers or a rival company to buy up the shares and offer irresistible deal to the shareholders of the target company.

Another problem of a fall in share price is that it can affect the rate at which Facebook can borrow money if the need arises. Creditors looks at the  company valuation before deciding on the rate of interest and the ability of the firm to payback upon maturity. This is the major reason why companies ensure that their share prices is considerably stable to fend off this potential treat.

October and November later this year is another phase of lock up period for the social media firm. We will keep you informed on the trend of share price and the revenue of the firm.

Emerging Markets : Focus on Singapore

Image: destination360

Singapore  formerly a British colony which became fully independent in 1965  with  approximately 5 million people with almost 60% Chinese. Singapore is one of the major hub for investments in the Asian pacific because of its cosmopolitan nature with different cultural background. Many foreigners find Singapore as their new home because of the peace and tranquillity and co existence of people of diverse culture and religion.

One of the reasons that makes Singapore to rise is the creation of Economic Development Board (EDB) which facilitated companies like HSBC, MAYBANK, ASCOTT to have their regional headquarters in Singapore. The general knowledge that economic growth solves social problem and the realisation of the small domestic market with the understanding that there is no natural resources to rely on made Singapore government to invest in its people to have the required knowledge am be able to compete well with the foreigners.

The government created possibilities for export by opening up its borders for foreign direct Investment unlike other countries they have always been outward looking.

Singapore Stats:

Ranking	Quality of Life	Economic Activity
1	London	London
2	Singapore	New York
3	New York	Hong Kong
4	Geneva	Shanghai
5	Sydney	Singapore
6	Hong Kong	Beijing
7	Paris	Dubai
8	Vancouver	Paris
9	Miami	Tokyo
10	Dubai	Frankfurt

Figure 1:  Quality of life

Ranking	Data 2010	$ US	Expected 2050	$ US
1	Singapore	56,532	Singapore	137,710
2	Norway	51,226	Hong Kong	116,639
3	US	45,511	Taiwan	114,093
4	Hong Kong	45,301	South Korea	107,752
5	Switzerland	42,470	US	100,802
6	Netherlands	40,736	Saudi Arabia	98,311
7	Australia	40,525	Canada	96,375
8	Austria	39,073	UK	91,130
9	Canada	38,640	Switzerland	90,956
10	Sweden	36,438	Austria	90,158

Figure 2: GDP Per Capita (2010 PPP US$ )

( Figure 1& 2 according to The Wealth Report 2012 published by Knight Frank and Citi Private Bank)

The Attractions:

The above stats might give you small indication about the growth and prospect of Singapore. Let us look at some of the attractions

Closeness to China: Singapore's closes to China which is the second largest economy in the world has definitely impacted on her growth  going by this shows a direct relationship between the two economies.

Free trade: Singapore government has always been one of  the foremost advocate for free trade and this preaching is paying off on the level of influx of foreign companies. Singapore has the busiest port in the world. it is also a key factor in its economic development.

Tax advantages: Singapore opened up its borders by allowing Investors and companies to benefit from the double taxation agreements with other nations. Start ups can gain tax advantage for the first 3 years if certain conditions are met. Angel Investors Tax Deduction Scheme (AITD) this like (venture capital) will also enjoy 50% tax deduction when they invest in start-up companies

Real Estate : The property business is booming with the abundant opportunities and also the policy that allows investors to own property in their name which is not common in the Asian-pacific.

Low Business cost: Investors are drawing towards Singapore also because of the low cost of doing business which is evident when the World bank ranks the country as the world's easiest place to do business in its report (Doing Business 2011 report). It takes just two procedures to register a company in Singapore with maximum of two days timeline.

The challenges:

The multi cultural divide might be used to disrupt the economy by some politician when they fill threatening. There are also barriers for foreign companies to operate in some sectors like legal services.