Njeri Rionge featured on BBC Network Africa programme on 14 May 2012
For internet entrepreneur Njeri Rionge, Africa represents the next economic frontier. She say strong indigenous, African-owned companies are needed to take advantage of the boom times ahead. Ms Rionge is as famous in Kenya for her success in starting up several companies at the same time as she is for Wananchi.com, a cable, broadband and internet-based telephone company. She started her dot com dream and first big venture, Wananchi.com, with the hope of bringing internet connectivity to the masses. Today the firm has grown to become the largest internet service provider in East Africa and is worth $173 million (£107 million) a huge sum for a firm with an initial start-up of $500,000 (£308,000).
Read the full BBC article here.
- Njeri Rionge is one of Africa’s leading entrepreneurs and one of the very few women pioneers in the ICT sector on the African continent.She co-founded internet service provider Wananchi Online that has since been transformed into Wananchi Group Holdings – one of east Africa’s leading providers of pay-tv, broadband internet and VoIP services. Last year the company raised US$57.5 million in growth capital from a group of international investors.