“Mobility has huge socio-economic, educational, commercial, societal and individual significance. Emerging economies have been hugely resourceful in using mobility in socio-economically important ways, to empower micro enterprises. By embracing mobility as a content delivery platform, emerging countries or continents can leapfrog developed economies, establishing a unique societal brand in a vibrant new industry”.
That is Emma Kaye there. She’s going to be one of the speakers during Mobile Web West Africa 2012 that starts tomorrow 25 April 2012 and she would be speaking on the first day of #MWWA2012.
Like the previous edition, this one promises to offer quality contents plus some fun. During the Mobile Web West Africa pre-conference chat yesterday with the event organisers, Emma Kaye’s name was mentioned. She was heralded as a fantastic entrepreneur who has done great stuff in the mobile technology sphere in Africa.
Digging through the web, I was able to find some interesting projects that she’s been working on. She has an impressive bio too. She once worked on the team that was producing the award-winning Sesame Street.
What has Emma Kaye been up to for some time now?
In recent times, she’s been working on a new service called Bozza. Bozza is a service that allows people to share their own story and contents using their mobile phone. The contents produced on the platform are local contents and people find it very useful and they consume it. The service was first tested in a specific community and it the first three days of launching it within MXit, there were 40,000 downloads. A month later and the number jumped to 170,000, she said while speaking to SouthWood.
There are lessons to learn from her. Emma has been growing this product and they hope to make it a Pan-African service that will be coming to Nigeria, Ghana, Zimbabwe, Kenya and other African countries. Popular channels currently include Naija Music and NaijaPoem, Badilisha Poetry, Bozza Hits and Mobi-Football. Bozza currently works specifically on feature phones. But BlackBerry optimisation is currently in development and smartphone optimisation to follow in mid-2012.
Worthy of note is those who are using the product. Musicians, Small business owners, people are creating their own contents, just like it is being done on YouTube and BattaBox. There is an option for those who create contents for Bozza to monetize it. Bozza features music, video, and poetry from across Africa and boasts with over 300 artists, filmmakers, and poets with new channels being released every day.
No doubt, it will be interesting to hear what Emma Kaye has done and what she has to tell those who are trying to create products that are targeted at the local market. Local contents sell and resonates with the people more.
I will be looking forward to talk to her after her presentation at the Mobile Web West Africa event. Is there any question you’d like to me to ask her? You can drop it below in the comment section or tweet it at @bits.
Below is an Interview that Russell SouthWood did last year on Bozza and what led to the service being developed.
[youtube wKaNUJAuGp0]
