Monday, 29 August 2016

Why every startup entrepreneur should visit GoBigHub.com



Running a Business is like war. You either make profits or you make loses. That is why most professors advise MBA students read the most unlikely book: The Art of War by Tsun Zu. Available statistics of business mortality rates seems to reinforce the analogy that running a business requires a replica of strategies, typically employed by war planners.  A great number of businesses do not live long enough to celebrate their first anniversary. GoBigHub.com exists primarily to solve some of the most pressing problems afflicting entrepreneurs. 

With the myriad challenges startup entrepreneurs have to contend with, GoBigHub.com has positioned itself as a leading one-stop support hub for entrepreneurs of all walks of life. If you asked most startup entrepreneurs about the key challenges impeding their progress, lack of capital or rather capital acquisition, would top the list. 

Dubbed the Silicon Valley of Africa, GoBigHub.com has readied itself to play a pivotal role in creating a favorable ecosystem for small businesses across Africa. Given its propensity, GoBigHub.com connects local entrepreneurs to local investors for the benefit of both the investors and the entrepreneurs. The investor gets a return on investment accrued from invested funds. The entrepreneur gets the much needed capital to fund their business ideas. 
 
Most entrepreneurs with the most brilliant, commercially viable and scalable business ideas get connected to investors quite swiftly. The entrepreneurs are tasked to specify the exit strategies for the investors. The investors either provide the financing as equity financing in exchange for stake in the funded companies or as debt capital which the entrepreneurs pay back at a mutually agreed interest rate. 

The work of GoBigHub.com is embodied in the firm believe that trade, rather than aid will spur Africa’s economic transformation. The management and staff of GoBigHub.com strongly believe that when people pool resources together, the resources available could fund the next generation of big Businesses in Africa. The Pan-African vision informs the company’s aspiration to spread out and set franchises in all major African Cities.   

The process of applying for funding is quite simple and straight forward. The entrepreneurs applying for funding from investors can register on GoBigHub.com website and fill online application form requesting for funds. The application indicates the problem the entrepreneur is solving, the sales projections, the target market, ownership and management structure of the business. The applicants also attach business registration certificate, financials and other relevant business documents. Investors then browse through the GoBigHub.com website to see investment opportunities available.  

GoBIgHub.com also organizes “GET FUNDED” events in which entrepreneurs are given the opportunity to pitch directly to investors about their ventures. After the presentations, the investors pick ventures they are interested in investing in. GoBihHub.com handles the legal aspects of the transactions such as drawing agreements and witnessing the sighing thereof.  The investors transfer the amounts of money committed for investments through GoBigHub.com for onward disbursement to the entrepreneurs. 

The efforts of the team at GobigHub is now yielding fruits. According to its Founder and Lead Mr. Ojijo Pascal, the company has an ever growing portfolio of companies and projects for which GoBigHub.com has secured funding to the tune of hundreds of millions. It’s noteworthy that GoBigHub is also nurturing an investment culture across the continent. Some of GoBigHub.com’s investments in projects such as fish farming and other agricultural ventures were raised from multiple small-scale investors some of whom contribute as little as UGX 50,000/=. For the first time, small-scale investors are beginning to realize the power of collective investment schemes such as SACCOs, and Investment Clubs. 

GoBigHub.com also provides affordable business incubation space for startups as they grow their business. The Incubation space has internet connection, drawers, ample parking, water, in a conducive environment. At request, the incubator also allows entrepreneurs to pay for daily use of the incubator.   

The Hub also offers mentorship opportunities for startup entrepreneurs. Through Inua Kijana fellowship programme, budding entrepreneurs are assigned to different mentors who have successfully grown the type of business the entrepreneur is running. The mentors devote their time to share real life lessons learnt and experiences in running their own businesses. 
GoBigHub.com has previously partnered with other organizations and Ugandan incubation hubs such as Mara Foundation, Food Science and Technology Incubation Center, Uganda Industrial Research Institute, Global Business Labs and Outbox to run accelerated Business mentorship.   

GoBigHub.com is thus a great place for every African entrepreneur who has initiated and building a business.  Startup entrepreneurs can follow them up on social media platforms to keep in touch with new opportunities available for entrepreneurs. 
Owachgiu Dennis

Naniwapi.com: The exclusive one-stop online platform for all your needs


Every now and then people are relying on internet to get things done. This usually means logging onto dozens of websites and online applications to accomplish those distinct needs. Wouldn’t it be cool if a user could just log onto just one platform and do all those different things in one place? 

Yes, that is precisely what the exceptional team at Naniwapi.com has done. Naniwapi has been created to serve as a premium one stop platform and market place for all conceivable needs of diverse users. On Naniowapi.com users can post their items for sale, view events, view news and current affairs.

NaniClinic allows users to search through Clinics, Pharmacies, drugs, doctors and nurses. It has a feature that allows users to book appointments with doctors. Users don’t need to line up in a queue to see a doctor, as they can make all the arrangements via NaniClinic. Users can also seamlessly buy drugs and other pharmaceutical products from the platform.  
    

Through the platform users can also post their items for sale, and buy other item they need. Just when has posted items for sale, they can also book an air ticket and bus ticket respectively for your next trip. They can also browse through arrays of upcoming events. 

A powerful alert feature in place to allows users to keep track of transactions in their naniwapi.com accounts. The alerts and status nonfictions keep users abreast on what is going on in various modules of their account. If an order for a user’s product has been received, a system generated alert message is automatically send to the seller.   
 
Even while the Platform is in Beeta version, Pascal a user who has been among the early adopters says he is wholesomely impressed with the user experience, intuitiveness and the simplicity of the website. “I post a book for sale on the platform, view news, lookup the next events to attend, browse through what is happening in Cinemas and Theaters”. Says Pascal. 

NaniLocate helps users to locate friends such as former schoolmates and workmates in real time. Aware that your network is your net worth, naniwapi.com is an exquisite platform that uses advanced algorithms to trace friends based on user-supplied information to link people who have worked or studied together. Through this real time linkage, naniwapi.com adds value to users by enabling a social networking that creates immense opportunities for all users. Naniwapi.com is inspired by the philosophy that each naniwapi.com user can add value or sell something to another user. 

NaniChat allows friends, sellers, buyers and all other system users to chat with each other on the platform. The Chat feature on the platform implies users can generally do all they need right there on the platform. Whether it’s a chat with an associate or business negotiation with a potential client, NaniChat powers it.   

Naniwapi.com is an exclusive marketplace for connecting with great people. The app isn’t about quantity but quality of interactions and networking. If a person was to painstakingly ask each friend whether they know someone selling something, it would be a laborious and time consuming process. The app removes that pain, and lets people to effortlessly know “who is selling what”. Rather than randomly asking people about what you want to buy or sell, naniwapi.com bridges that gap.  

You want to spend the night at a friend’s spare bedroom instead of sleeping at a hotel? You need a friend to show you tourist around a city without hiring a tour guide? You want to drive around the city in a friend’s car rather than hiring special hire? Naniwapi.com solves all that by putting you in touch. 
 
Naniwapi.com is an epic platform that fosters networking.  Your networks on naniwapi.com can be your next mentor, mentee, customer, supplier, employer, employee, contractor, advisor, personal Doctor and broker. The list is endless. And naniwapi.com app is making it possible in real life.     
 
Naniwapi.com’s founder Ojijo Pascal proudly says he is not merely the owner of naniwapi.com, but he is also a devout user of the platform. “I often have quite a good number of tasks I need to get done across my different companies. Like any other use of the system, I use the platform to post about services or products I need. Naniwapi.com solves my problem. It can solve other people’s problems too” says naniwapi.com founder. Ojijo says his networks of clientele have often asked him to recommend buyers or sellers for different products and services. Now they can simply post what they can easily post what they want to buy or sell on the platform.   

Since naniwapi.com is giving people an opportunity to sell stuff the platform, it became imperative to give people an opportunity to generate receipts on the go. NaniPOS mobile App serves that purpose by converting a phone into a Point of Sale terminal. NaniPOS harnesses the power of mobile technologies to add values to entrepreneurs. PoketiApp is the mobile payment engine that integrates mobile payment solutions across different networks and allows people to receive payments through mobile money.  
  
If you thought Naniwapi.com’s services are only the aforementioned, you would be gladly surprised that there are more other top-notch features. NaniCredit allows eligible borrowers who meet the criteria to borrow money. The borrowed money is automatically wired to the borrower’s mobile money account.   
Naniebooks allows users to access books online. Naniebooks has both free books as well as premium books on Sale.  

The Business Titan magazine rated Namiwapi.com as a revolutionary platform that is useful to every avid networker. Naniwapi.com mobile App is also available for Android devices in Google Playstore. The App also has a web version that can be accessed via www.naniwapi.com.  

Owachgiu Dennis
The author is a satisfied naniwapi.com user.




Friday, 19 August 2016

How Uzima foods boosts health and creates wealth for its Distributors



Food and health constitute the core basic needs of all humans. Right from the richest to the poorest; the religious to atheists; they all need food. People can do without perfumes, designer clothes, jewelries, and yes, they can forego conjugal pleasures, but not food. Food happens to be the number one cause of disease, and the number one cure of diseases, depending on what you eat.

Its this centrality of food in people's lives that creates inextricable linkages between food and eating habits to health. On the other hand, so much uptake of certain nutrients such as cholesterol has health complications. On the other hand low intake of certain vital minerals creates health maladies.


Its one thing to eat a lot of food, and quite another thing together to eat what contains the right amount of nutrients. Uzima foods directly solves nutritional imbalances by manufacturing well balanced food products that are rich in particular nutrients. 

Uzima is a Kiswali word that means wholeness. Uzima foods are provides the entire healthy amounts of nutrients one needs in a day. The body requires a certain amount of each nutrient for healthy functioning of the body. When you eat Uzima foods you don’t just eat to fill your stomach, but you get a health amounts of all the different nutrition needs of the body.

The founder, Mr. Ojijo Pascal personally saw the necessity of a balanced nutrient way back in 2015. As a single man, eating irregularly, skipping meals and eating snacks most of the time, most of the foods didn’t have all the necessary nutrients. Health wise it was hurting, yet health is all one has got.

Drawing the expertise of some of the most dedicated and accomplished professional nutrition and food science technologists, the team at Uzima foods embarked on developing fortified and organic noodles, cookies, juice, instant porridge flour containing all the nutrients one needs in a day (minerals, vitamins, carbohydrates, fats, fibre, and proteins).
Uzima distribution channel is strictly through network marketing channels. The choice of this distribution strategy is aimed at cutting operational costs. The cost that should have been used for advertising, distribution and marketing are significantly reduced. The cost saved is passed to partners.

Given this disposition, Uzima creates a real income opportunity for its partners. Everyday satisfied customers recommend great products to their peers like family and friends, but they get no reward. As a great product which is worth recommending, Uzima pays its partners for recommending and selling the products to one's networks. Its fun because you are simply buying food to eat and Uzima pays you a commission each time you buy or refer a friend, relative or colleague to buy.   


Uzima has elaborate compensation scheme that includes commission and bonuses to reward partners for recruiting other partners and for selling the products. All one needs to do to become a distributor is to buy Uzima products worth UGX 400,000. After purchasing the products, one continuously earn 6% commission and 6% bonus for every sale made.

When a partner recruits three and helps his or her down lines to recruit three other people, the distributor gets 48,000 per recruit. Uzima is a big deal business opportunity because everyone would readily love to eat the healthy and quality food products Uzima foods has on offer. The income prospect is compounded in the company’s tagline “Eat Healthy. Grow Wealthy”.

How Investments in Agriculture can ease Uganda’s unemployment



Most countries lag behind economically because they fail to exploit their competitive advantages. Massive Youth Unemployment in Uganda today correlates directly with the country’s inability to create opportunities in sectors where they have competitive advantages. In Uganda, agriculture is a key competitive advantage because of the large tracks of fertile arable land available countrywide. Uganda’s land can record high yield even without fertilizers.  

Since it employs nearly 80% of the population, Agriculture is the sector that can be relied to ignited an increase in household incomes for the greatest number of people. Investment in Agriculture can positively impact on many sectors of the economy simultaneously. Great and mighty economic powers such as the United States of America owes their economic growth to Agriculture.

Uganda certainly has numerous untapped opportunities. It is noteworthy that the handful of small holder coffee farmers in Uganda have already made Uganda Africa’s leading coffer exporter and brought in considerable income. Uganda’s production level and earning can still grow up significantly for coffee, just as for other agricultural products. Investments towards processing such products locally could further allow Uganda to export finished products rather than raw materials. Exporting finished products would earn even more money for the country and create many new jobs at the processing plants.

The growth of agro-processing industries to process agricultural products will itself create jobs for multitudes in other related industries. By-products in other manufacturing cycles are automatic raw materials for other products. Other business will emerge to handle Packaging, transporting finished goods etc. When the goods are exported the country will earn the much needed foreign exchange for the economy and improve the balance of payment position.

The fact that countries that are not as endowed as Uganda are doing well means the sky is the limit for Uganda. Arid Egypt grows and exports agricultural products all year round using water from rive Nile, and Uganda has the source of river Nile right here. Israel products several tones of fresh water fish in tanks, and Uganda has the largest fresh water body right here. Botswana exports more tones of beef products globally, yet Uganda has more cows than Botswana. Israel exports more Diary products yet Uganda has more dairy cows than Israel. 

It’s time to take advantages of these competitive advantages to uplift the economy. With the bulk of our population being youthful, availability of labour force is in itself another competitive advantage at our disposal. The kind of agriculture that will create enormous opportunities will have to be commercialized intensive agriculture, not the traditional hand-to-mouth subsistence agriculture. This requires real investments and the national budget should reflect agriculture as a priority area.
The huge amounts of money the country can potentially earn from agriculture will automatically spur the growth of other sectors, notably the service sector. Uganda already has a vibrant service sector, but since most people - about 67% live on a 2$ a day- the service sector can’t continually grow in an economy where the majority have a low purchasing power. Agriculture is that one sector that can unlock the purchasing power of the largest portion of the population since it employs the majority. The increase in purchasing power would then increase revenues in the service sector.

Agriculture can thus accelerate economic growth, which will create several new opportunities for citizens.  Most prosperous people who will earn a decent income from agriculture will reinvest the money in other new ventures. It is these new ventures that will create more employments opportunities for our young people. It is on that premise that agriculture must be embraced and allocated up to 10% of the budget annually. As a productive sector, the more money invested in agriculture, the more money government will earn back in tax and non tax revenues. The increased revenues can then be allocated to other crucial budgetary sectors. 

The next logical question is where do we get the extra money to invest in agriculture? In my opinion we have three clear feasible ways. One would be to temporarily cut down the state’s administrative costs and use the money to invest in agriculture. Office automation would cut down the required number of personnel, thus saving some money. Reducing on the number of political appointees, by trimming down some non-essential and redundant personnel such as the “senior advisors” who offer no advice at all.

Another strategy is by implementing agricultural and economic zoning in different regions. Zoning will encourage bulk production with the additional advantage of economies of scale. It becomes easy to attract foreign direct investments for agro-processing industries to areas with enough raw materials.    

The third strategy would be to formation of individually owned agricultural cooperatives through which many smallholder farmers can pool money together to either carryout farming together or to process agricultural products. The government can set up a cooperative bank or a Bank that is agriculture-friendly to provide financing to the agricultural cooperatives. Alternatively, the government can channel cheaper credit in form of Agricultural loan facilities through existing networks of commercial banks.       

The author is a farm owner with a farm in Nwoya District.