Kenya Ready For Digital Age As PayTv Begins To Be Reality With Smart Tv Entrance Into Market

The Emergence of Pay Tv is causing sensations among Kenyans as  Digital age becomes a reality.The deadline for the switch to move from analogue to digital for Kenya is the year 2012.Smart Tv made Its entrance to the market Yesterday and promises Nairobians a time of their lifetime in home entertainment.Viewers wishing to get the Smart tv package will have to buy aconnection gadget at ksh five thousand and pay a monthly subscription of nine hundred shillings.South African company DSTV which has been providing cable tv to kenyans has been forced to reduce some of its packages to as little as eight hundred to match the competition from emerging pay tv companies.

   he move from Analogue to digital will give local content providers leverage in showcasing their content.Information permanent secretary Bitange Ndemo sait that Pay tv companies will have to allow forty percent of all content to be local in order to boost Kenyan content.

Zain Rebrands To Airtel Kenya As Safaricom Takes It Onslaught To The Grassroots In A Collabo Ya Mwaka With RoyalMedia Company

Ten Years Ago Two Mobile Telephony companies,Safaricom and Kencell set up shop in Kenya.A decade later Safaricom has kept its brand unscathed as Zain Changed not once not twice but thrice.Zain now officially Airtel Kenya hopes to capture a bigger  market share currently being denied them by mobile telephony giant Safaricom.On the day that the official launch was being done 22nd November 2010 Safaricom was launching a 45 Day campaign in conjunction with Royal media services Company, a move that is seen as snobbing the launch  and diverting attention to its marketing campaign.Royal media is well known for its extensive grassroots campaigns and Safaricom Is hoping to get more Loyal customers and further push its market share up.Twenty billion shillings was the figure safaricom announced as its half year profit recently and that in itself spearks volume about this company.Airtel in addition with the low tariff model that they are bringing in will have to do something drastic about their Brand and image as perceived by the customer, otherwise another rebrand might just kill the company.Safaricom already boasts of another powerful brand M-pesa even as Airtel,s equivalent previously called Zap continues to struggle.

   Players in the industry will be waiting to see the next move the two companies make even as Orange and Yu start intensifying on their own separate Marketing strategies. One thing is for sure, the field out there is getting hotter and hotter and its time the boys are separated from the Men.

Barclays Goes All The Way In Rolling Out Mpesa To Its M-banking Clients

Barclay's Bank account holders can now enjoy the convenience of transacting E-money from their accounts to m-pesa and back.The service, launched yesterday in conjunction with Safaricom who own the M-pesa product means that customers will be getting closer and closer to their Money using their mobile phones. Safaricom CEO Michael Joseph said that the launch was in line with Safaricom's goal of providing quality services to all its customers and ensuring that Mpesa is felt all over Africa.The launch also means that agents can buy electronic float easily and hussle free.Safaricom has a similar partnership with Equity bank- M-kesho which apart from offering easy money transactions from Mpesa to Bank and back also offers insurance services and ensures that the bank reaches even the rural people.Michael Joseph the out-going chief executive officer for   Safaricom said that the retail bank as we know it now may not exist that way ten years to come as more and more people embrace Mobile banking.

Access Kenya Launches Surveillance Service For Mobile And Internet Users To Assist In Curbing Crime And Easing Traffic Congestion

Access Kenya has Launched a surveillance service to help ease traffic in Nairobi and Mombasa.The cameras will help motorists to choose less congested routes and thus save time in getting to their places of work.The cameras capture live updates in real time and relay to the access Kenya portal which can be easily accessed via the mobile phones by Motorists.This is definitely a very innovative digital age product by Access Kenya.It is in line with vision 2030 and apart from easing congestion it will help in curbing crimes such as recently experienced in cash in transit cases.The cameras totaling 23 will cover major roads in Nairobi and Mombasa. The service can be accessed through access Kenya's portal at home.co.ke

Safaricom's Masonko Promotion Versus Zain Angukia Millioni Latest Onslaught At Each Other In The Fight For Markert Share

The latest Promotion by Mobile Service Provider Safaricom, Masonko Na Safaricom just A day after Zain announced the Angukia mamillioni na Zain is the latest in a series of strategies being applied by the two warring companies to woo subscribers. The catch here is to drive usage so that they can keep a hold on to their subsribers and increase both their market shares. Through angukia milioni na Zain, Zain hopes to push its market share to 50 percent. Safaricom is not taking this lying down and thus has come up with Masonko na Safaricom.Whoever comes up with these safaricom names must be one sharp mind.
 In the Zain Promotion, they are offering one million per week plus thousands of consolation prizes. All one needs to do to enter is make calls and receive calls, sms top up any denomination internet access and subscribing to club 20 ziki kopa Credo me2u and call back services. For the Safaricom promotion all a subsriber needs to do is top up any amount apart from bamba 5. Each top up of Bamba 10 gives the subsriber 10 points and enters them to a daily draw and the subscriber could just receive money from M-pesa.
 
Safaricom which boasts of being the only provider with 3g and going to 4g soon promises its Subscribers good value for money which sounds pretty much as if Michael is telling His subscribers  not to mind the price but to look at the good quality service. Zain on its side is enjoying a boost from India's Barti airtel and looks as if is not letting go of the low tariff system.

The other two providers YU and Orange havent been Left behind as they have also unleashed bags of goodies for their respective subsribers.

CCK Dancing With Death By Prolonging Sim Registration Deadline

The Communications Commission Of Kenya Is literally Dancing With Death by Continuing to Prolong
The Sim registration. The initial deadline was July 31st then came August 30th then September 15th. God only knows what the next deadline will be. Meanwhile grisly murders like the one which happened on Friday night in Kiambu will continue to happen. Kidnappings and death threats abound. Please CCK stop dancing with the devil Himself and bring this operation to a close. We will assume that those that haven't registered their Sim Cards have other Ulterior motives. Everyday we hear of  a different con game and Kenyans end up losing millions of Shillings. In a case like the Kiambu Murder nothing was taken from the deceased and thus the people who did it might have known the victim. With everyone registered it is easy to have a Name and an address and thus we will be avoiding such incidences.

Therefore CCK cease giving anymore deadlines and lets see whether most of the phone related crimes will be reduced drastically. I know they will.

Safaricom Advert Masaa Ya Kujibamba A Far Cry In Advertising

Have you watched Safaricom's new advert? One where The Main character asumes a news like Anchor Like position for masaa ya kubamba. In my opinion this should be the most boring advert ever to grace our TV screens in this our digital age. Zain's Advert of three shillings one shillings is better by far. What was safaricom's marketing department thinking coming up with such a boring advert? In this digital age people are busy and the slightest hint of something that will bore gets flipped over for something more exciting.

 Masaa ya kubamba surely safaricom that talks volumes and clearly shows that you were caught pants down by Zain. No wonder the bend over Campaign right at your doorstep.

Since we are speaking of adverts, why not talk about Ecobank's advert which i consider out of this world. Innovation is the key and if Ecobank wanted to bamba somebody then believe you me am in their box.
 

So mine truly Safaricom you better unleash anothe advert to replace the masaa ya kubamba advert which i dare say once again its damn boring. 

Red Numbered Calls Bring Fear Among Kenyans As CCK Completes Sim Registration

Have you received A call with a red number of late? Well if you haven’t then sources true or otherwise claim that you may soon receive one. Upon receiving such calls then woe unto you because you shall surely die. If you ask me this should be the biggest joke this side of the sahara this season. Red calls blue calls yellow calls or rainbow calls for that matter, it doesn’t make a different. The red call hoax has brought fear among the 20 million subscribers most of who use black and white screen phones. Safaricom’s chief executive officer once described Kenyans as a people with peculiar calling habits. Well this red call thing might just be one of those peculiar calling habits.

With the CCK having completed its sim registration campaign just a day coinciding with this satanic romour this makes it ironical because such is exactly what the Communications body wants to eliminate. The funny part of the Red calls rumor is that actually several guys have died after receiving the calls. If you ask me I would have a specialist perform a post mortem to actually declare the cause of death. Possibly could have died from malnutrition or stress. They also possibly could have received a call from one of the numerous promotions handing people millions of shillings in prize money. You see if the largest amount of money one has ever held is Fifty shillings, when you call him and tell him he is the proud owner of 13,000,000 shillings then death is a possibility.

So my dear Kenyans, don’t be afraid to pick you calls. You must just refuse to pick that call and it may be your boss announcing your promotion. It might be the shinda smart guys calling you to go and pick your Range rover SUV worth fourteen million Kenya shillings. It might be your girlfriend who has concealed her number to surprise you with a call to say she loves you. The possibilities are endless. But strangely enough Kenyans choose to choose the possibility of a Red call straight from hell!

The CCK has done its part and the era of terrorist sending threatening texts and prisoners making demanding calls from the comfort of their cells is over!

Fight For Market Share Intensifies

The fight for Kenya's Mobile telephony market has intensified.Zain marketers held an impromptu roadshow at Safaricom House Westlands forcing Michael Joseph to come out.
The Zain promoters played songs like Bend-over which leaves one with no doubt as to what they meant.(If you dont know then then you wont be told)
This might be a sign of things to come as the battle for the market share intensifies.This is ruthless marketing and extreme tactics and one can only hope that war of words(bad ones does not ensue)
Meanwhile consumer continues to enjoy to the maximum. A joke making the rounds says that Flashing someone now constitute to hate speech. With sms rates as low as one shilling sending someone a please call me is considered an abuse.
My prayer is that the two competing company should come to an agreement and serve its customers efficiently,affordably and quickly.

Zain Removes It Claws In An All Out Tarrif War Against Safaricom

Zain Kenya limited and soon to be BHARTI AIRTEL released a shocker yesterday in what has turned out to be a raging price war against mobile giant Safaricom. Zain announced the lowest tariff across networks of three shillings a minute and SMS for only one shillings.Safaricom's chief executive officer Michael Joseph was quick to term the move unworkable and an unfair way of competition. On his side Rene Meza Ceo for Zain Kenya Ltd insists that as part of the package being brought in by Barti Airtel, the low tarrif is very much workable.
Meanwhile as the price war rages on Kenyans are jamming the network with calls and text messages. One time referred to as Kenyan's peculiar calling habits by Safaricom's Michael Joseph, always trust Kenyans to jam the network when freebies are announced.Players in the industry will be watching to see whether this low tarrif offer by Zain is here to stay or it is just a shake up.Bharti Airtel and ECI Telecom further relationship with an optical network expansion agreement.(CONTRACTS): An article from: Fiber Optics Weekly Update

Safaricom The Better Option Braves On Despite Multiple Downtimes As It Prepares To Announce Its Profits

Lately i have noticed some flows in my favorite network Safaricom. I tried calling my number several times but it was not going through. I called customer service at 100 and was advised that my number had diverts and if i would want them removed. Of course i agreed because in this age and time no on wants to be mteja. Not after entering a dozen competitions and waiting for that magical call telling you
that you are the lucky winner of one million grand prize! I have had that dream a million times.
Anyway,even after the diverts were removed i still continued to experience the same problem.
I remember even trying to load my favourite bamba five so that i can use safaricoms Internet to check my facebook and it kept on failing.
As safaricom announces its financial results,its amid these challenges.With fifteen million subscribers and with price war raging on,where zain and Yu are eying the subscriber,safaricom the better option will really have to be the best option.
Basically Safaricom has it all figured out. They have the best services so far and understand the mobile telephony market inside out. How else do you explain getting a loan you repay at ten percent interest. That is what Okoa Jahazi does to you but despite that the service has continued to enjoy a favorable popularity.
The latest partnership between Safaricom and Equity bank on M-kesho is another first class service by my one and only network and soon my dividends will be deposited straight to my M-kesho account sited at my phone.
Well,so much bla bla about my thoughts on the downtimes,price wars acquisitions and counter acquisitions of my beloved network,what are your thoughts? Comment and maybe we can agree to disagree.http://ring-tonescraze.blogspot.com
This just in.......Safaricom has reported a pretax profit of 20.9 billion even amid cut throat competition.There you have it.Safaricom is indeed the best option.

M-kesho Equity Goes Live But Daggers Are Drawn In The Fight For Mobile Users

Equity's C2B (Customer to business)M-banking service which targets the 15 million Safaricom subscribers dubbed M-Kesho is up with a bang.Equity Bank customers will be able to do most of their banking hall transactions right from the comfort of their Mobile phones.The launch of this great service now heralds an all out war from other service providers who are also eyeing the Mobile phone user with dripping mouths.Convenience is the key word here as the world becomes fast paced.Daggers now have been drawn and the subscriber will be the benefactor as the transaction fees are bound to go lower and lower.A similar Service Launched earlier by KCB Dubbed Bankika has been enjoying a huge popularity.Bankika account holders can do most of their transactions from their mobile phones.M-Pesa has come in handy once again for this service bringing in its over 170,000 outlets as transaction points.
Other banks that have taken up M-banking include Barclays with Hello money,NIC and Standard Chartered Bank.With 20 million mobile Users that translates to big business for banks and Value Added Service providers.Kenya has proved once again that we have the brains to come up with innovative products and services even after the revolutionary M-Pesa Product launched by Safaricom
in 2006.

Facebook Spreads Its Tentacle Amid Hacker's Threats

Face-book,the number one website in the United States with a staggering 400million users,is venturing more into the mufti-billion advertising business.Everyday you log on to your face-book account you are bombarded with this and that advert.This is primarily how face-book makes its money.But now it is spreading its tentacles far and wide to get more of the advertising money.Even though Google dominates the web advertising industry Face-book is going it full force.This amid recent password and security infringement by hackers.
The stage is set and now it is crucial that Face-book puts its house in order as it goes full throttle in the advert industry
Face-book was started some Six years ago by Mark Zuckerberg while he was still in college.

Nairobi City Council To Introduce E-payment

Nairobians will soon be able to pay city council bills using their mobile phones.
This move will ease congestion in the city council offices and reduce the risk of carrying hard cash.The payment system should be ready in the next six months.
This i would say is a very timely move by the city council and a leap towards vision 2030.I would wish it to involve even the parking fees, as motorists in the buzzing city are faced with a myriad of problems looking for the parking attendants who hide themselves to later clamp the vehicles.
E-commerce is the way forward for our country and Africa as a whole.Going foward you will not have any need to carry hard cash nor will you need your ATM!
Just your phone! Go mobile.....Digitize!Bangkok Bank launches advanced all-in-one mobile banking and payments solution from Fiserv.(SERVICES): An article from: The Mobile Internet (Boston, MA)

The Easy Steps To Configer Your Nokia Phone To Internet

If you have a Nokia phone and are wondering how to go about setting up internet access,then you should worry no more.Here are some simple steps.
Go to the menu and select settings
Scroll down to Configurations
Then down to personal configuration settings-select

Account name SAFARICOM user name saf password data
use prefered access point select no
access point settings-
proxy disabled
bearer settings-packet data access point safaricom
network type IPv4
authentication type normal
user name saf
password data


then go back up to the account name and select option

then select SAVE as default

Bingo.You are ready to start surfing with your Nokia.

Incase of any hitches just call safaricoms customer care because most likely the sim card is not activated.

You can also try the ussd method of *445# or sending a blank text message to 445.
Hope this is helpful even though it is tailored for the safaricom subscriber.

Rush For Internet Users By Mobile Network Operators

It has been a mad rush by the Four main Mobile Network Operators,Safaricom Zain Yu and Orange to satisfy the internet appetite of its customers.Never before has the mobile phone been used to access the internet like now.The operators know this and are now concentrating more and more on data bundles.According to the latest survey by the communication commission of Kenya,Mobile data internet users grew to slightly above 1.9 million.This i may attribute to the young and upward mobile facebook and twitter generation.Safaricom has come up with a promotion dubbed King of facebook to try and woo the ever online subscribers.Orange has come up with a promotion dubbed bunda 1000,500 and 100.
The industry will be waiting to see what unfolds when the two other networks Zain and Yu come up with more promotions.Brace yourselves for a ride of your lives.You will surf the net till you drop.Surfing the net has never been so entertaining and all i can say is shop for a good data enabled phone and prepare for downloads galore!

Zain Changes Ownership For A Record Fourth Time

Zain has done it again.It has changed ownership for the fourth time.Barti Airtel took over the ownership of zain following an 800billion shilling deal by the indian telecom company.Zain subscribers expressed their anger at the perennial change over of the company.The deal means that Barti Airtel officially takes over control of 42 million Zain subscribers in Africa including 3million in Kenya.
Barti Airtel which operates on a low tariff model hopes to break even in the African market,a something that has evaded Zain for long.Safaricom's Chief executive officer Michael joseph however said that what works in India may not necessarily work in Kenya.Another Indian company Essar running by the YU brand also operates the low tariff model.Players in the industries will be watching to see what the new kid on the block has to offer.This is so especially because Barti Airtel are coming in with their own fibre optic cable and cable television.
Barti Airtel is part of Barti group of companies which has assets in India Singapore and Bangladesh.It was started by Barti a fifty two year old Indian businessman when he was only eighteen years old.Barti telecom has 120 million subscribers in India and enjoys a 25 percent market share.

Death Of Paper Money Heralds Mobile Supremacy

Paper money or bills and notes as they are commonly known are dying a slow natural death.The traditional corner shop owner will have to wake up and smell the coffee if he wants to continue with business.More and more people are opting to do their shopping with their card,be it debit or credit card.But those too are getting out of fashion especially with the misuse of debit cards running many families to bankruptcy.
The mobile phone is becoming the preferred means of paying for goods and services.With the advent of M-pesa in Africa,the mobile has taken its place in the business world and going forth more and more gsm subscribers will see it as a viable means of making payments and transfers.
The convenience that the mobile makes is fantastic noting that you can use it to go online shop from the internet and actually pay for goods and services provided.
So with the death of paper money no one is actually mourning as people will not have to carry hard cash which posses a security threat.

Safaricom Crazy Offer Takes Kenyans By Storm

You might have heard it from a friend or seen it in the papers today.The greatest offer by safaricom with a clearance sales where everything had to go!I personally couldn't believe it when i saw a phone previously going for five thousand having gone down to five hundred.Within hours of the news spreading most of the safaricom retail centres were flooding with subscribers eager to get themselves the latest in smart phones and laptops.
This just shows how kenyans have queer habits.I mean we dont shop until there is an offer somewhere.Anyway the offer was to die for but unfortunately most customers were disappointed because they were too late.All we can hope is that safaricom brings this offer again especially during the easter holiday.I also see a hunger for smart phones which have a greater capability as compared to the ordinary phones.
So guys,always keep some floating money just in case safaricom decides to go crazy with a crazy offer.

do you have a call back ring tone?

Most people dont have call back ringtones even though the craze is here to stay.The are approaching the whole thing about discarding ring ring and going to customized call backs with a lot of caution.