KIGALI, RWANDA – Her eyes shine brightly from behind her black, thick-framed glasses. A white blouse and gray trousers flatter her petite frame as she sits with her shoulders squared, her legs crossed at her knees. Her voice is youthful yet authoritative.
Clarisse Iribagiza, 24, is the 2012 winner of Project Inspire Africa, a Ugandan-produced reality TV show. The series showcased 24 young entrepreneurs from across four East African countries in an elimination-style competition, with the winner taking home $50,000 to use as start-up funding for his or her business idea.
Iribagiza is the CEO and co-founder of HeHe – which means “where” in Kinyarwanda, the official language of Rwanda – a mobile applications company based in Kigali, the country’s capital. She started the company when she was still a third-year student at the Kigali Institute of Science and Technology.
Iribagiza says that mobile-based solutions will solve the current information gap in Rwandan society, so her company, HeHe, launched a short message service solution during August 2012 in partnership with one of Rwanda’s telecommunication companies. The application will serve as a catalogue similar to a directory of names and locations of companies, government offices, services and events across Rwanda.
“If I want to find out where I can get my medical insurance [from the government], someone can text in and get information on things like that,” she says.
Iribagiza says that people in both urban and rural Rwanda will benefit from the service.
Iribagiza is also a mentor at the Knowledge Collaboration Centre, better known as kLab, a new space for technology entrepreneurs, or "techpreneurs," to interact and receive training to develop technology-based solutions. Here, she can help other aspiring techpreneurs to also turn their ideas into reality to best serve their country’s needs.
KLab is one of many new initiatives in the Rwandan government's strategy and partnership with private sector funders to promote information and communication technologies. Aspiring ICT entrepreneurs accepted as members of this new lab receive space, trainings and software to develop ideas to benefit their fellow citizens. Initiatives like kLab aim to overcome challenges in the field, such as a lack of entrepreneurial opportunities at universities and ICT in the local language. Its directors have set goals to expand in the coming year, with mentors like Iribagiza calling for more women.
In 2011, the government began to collaborate with the private sector and development partners to form an ICT strategy. The Rwanda government, led by the Information, Communication and Technology Chamber of the Private Sector Federation, the private sector’s counterpart to the Chamber of Commerce, made education in this field one of Rwanda’s top priorities, investing in it as a tool to help steer the country to a middle-income nation by 2020.
“The government started fading out to let civil society and the private sector take the lead,” says Atsushi Yamanaka, the national ICT strategy and policy implementation adviser at Rwanda Development Board, the government agency that directs investment in Rwanda across all sectors and a partner in the development of kLab.
The National University of Rwanda, the first and oldest public university in Rwanda, had 90 graduates in social sciences and management and 53 sciences and technology graduates in the 1980s, according to a 2004 World Bank report. The number of graduates rose to 325 and 124 in the 2001 to 2002 academic year at the same university.
This growth in graduates is no accident.
Alex Ntale, the director of the Information, Communication and Technology Chamber, is passionate about providing nationwide sensitization on the role ICT has in transforming the lives of all Rwandans.
“People in Rwanda need to benefit from the opportunities of ICT,” he says. “And the best way to do that is to educate them on the opportunities available in all sectors, from agriculture to education. The [software] developers need to interact more with the community to provide those development solutions with their applications."
The chamber took a tour around the country in early 2012 to educate citizens on the benefits of ICT. The tour included a discussion with multiple panels that invited citizen participation via toll-free phone-ins and text messages in real time.
Overall, there was a 7.1-percent increase in active mobile subscribers from 41.6 percent of Rwandans in March 2012 to 48.7 percent in June 2012, which totaled almost half the Rwandan population of 11 million, according to the Rwanda Utilities Regulatory Authority, a government-run regulatory board that vets and monitors the delivery of telecommunication services.
With the rising number of mobile subscribers in Rwanda, as is the case across Africa, mobile-based solutions is a growing opportunity for those in the ICT business. And the government and private sector are looking to connect young people with these opportunities for the benefit of the Rwandan public.
The Information, Communication and Technology Chamber along with various Rwandan development partners opened kLab in May 2012.
“KLab is an innovation space,” says Claude Migisha, the general manager.
KLab invites aspiring techpreneurs to apply online for membership to use the space. The applicants must go through an interview process that includes pitching their ideas to the kLab board. Successful candidates receive three months to access the space and free online classes, such as Udacity, an online curriculum.
“It is a place where individuals practicing or interested in learning and providing ICT-based solutions converge to share information,” Migisha says.
Migisha ensures that all members of the innovation space have mentors and the necessary assistance that they need to build their capacity in creating mobile- and web-based applications to resolve social issues in Rwanda.
Richard Muvunyi, 28, has been a kLab member for two weeks. A trained telecommunications and electronics engineer, he wants to create a solution to help Rwandans track lost identification cards at police stations across the country.
By the time the kLab board evaluates his performance in three months, he hopes he will have learned the tools he’ll need to begin programming his solution.
“It is easy to come here and ask someone to make that software on my behalf,” he says. “But I want to develop it myself.”
Formal computer science training is not a prerequisite for joining kLab.
Mark Musasizi, 22, is a recent graduate of Kigali Institute of Science and Technology with a degree in finance and banking. But three years ago, another field stole his interest.
“If ICT is the big thing going on right now, I think I can provide solutions to African problems,” Musasizi says enthusiastically. “Why don’t I go into that?”
So Musasizi jumped at every opportunity there was to understand ICT.
“I read about ICT,” he says. “I attended any ICT workshop.”
Musasizi initially considered moving to Nairobi, Kenya, to one of its technology innovation and incubator spaces. But during one of the many workshops he attended in November 2011, he learned that Kigali would soon have one of its own innovation spaces: kLab. He is now a member of the lab.
So far, close to 30 young and upcoming Rwandans interested in ICT are members with access to the space six days a week and to online lessons on programming.
Eugene Rwagasore, 27, is a software engineer with Nyaruka, a software development company based in Kigali and one of many organizations that collaborated to create kLab. Rwagasore was involved in the creation of the lab and designed kLab’s logo.
He says kLab fills a void in university curricula.
“KLab’s idea was from seeing the frustration in the lack of knowledge, that universities are not giving as much as they should,” he says.
Another obstacle kLab aims to overcome is the number of projects university graduates produce that never leave the classroom. Ntale recalls his and others’ projects in university succumbing to the same fate.
“A friend of mine, back in 2004, designed an algorithm as good as Google Maps,” says Ntale, which he adds was before the creation of Google Maps.
His colleague used this to help people find the shortest route to where they were going on campus. But his idea never reached the wider public because he lacked the support to develop his idea.
The chamber wants to remedy this situation through kLab.
“We want to collect all the projects and categorize them,” Ntale says. “And give the programmers the opportunity to pitch to the specific industries.”
Yamanaka says that universities are currently making a greater effort to build their technological capacity. The Japanese International Cooperation Agency, an independent administrative institution of the Japanese government responsible for promoting development and reducing poverty, worked with Tumba College of Technology in northern Rwanda to build capacity in training in computer science and electrical engineering programs, he says.
“This was through training lecturers in university on the importance of mathematics, logical thinking and science,” says Yamanaka, who was involved in the program.
Four years ago, the Rwandan government approached the Japanese International Cooperation Agency to request that an adviser on ICT capacity development be sent to Kigali after noting the agency’s university trainings. It is now a partner in the kLab project and sponsors Yamanaka's role in it.
“I was in there at the right place and right time,” Yamanaka says with a smile.
Other universities are also involved in kLab, such as Carnegie Mellon University in the United States.
Yamanaka says that this is the right time for Rwanda’s growth in technology-related investment.
But with immense growth come with other challenges too – challenges that kLab is ready to take on.
“Everything in ICT is in English,” says Ntale, also the president of The iHills Network, an association of young Rwandan technology start-ups that was instrumental in kLab’s development.
Musasizi says that providing solutions in native Kinyarwanda will solve a huge gap in information.
Yamanaka says that that the programmers and software developers also need to consult the target users of their developments.
“Only when you do that is when you can come up with a solution that makes sense for the user,” he says.
KLab is looking to increase the number of women in this field too.
“About eight to 10 are women,” Migisha says of the space’s current members.
Iribagiza says she is particularly passionate about this and is part of a team of young women encouraging girls to get involved. The group has visited schools and hosted talks with the girls on the benefits of the ICT field.
“I guess we have to do something about it,” Iribagiza says.
But she also urges more people, organizations and the government to promote ICT among women. She says that the education system should make it more appealing to girls to study.
“If she doesn’t see how this is going to change the world tomorrow, then what’s the point?” she asks.
KLab is looking to expand in order to drive this change.
“We want to have at least 200 members in a year,” Migisha says of the coming year.
Another goal is to produce at least 10 technological innovations each year in Rwanda.
“We want also to export products made here in Rwanda, not only agriculture products, but also technology,” Migisha says. “That is the long-term vision of the country.”
