BD’s ten most popular business stories of 2014

Opinion and Analysis

Forbes' Africa Richest survey last year placed the wealth of Bidco CEO Vimal Shah (in foreground), his younger brother and father at $1.6 billion (Sh138 billion). This year, his father is on the list at only $700 million (Sh63 billion). PHOTO | FILE 

By BDAfrica.com TEAM

In Summary

• Page views tell us what interested the collective ‘you’ most, if not what mattered most.
• Is there a news story you believe should have drawn as many readers as these did?
• Better yet, are there any important stories you feel were underreported this year?

Which were the ten stories on BDAfrica.com that attracted the most attention from readers in 2014? And why did you like them so much, we sought to know.

You may have noticed most of them lingering in the Most Popular list to the right of your article pages. We did too, so there are few surprises here.

We are, however, intrigued as to why these ten made the list while a few others that seemed to burn hot when we first posted them did not.

Wealth and earnings seem to be popular themes as were innovation and, for some reason, information on significant changes to Safaricom products. As to why these ten in particular drew the most clicks… read on to find out:

10: Top 40 Women Under 40 2014:Business Daily’s annual list of young women to watch, released in mid-June this year, was the tenth most read item on the website. The year’s list of Top 40 Men Under 40 also drew strong interest but, having been released in December, did not make it to the most read list.

9: Relief as DStv’s monopoly of football ends: This story about pay TV access to premium content (mainly English Premier League football rights) kept drawing in readers for a while. Regulators stirred things up with talk of new content sharing rules, picking up a battle they had abandoned in 2013. Will they succeed this time? Stay tuned to see how that goes.

8: Low cost Kenya-made car goes on sale at Sh950,000: Africa’s cheapest car. Made in Kenya. By a young British entrepreneur funded by an American billionaire whose pockets are full of inherited cosmetics money. Everything about the Mobius II made its story a sure winner. They’ve hired former Safaricom CEO Michael Joseph as a marketing advisor, taken on the Chandaria Group as investment partners and gotten President Uhuru Kenyatta to place an order. We’ll keep an eye on this one.

7: KANTAI: Why Kenya’s real estate scene is a bubble waiting to burst: Columnist Wallace Kantai stoked the hornet’s nest with this candid piece, sparking debate both in the comments section as well as among other BD columnists. See MUSYOKA: Kenya’s property market rewards cash buyers at expense of mortgage takers and BELLOWS: Kenyans must look beyond property. You found it intriguing enough to put it in the Top Ten.

6: Kenyan billionaires who escape wealth trackers’ spotlight: Because there’s always something wrong with rankings of Kenya’s wealthiest people. We wrote this in February, after London-based New World Wealth put out a disputed list of Kenya’s 25 richest people. Naturally, you were more interested in those missing. The story got renewed interest in November when Forbes Africa dropped Vimal Shah as Kenya’s richest man and decided the family was worth half its previous estimate. Wealth, hidden or not, makes good reading.

5: Kibaki sells Nairobi’s Union Towers to MKU for Sh800m: We can think of a few other deals sealed in 2014 that might have been of greater consequence or public interest, but this is the one that got the clicks. (Readers showed a good deal of interest in investments by private universities). The sale by the former President was three years in the works before it was sealed in September.

4 and 3: Safaricom to offer free selection on Bonga point buys and Safaricom terminates post-paid calling tariffs: The third and fourth-most read stories on the site were these articles about two minor headaches at Safaricom (the Sh3.5bn-and-growing problem of unclaimed Bonga Points and the popular but loss-making Karibu post-paid tariffs). Safaricom’s decisions on both matters affected enough of our readers to push the stories to the top of the pile.

2: What Kenya’s top companies pay their CEOs: This analysis of compensation paid to chief executives at publicly listed firms was an instant hit with readers when it was published in August. But, as with information on wealth, that on Kenyan CEO pay is closely held making such lists hard to compile. Let’s hope for more disclosure and details in annual reports.

WHAT TO READ NEXT: BD’s ten most-read personality profiles of 2014.

1: The Most Read Story of the Year was this lead piece in a three-part world exclusive in November revealing the details of ‘ChickenGate’, a scandal involving bribes paid by agents of a British security printing firm to Kenyan public officials: UK court exposes bribery at Kenya’s poll agency. We’re just as proud to have broken this story as we are to bring you dozens of other important matters that did not attract enough readers to make this list.

Before you go: Page view totals tell us what interested the collective ‘you’ most, but not necessarily what mattered most. Is there a story you believe should have drawn as many readers as these did? Better yet, are there any important stories you feel were underreported? Do let us know so we can do a better job. Best wishes in the New Year.