Scaling tips from seasoned tech entrepreneur

Stakeholders during the Women in Tech Cohort 5 launch at the Strathmore Business School on March 9, 2022. PHOTO | DIANA NGILA | NMG

By LYNET IGADWAH More by this Author

The difference between start-ups that expand and those that eventually fizzle out is the mindset of the founders.

Cellulant co-founder Ken Njoroge says that when an entrepreneur makes a deliberate choice to scale up and work towards achieving that goal, growth can be realised.

Prevailing financial constraints and unconducive physical surrounding, he adds, should not be used as an excuse to remain small.

“When you make that choice to scale, you have conviction and you talk big about that business,” Mr Njoroge tells female entrepreneurs during a recent Women in Tech Town Hall session.

The sessions organised by Standard Chartered Bank (StanChart) in partnership with @iBizAfrica- Strathmore University target women-led start-ups that are looking to scale up their business using technology.

Mr Njoroge, a seasoned entrepreneur, shared his journey of nurturing Cellulant –a global payments company that has a presence in 18 countries across Africa and 35 markets.

When he started the firm in 2003 with only three employees, those around him thought it was ridiculous to state that “we want to build a billion-dollar business”.

At the time, the company was struggling to raise capital, was grappling with attracting angel investors and was operating from a ‘dirty warehouse’. This reality did little to dampen his spirit.

“It wasn’t about my reality but rather about the choice I made and the vision we had as a company,” he says.

StanChart was the first bank that Cellulant signed up as a customer while still operating from the ‘dirty warehouse’ and soon other banks wanted to become customers. Today the business has about 275 bank customers.

Currently, Cellulant is a $40 million business whose offerings include mobile payment solutions and the One-Stop Payments platform where banks link customers to their accounts via a mobile-based system enabling them to perform various tasks.

Aside from Cellulant, Mr Njoroge is the brains behind 3 Mice Interactive Media (3 Mice.com) which he began in 1998. The company specialises in web design& development, online advertising, search engine optimisation (SEO) and search engine marketing

He divulges successful businesses must be ready to expand through sale of equity since family sources reach a saturation point and can no longer fund a company’s expansion.

“Do not let your circumstances beat you and condemn you to a small place forever. The truth is that small business end up being irrelevant and cause a lot of pain for families,” he said.

Aside from being decisive about scaling and conviction to make it big, the other vital ingredient for growth is hiring the right people to actualise the company vision.

“The people you bring to join your business from the beginning need to buy into your mission. A company’s success rate can be gauged by looking at the initial 3 employees hired when the business was at the idea stage,” he says.

The Women in Tech Town hall sessions is a three-part series meant to bring together Alumni of the Women in tech programme to gain insights, network and learn from industry experts on how to further grow their businesses.

The programme also supports start-ups with business management training, and mentoring, as well as helps them access investors. This year’s cohort five top 10 teams were selected from a pool of over 350 start-ups that had applied for the programme.

They include contemporary footwear and accessories brand Pure Purple, e-commerce fashion store SIAGO, skincare label Keyara Botanics, digital marketing agency DigiPath Africa and online household retailer GoBEBA Everything.

Others are farm management communication system SowPrecise, breastfeeding moms milk supplier ON MY MIND, wearable medical device provider Aurora Health Systems, timeless bags maker Sello Designs, and learners with disability platform provider Learning Differently.

The entrepreneurs have gone through 12 weeks of mentorship @iBizAfrica-Strathmore University where they were offered expert training in the areas of business idea conceptualization, strategy formulation and marketing which is key in moving businesses from incubation to sustainable ventures.

The Women in tech program has since its inception attracted over 1,800 applicants, trained over 40 entrepreneurs and funded 20 women-led startups through a partnership with the Standard Chartered Bank.

ligadwah@ke.nationmedia.com