Thus Spaketh Idd Salim

Beware - Jokers. All over.

In your life as a coder, as you grow in code and start churning out solution, getting traction and your products start getting a respectable user-base you will definitely attract interest.

Fellow coders will congratulate you, gurus like Jamo and Marto will advice you on how to optimize. These are your best friends.

On the other hand,  programmers (read: wannabes) and kiddies will try to replicate your concepts. Just like Man Urinals fans do, they will try to ride on your success so as to satisfy their own ego and ignore the reality. ‘Nilikuwa na yeye aki-debug na nikamsaidia’, they will say. These, my friend, are your pest friends.

In my time and space, I have met so many talkers, jokers, time-wasters that sometimes, we run the risk of meeting one serious person, and just take them to be jokers. They are so many.

The Kenyan tech community is small and known and it takes one just a simple Google search to list them all, plan a meeting and siphon ideas, time and hope.

I remember, once, we wasted a whole week doing demos, meetings to an investor from europe, only to be given a once-in-a-lifetime take-it-or-leave-it offer to sell 25% shares of Symbiotic for USD 10, 000. Ohh how stupid and needy we are perceived as being!

Then comes the worst breed of them all. Phony investors. They come from all over, far and wide. Promising heaven and telling you that your struggles are over. Ohhhh… the sweet words!

In the last 4 years, I have met all of their types. My experience has taught me, ultimately, to only trust the 4th type. The others will waste your time in endless demos and meetings (some costly and exhaustive), endless documentation, talk, talk, talk, talk, excuses, shortcuts, talk, and annoyingly.. MORE TALK.

Type 1 – Najuana Investors

These are the kinds of fellas who were in school with everyone. They play golf with the some and have a meeting next week with the rest of the movers and shakers of the Industry. They are always ANNOYING with their phone habits and would interrupt your demo or concept talk and talk for 30 mins on the phone as if you are not there, before hanging up and saying : “Ahhh, that was Raila. he can’t stay for a day without calling me”.

Any company you mention, they know, are related to, have been to school with or have lunch the following week with the MD/GM/CEO/Sweeper.

I won’t deny, there are people who are, thus, connected. But that is as far as the story goes.

Type 2 – Bait Investors

This is the dangerous kind.

These are the types who are ready to ‘put-in-something-small’ in your company to ‘show-their-belief-in-your-product’. A programmer barely knows the value of their software but a coder has an idea of the ‘value’. So, if you show the investor a projected ARPU of e.g. KSHS 13 per month for 350, 000 users. They will table a 20% shares for IMMEDIATE KSHS 10M infusion offer.

Then your broke head starts spinning. Then s/he offers, “Here is a 450k check, I will pay the rest in a month or 2. Meanwhile I need the company documents. We need to work on the directorship and change the company ownership.”.

Most coders would fall for this. Liko taught me this trick and how to get around it. “If someone is not putting in HARD cash and in the FULL AMOUNT agreed, then don’t waste your time. Don’t take promises or be fooled or soothed and cajoled with marupurupus. RUN for the hills!”, was part of his advise.

Type 3 – Next-Week Investors

These are the postponers in every commitment. That meeting they were to hook-up between you and MJ himself. That demo they have already spoken to Bitange about. The Kalonzo hook-up that they are just waiting for a confirmation on so that you can discuss election monitoring in Kanzalu using your J2ME app. Total time-wasters. Eventually, they will get you to a meeting that you COULD have gotten yourself into, sooner.

By then, the chance to sell is gone.

Type 4 – Yourself

This is the BEST kind of investor. Mostly broke/naive and vulnerable, but they are the think-tank. The conceptualizers. The implementors. The coder. The hacker. The backbone. This type will never let you down.

TBC…

Ehh! Enough blogging.

Back to code…

Wazi.