Thus Spaketh Idd Salim

NFC Powered

Well, NFC. NFC. Near Field Communication. That’s what it is. A technology that enables devices to talk to each other and exchange instructions. Yes. Instructions. And I use that word loosely because ‘instructions’ could mean anything.

Anything from sharing a file, contacts to doing more sophisticated operations. And THAT is what makes the technology powerful.

A few days ago, I talked about How Safaricom could leverage QR Codes to extend Mpesa to the Lazy. I received some emails from some people; some angry, some happy. But what can I say. I am just sharing thoughts.

I did it then, And I am going to do it again. As always, I will make this idiot-proof, such that even someone who vascodilates at the mention of a female COM port will understand.

The opportunities I see leverage  mCommerce, the human need to collaborate and also the need for privacy. Once again, like QR, NFC is not an end. It is a means.

1 – Social Applications

The best social application of NFC that I have seen so far is Pokens [Whats a Poken?]. I saw a Brian [ @PostersnTokens ]  at #pivot25 evangelizing and selling them and the concept was really amazing. If you buy one, each device your Poken touches becomes coupled and you exchange one-time information. The information in this context was Contacts. Touch your Poken on Mine and you get my contact information [name, email, mobile, twitter, linkein, MKZ etc] and I get yours. All transferred at the NFC Speed of 424 Kbps. Super Fast. As soon as you plug your USB-enabled Poken to the PC once you reach your home/office all the contacts are automatically added as friends on your Poken.com account.

Now, because Kenyans are Kenyans (#StalkMuch), Safaricom would need to add just a PIN verification layer and BAM!! They have a hit product. I don’t know whether it is Gemalto or Oberthur that supplies the Safcom SIM Cards, but their new Generation of SIM Cards are NFC-Capable. Yes. That’s right. A technology that EVEN Korea have not tried, is already here. Talk of impetus!

Now you no longer need to buy a High-end phone. Your Mulika Umulikacho phone can now support NFC.  You no longer need to type or key on someone’s number again. All you need is to let your phones touch. User defines what data can be shared and an optional PIN. Through technologies like 3G, GPRS, Binary SMS or BIP [Don't know why the Wiki Page was deleted but check here or here - better for definitions], Safaricom would then enable EACH and EVERY subscriber to be able to save their data in a cloud.

Gone are the days when someone would tell you ‘I am out of cards’ or ‘I dont have a pen’. Just let your phones touch and you are instant friends. Simple does it. Safaricom becomes the BIGGEST Telco social Network in EAC. With all my contacts saved in a cloud and all my social connections saved and secure, I would not mind paying KSHS 10 per month, to have the peace and comfort of knowing that my contacts are safe even if I were to lose my phone. So would 20M other Kenyans. Extra revenue.

Safaricom would effectively get into the space of social sites e.g. FourSquare, MKZ etc, even without trying. I enter a club and NFC [verb] my phone to the counter and PAP! I check in. All my friends already here get an alert. Depending on my private settings, of course. Safe, practical and fun.

With a Safaricom Social Network [Not SafariBook or SafWitter. Kwendeni!], avenues like adverts and easy customer service would open up.

2 – Mpesa Payment Integration

Now, this is MpesaQR on Steriods. As soon as the waiter brings the Bill, see the MpesaQR Article for thought trail, All I have to do is have my phone touch her terminal (no pun intended), and then enter a PIN. The payment becomes instant. God bless NFC.

Ofcourse, payment goes beyond coffee. Think Matatus, Think Hotels, Think School Fees.

3 – MPG

Yes. I have sung about this. I don’t want to say anything about the Safaricom Innovations board, but the question :  ’when will they start working?’ always lingers.

There are only 3 MultiPlayer Games [MPGs] that are widely played in Kenya. In Stadiums, Matatus etc. They are Hakuna 1.0, Haiko Version 2 and Sijamaliza 2.1. In short. There are NONE. There is no incentive to create.

With a functional Innovations Board, soon I hope, there will be an incentive to engage people on Data. NFC, like in the 2 examples above, would be used as an enabler. As a HandShake extendor. Then the other technologies take over.

What? You think you can challenge me in a game of Chess at the back of a Matatu? Loser pays the fare? Ok, NFC me the game request and let us play!! I win, you pay the fare! Or let me take you out. #vybeMadeEasy.

Where are those Panadols?

Back to code.

Wazi.

Tunacheza na Maneno

What?

What?

You thought all I could do was Code and Hack pekee?

A long, long time when I was young,  I used to read poems like ‘Ndoo’ by Mwinyi Hatibu Muhammed [Siitaki inatati, ndoo imwagayo maji] and Ndoto [Jana usiku niliota, ndoto nzuri kuliko zote, nilizungukwa na ukuta, na maji tele kotekote.] infront of hundreds of parents in Hekima Promary School in Isiolo.

Parent’s day.

Yes. I still remember it like it was yesterday, albeit it being 15+ years ago. Mzee ni wewe.

If I ever wanted to be a DJ, I would dream to be Armin Van Buuren. A real Master who can do hours and hours of real-time mixing. Achana na the Wannabes we have here. Una-scratch mpaka Scratch. If a rapper, talk of Snoop and Tupac. And that fat ugly guy who sang as if he was eating, yeah.. The Notorious Big G. Achana na hizi rap za Kenya za Masama mamama, ora wakora dara dame kwa rasa madness.

But I decided to be a Coder. And then I remembered what Griffin Told us in Starehe: “If you ever have to make a cup of coffee, make it the BEST cup of coffee ever made.” That created the perfectionist we aspire to be.

More about that Kesho. Leo ni poem/rap [RaPoem].

And here cometh your poemeth, my friendeth:

My fingers on the keyboard… Tap, tap, tap;

4 more hours of code and it is a wrap;

Line by line, code flows like a verse of rap;

I use Java, PHP, Python or Lua, not VB ama .Net, coz its crap;

Today I develop a mobile app;

For Nokia, I will make it load a news map;

For the Samsung, al make it take a snap;

Share your experience with the world, let them know whatsup;

An error is thrown, it must be a bug;

Line by line I go through the code, we debug;

I know how to do this stuff, I aint no fag;

I finally get the cuplrit, and step on it like a rug;

I never knew I was this good, ‘Kanye Shrug’;

The bug is gone, down and out, ni kama nime-i-mug;

Coder mkali kama nacet, na si ati tuna-brag;

Code runs like a charm, where’s my coffee mug;

After job lazima niende Qz, kucheza pool;

Muendo, GT, Chunkie and Muniu, kwa table we rule;

Any opponent anapata 7-baller, we take them back to school;

Ha! Ati nimeangukia, shut up you fool!;

Chapa boyie wa kampo 7 baller the 3rd game;

Kwa corner nacheki kwa stool ameketi wake dame;

She smiles at me juu mii na chali wake si the same;

In her mind ana-wonder kama anaweza ni-tame;

It would be unfair for me kuanza kum-blame;

She twists on the seat na naweza feel the flame;

To be continued…

Back to code

Wazi!

Mpesa + QR Codes = SPEED

Yeah. I know. I have been accused of thinking too far ahead by alot of people alot of times. But allow me to indulge you for 8.2 minutes.

Think with me here.

When I was living in Uganda between 2004-2008, I had a flat nose because of the frequency at which doors of Banks, telcos and corporates were banged in my face.

Java and SMS-Based remote bank servers administration? That is too new for us. What? Realtime NSSF contributions and savings calculation, status notification and advise via Premium SMS? Naah, Ugandans can’t send SMS. GPS and AGPS-based Mobile App to locate and monitor your kids, cars and animals via GPS with geofencing? No. Uganda was too cloudy. End-to-end Sim-Based phone and SMS encryption for the Military and Police and Politicians to prevent call/sms tapping? No! We have 16K Sim Cards. This is not Kenya!

[EDITOR NOTE] The original title of this post was ‘How Safaricom could leverage QR Codes, NFC and Augmented Reality for Mpesa’, but before I could finish the QR code bit, the post was too long. So I will split the post into 3 parts. QR, NFC, AugReal. All powered by Safaricom 3G and Mpesa.

This is part 1 of 3.

And so I came back home. 4 years wasted.

QR Codes

QR Code are just that. Quick Response codes. Invented by Toyota to monitor vehicle parts using High-Speed Scanners. Quick is the keyword here. They are NOT a basic need or mandatory. But they make a difference where one has 45 seconds to transact, and not the usual 10 Kenyan minutes. Unfortunately, most Kenyan transactions fail to take place because of this. Time.

Hence cometh the QR. The need addressed here is the need to provide speed, security, efficiency and convenience.

Safaricom the other day had to start a USSD service where people could dial and get the list of ALL the PayBill business numbers for e.g. KPLC, Nairobi Water etc. People were sending money to the wrong PayBill accounts. Paying electricity bills to the AppleBees paybill number. Etc.

Just like you, I don’t remember the USSD code right now. Either I am that lazy or I have 21674 other things to remember. Not USSD codes. And I am a techie. What do you think happened to the 39, 278, 228 non-techie Kenyans. Yes. They forgot 2 minutes after reading that SMS.

Such is man. Forgetful. And thus, the need for automation. There are 350, 000+ Android phones in Kenya right now. [See AfriNovator]. Nokia is in the millions, with a good S40 or s60 that has a camera that can auto-focus (a key requirement for QR codes) being the majority.

So, the mobile clients that can run an app are there AND the need to automate Mpesa via nifty apps is there. With over 9M phones with the ability to run this solution, the development of such an App would kill 40%+ of Safaricom Mpesa headaches and ALSO increase the transactions volume.

So, how would it work?

A picture speaks 1000 words. See below.

Simple, Fast, Secure, Convenient

In a coffee shop [Call it Kahawa Tamu Shop], the attendant will hand the client a receipt with amount and QR code. The client can pay by cash or MpesaQR. The Small and Fast MpesaQR Application will scan the QR code and get information from it e.g. Price, Merchant name, Mpesa PayBill Number.

After scanning, an operation that takes 3-5 seconds, the MpesaQR app will ask the client ‘Pay Kahawa Tamu Shop KSHS 1850 via Mpesa?’. Once the client presses ‘YES’, the app will display ‘Request Successful. Await Mpesa Confirmation SMS’.

Internally, Our team would have liaised with Safaricom to create a secure, super-fast and robust session-based arbiter to do the actual Mpesa Processing [Debiting and Crediting].

The client and the merchant then get SMSes. It will be as if the client actually went to mpesa menu, selected paybill, entered the correct paybill  number, entered the correct amount, entered the correct PIN and confirmed. Only faster. 3 steps instead of 8.

The operation Mimics the actual navigation through the Mpesa Menus but eliminates the common errors e.g.:

• Wrong Amount.
• Wrong Paybill Number.

The MpesaQR App scans the code and get the information. The rest is a breeze.

Good. Now let us get out of the coffee shop and extend the MpesaQR system. Thinking out of the box.

This model is extensible to ANY bill payment vertical. Water and Electricity Bills would now come with a QR code at the top-right corner. Target audience for this type of a solution is practically anyone, from anywhere, charging any amount.

Another Kenyans4kenya requiring 50 bob donations? Just scan the QR on the TV Screen or Newspapers. PAID!

School/Church needs new chairs and is asking for donations? Just scan the QR on the TV Screen or Newspapers. PAID!

Online shopper wanting to Check out from a Shop Powered by Mpesa? Just scan the QR on the Website. PAID!

Advert about a kid needing operation? We rarely donate here because we WON’T go to queue at KCB to pay to that account. But with the QR on the screen? Just scan the QR on the TV screen and Press ‘YES’. PAID!

Back to code.

Wazi.

4 BabySteps

Banx suggested that I stick to being a tech blogger and a gadgets reviewer for the next 3 months until watu watulie. Moving on swiftly.

Well, @smutinda and @mbuguanjihia represented Kenya in the just-concluded DEMO launchpad event – www.demo.com. I was privileged to get an exclusive on what happened and who won what and why. It was a success story. Letting everyone out there know that there are real coders and thinkers in Africa, contrary to common belief.

This was an awakening.

Shimba ranked highly in their category and was behind a solution from Stanford with their MedAfrica product. The Stanford team, with funding from Eric Schmidt and the best tools (more about this later), had made a gadget that you attach to your back and it gives you a slight electric vibrations when you sit in a bad posture. It helps you sit better and protect your backbone. [Read More here]

MedAfrica was something different altogether. Given the sad fact that there are ONLY 7, 000 doctors tasked with serving 40, 000, 000 Kenyans, MedAfrica uses the fact that there already 10M mobile users in Kenya to create eDoctors. MedAfrica would cut the Doctor:Patient ratio from1:5714 to 1:4.  Here is the presentation.

The 4 lessons.

Lesson 1: Relevance Matters

Ofcourse, In being from a First-world country, this was a difficult sale. With all the online services like my MyPhysician and the rest, it was difficult to explain how so man people could not have access to basic human right like medicare. So, MedAfrica tanked in this initial round. Luckily, not winning the DEMO accolades did not amount to total failure.

Lesson 2: Funding Matters

I can’t talk enough about this. Linet always frowns at me when I talk about this. We always seem to have a “Develop your solution, generate interest and the funding will come” VS “Give me the funding and I will give you the BEST solution” debate. I never seem to be able to explain the later, a mantra I subscribe to.

Seed capital is all developers ask for. Not Millions and Millions. Google would never have been afloat without the US$100,000 funding from Andy Bechtolsheim [Read More Here]. Facebook would not have kicked off without the first investment of US$500,000 in June 2004 from PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel [Read More Here]. I could go on the WHOLE day.

But then again, we are in Africa and funding/seed capital is a pipe-dream.

So cometh the challenge to the Universities and the Government.

Lesson 3: Government Matters

In the US, all Universities offering Computer Science have funding available for the MOST promising students. Government subsidizes and offers security for loans to IT initiatives from Government Banks. Need KSHS 5M to do a project, no problem. Your University and the Government just needs 20% shares of your company, and you will get the loan tomorrow. Try that in Kenya.

Our old-money-old-ideas mental setup, colonial-thinking and defensive business models make this impossible.

So, the innovators and thinkers are still REQUIRED and EXPECTED to fend for themselves. Think about your product, then think about the money to make the product a revenue-generating solution. Once you start making money, KRA and KAC will be sent over to see ‘how’ you make all this money. Then the ‘investors’ will come. When you don’t need them.

People who invested millions in FB and Google, ventures that had NO revenue potential or defined streams, right now are smiling all the way to the Keyboard to refresh their profits screens. There are no risk-takers here. Yet.

Lesson 4: Name Matters

Think of the power in a Name. UoN is know for Riots. Harvard is known for Excellence. Most people would still rather partner/invest in a C student from Harvard, than an A student from UoN. [If the GradeNazis would allow my use of Kenyan Grades for Harvard]. Until maturity comes to our students to elevate our name in such a manner that the very mention of UoN, Strath, JKUAT or CUEA would put a smile on investors and partners, the prejudice will remain.

Also, what we learn or are perceived to learn matters. It makes me sad that we are still teaching PHP, CSS and Javascript in Campus, 4th year. I will not belabour this point.

Kids need to leverage the Fibre and use the 4MB Ngwati links to learn things that blow the socks off investors. Talk QR Codes, NFC, e/m Payments, Cloud, Anything. Si Css.

Back to code

Wazi.