#Android App Development Companies in Tanzania

[safracatz]

The Use of Artificial Intelligence in Android Development

Innovative technology has affected all aspects of people's lives over the years, and mobile apps development companies are no exception. Developers come up with innovative concepts when combining engineering into applications. In this sense, artificial intelligence is one of the most commonly used innovations. In terms of AI, the Android platform was particularly progressive. By announcing the Android Platform, developers can build the most unusual experiences with AI, ML, AR. Also, Google has developed tools for Google AI that confirm its aim of developing AI as the prime technology condition for Android applications.

This probably occurred when every Android app developer will experience rising demand for AI-powered applications. Businesses of all sizes are made to spend further investment on this innovation to present their consumers with unique experiences. For Android apps, when using AI, it is possible to integrate different forms into it. Let's see the many AI technologies used to revolutionize Android apps for businesses.

Chatbots

Chatbots is one of Android's most innovative AI ideas. Such intelligent digital aids can experience and communicate intelligently with the human language. You can even collect data and support customers seamlessly 24 hours a day. Yes, they should suit human-supported experiences in such a way that organizations can even find them a replacement for future people. Chatbot development or integration is growing energy and most companies tend to hire Android application developers to take up this trend. The most generally used chatbots are banking, education, and e-commerce.

Speech recognition

Special recognition of Android apps is another AI feature that is rapidly growing commonplace. This software, as its name implies, decodes the speech of people into a language that a machine simply understands. Because voice is the keystone of mobile searches, businesses must introduce this in their apps. Speech recognition can support different activities, such as product/service search, voice business, instruction for smart devices like home automation and self-driving cars, account registration, form fill out the information, and more. Speech recognition can support.

Know More -

AI and IoT are transforming mobile app development

Face detection

As safety is key attention for app users, companies rely on face detection as a security measure. Face detection related to the AI-facing method which identifies the face of the user as a digital image. Active face identification is used essentially for the identification of people and things and the tracking of movement. Android uses this software concurrently with the camera to recognize faces in different images. For the detection of the user faces in its photos, Facebook uses the face recognition feature in its algorithm.

Personalization

The secret to success is a personal experience, which enables companies to achieve customer loyalty. Based on user choice and expectations, aI collects user data and gives true predictive analytics, which allows the systems to implement the application users with advice on their own. It can improve customer experience and improve the user recognition rate. It is also a smart move if you need to step outside of rivals and connect it with your project.

Text recognition

Text recognition is another AI feature that performs it big in the Android app. In general, it consists of two processes: text identification and recognition of the recognized text in media files such as images and video formats. To recognize the message, AI does the job of dividing it into various segments. Developers can either exploit or present an additional feature in the mobile app for developing a standalone application. For word-based Android game apps, text recognition is essentially used to support tasks relating to word selection.

Landmark detection

The mark detection function uses AI technology to detect landmarks in an image, as its name implies. With this feature, all the landmarks in the picture, be it a presentation or a business logo, can be scanned. The identification of landmarks is typically a basic component of complex research procedures. For example, Facial Landmark Detection works as an enhanced security mechanism for secure payments and transactions through an Android app.

Know More -

Impact of AI and its Implementation in Mobile App Development

 Image labeling

Photo labeling is another big AI feature that Android app developers support. Used by AI, marking is utilized to the objects stored in the device. Based on these labels joined by the image labeling feature, the users can easily find the images later. This functionality is great because it increases the interactivity of your software and improves the user experience.

Smart reply

GMAIL users Artificial Intelligences and Machine Language technology to construct meaningful answers based on the content of the mail. This allows the app to present users with a rich and personalized experience. It also speeds up communication because they do not need to be key to the responses anymore, but have access to the relevant ones within the app.

Conclusion

Presently, you're all informed of the different features of AI that your Android app can allow, it's time you use them. These features allow your app to experience the most amazing and perform it stand out in a competitive environment. You offer opportunities you can't afford to miss. Thus, a provider that is an authority on the Android platform and has a stronghold on AI technology is the best way to benefit from mobile app development. You may get in touch with us at mobile Apps Development Company in Nigeria for a free quote to develop a mobile app for your business. And helps Business owners to reach more customers who want to change their business towards app development, Blockchain, and Machine Learning Development software. The Company has a very good working environment. To know more about my company, Visit Fusion Informatics. For more queries please send an mail to get a free quote sales@fusioninformatics.com.

For More details visit: 

Apps Development Companies in Zambia

Best Mobile App Development Companies in Tanzania

Mobile Apps Development Company in Kenya

Apps Development Company in Uganda

Mobile App Development Companies in South Africa

[glitex]

Why develop a mobile application?

How is it that mobile applications can offer totally different functionality than web interfaces? There are multiple useful features that are exclusively available on mobile applications. The following are two major reasons why you need to develop mobile application for your business

Push notifications

There are two forms of smartphone app alerts: push notifications and in-app alerts. They are both attention-grabbing options that connect in a relatively non-invasive way for smartphone users. In-app alerts are alerts that can only be accessed by users when they open an app.

On the other hand, push notifications are displayed to users regardless of the operation they are currently performing on their mobile device. This is a powerful way to grab the user’s attention; in fact, there have been some cases where push notifications delivered click-through rates of 40 percent or higher.

It goes without saying that the notification campaigns have to be thoughtfully prepared. Users will resent being constantly pinged by notifications that don’t deliver urgent or relevant information.

Push notification makes it possible to grab the attention of your customers for instance notifying them about the offers and discounts on a weekend

Ease of personalization

Mobile apps give you the liberty to personalize the user experience on the basis of their preferences, location, usage patterns, and more. With mobile applications, it’s easy to present consumers with a highly personalized interface. In addition, a mobile app can also allow users to customize the app’s appearance as per their preferences.

How to choose the right developers for your mobile application

Statistics from the Google Play Store show that over 60% of the apps on the store have never been downloaded; over 35% of them are downloaded but are inactive. This means mobile app development needs not only the skills of a mobile developer but also a multitude of disciplines to realize a successful app. To achieve a successful mobile application, you need to work with a reliable mobile application development company.

Article By Glitex Solutions Limited

Which company is best for mobile application development in Kenya and East Africa?

Glitex Solutions Limited is Kenya’s Top & Best Mobile App Development Company in Nairobi, Kenya. Our team of expert is skilled in Android & iOS mobile apps development. We develop mobile applications at affordable prices. Whether you are in Nairobi Kenya, Ethiopia, Somalia, Rwanda & Tanzania Glitex Solutions Limited will serve you. We are a comprehensive mobile app development company that helps you to develop and maintain Mobile Applications for both Android and iOS. We develop user-friendly and secure mobile apps for any type of businesses model.

[sknews7]

Mobile health: The future of global healthcare – The European Sting – Critical News & Insights on European Politics, Economy, Foreign Affairs, Business & Technology

Credit score: Unsplash

This text was solely written for The European Sting by Mr. Goodluck Issa Nchasi is a 2nd yr medical pupil at Catholic College Of Well being And Allied Sciences, School of Drugs, positioned in Mwanza, Tanzania. He’s affiliated to the Worldwide Federation of Medical College students Associations (IFMSA), cordial companion of The Sting. The opinions expressed on this piece belong strictly to the author and don’t essentially mirror IFMSA’s view on the subject, nor The European Sting’s one.

A well-known quote by Mahatma Gandhi says “It’s well being that’s actual wealth and never items of gold and silver.” There was an amazing evolution within the well being care system for the reason that 19th century (1). The unprecedented development of cell applied sciences, in addition to developments of their modern software to handle well being priorities, has developed into a brand new subject generally known as Cellular well being (mHealth). Cellular well being is a quickly increasing subject within the digital well being sector offering healthcare assist, supply and intervention by way of cell applied sciences comparable to smartphones, tablets and wearables(2). In keeping with the Worldwide Telecommunication Union, there are actually shut to five billion cell phone subscriptions on this planet(3).

Rise of Cellular Well being Functions

For the reason that launch of the Google Play and iTunes platforms in 2008, the variety of apps for cell phones has repeatedly grown. It has been estimated that there are about 325,000 apps(4) labeled within the classes of well being and drugs. Of those, 65% are devoted to well-being (train, wholesome way of life, management of stress, weight-reduction plan, and vitamin). These devoted to particular illnesses represent 9% of the whole, adopted by these associated to being pregnant (7%) and apps centered on therapy adherence or alarms to take treatment (6%).

Healthcare amenities are leveraging cell know-how in new methods to drive down prices and assist maintain their companies inexpensive for as many individuals as doable. Cellular know-how is altering the healthcare trade by means of the next methods,

Cellular pc cart geared up with a digicam permits physicians to conduct appointments with their sufferers by video convention. This mode of therapy has proven quite a lot of promise in lowering transport and therapy prices for sufferers who shouldn’t spend hours within the ready room.

Cellular know-how helps to scale back the size of the typical hospital keep, a welcome change for a healthcare setting the place payments for in a single day hospital stays are prohibitively costly for a lot of(5).

Cellular well being in center and low-income international locations

Governments are expressing extra curiosity in mHealth as a complementary technique for strengthening well being techniques and reaching the health-related Millennium Improvement Objectives (MDGs) in low and middle-income international locations. mHealth is being utilized in maternal and little one well being, and programmes lowering the burden of the illnesses linked with poverty, together with HIV/AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis. mHealth purposes are centered on enhancing well timed entry to emergency and normal well being companies and data, managing affected person care, lowering drug shortages at well being clinics, enhancing medical prognosis and therapy adherence(3).

References

1.         Hillman Okay. The Evolution of the Well being Care System.

2.         Milward J. What Is… Cellular Well being? SOCIETY FOR THE STUDY OF ADDICTION. 2019.

3.         Group WH. mHealth: New horizons for well being by means of cell applied sciences: second world survey on eHealth. 2011.

4.         M P. Cellular Well being Apps Obtainable in 2017 – Android Now the Main mHealth Platform Web 2017.

5.         Lurie A. How Cellular Know-how Is Altering The Healthcare Trade. Well being IT OUTCOMES. 2018.

Concerning the writer

Goodluck Issa Nchasi is a 2nd yr medical pupil at Catholic College Of Well being And Allied Sciences, School of Drugs, positioned in Mwanza, Tanzania. He’s additionally a member of the Tanzania Medical College students Affiliation (TAMSA), because the nationwide officer of SCORE – Standing Committee on Analysis Alternate

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[un-enfant-immature]

Google’s lightweight search app, Google Go, launches to Android users worldwide

Google Go, a lightweight version of Google’s search app, is today becoming available to all Android users worldwide. First launched in 2017 after months of beta testing, the app had been designed primarily for use in emerging markets where people are often accessing the internet for the first time on unstable connections by way of low-end Android devices.

Like many of the “Lite” versions of apps built for emerging markets, Google Go takes up less space on phones — now at just over 7MB — and it includes offline features to aid those with slow and intermittent internet connections. The app’s search results are optimized to save up to 40% data, Google also claims.

Beyond web search, Google Go includes other discovery features, as well — like the ability to tap through trending topics, voice search, image and GIF search, an easy way to switch between languages, and the ability to have web pages read aloud, powered by A.I.

At Google’s I/O developer conference this spring, the company announced it was also bringing Lens to Google Go.

Lens allows users to point their smartphone camera at real-world objects in order to bring up relevant information. In Google Go, the Lens feature will help users who struggle to read. When the camera is pointed at text — like a bus schedule, sign or bank form, for example — Lens can read the text out loud, highlighting the words as they’re spoken. Users can also tap on a particular word to learn its definition or have the text translated.

While Lens was only a 100KB addition, according to Google, the updates to the Go app since launch have increased its size. Initially, it was a 5MB app and now it’s a little more than 7MB.

Previously, Google Go was only available in a few countries on Android Go edition devices. According to data from Sensor Tower, it has been installed approximately 17.5 million times globally, with the largest percentage of users in India (48%). Its next largest markets are Indonesia (16%), Brazil (14%), Nigeria (6%), and South Africa (4%), Sensor Tower says.

In total, it has been available to 29 countries on Android Go edition devices, including also: Angola, Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Cote d’Ivoire, Gabon, Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Mali, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Philippines, Rwanda, Senegal, Tanzania, Togo, Uganda, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.

Google says the app now has “millions” of users.

Today, Google says it will be available to all users worldwide on the Play Store.

Google says it decided to launch the app globally, including in markets where bandwidth is not a concern, because it understands that everyone at times can struggle with problems like limited phone storage or spotty connections.

Plus, it’s a lightweight app for reading and translating text. At Google I/O, the company had noted there are over 800 million adults worldwide who struggle to read — and, of course, not all are located in emerging markets.

Google Go is one of many lightweight apps Google has built for emerging markets, along with YouTube Go, Files Go, Gmail Go, Google Maps Go, Gallery Go, and Google Assistant Go, for example.

The Google Go app will be available on the Play Store to global users running Android Lollipop or higher.

[safracatz]

How Artificial Intelligence Will Shape the Mobile App Development

The connectivity and the app's environment have extraordinary changes significantly in our daily lives. I accepted this changed our way of doing our jobs, online shopping, entertainment, etc., the development of artificial intelligence has a major impact on our communications with our devices and mobile applications. AI now has many faces, including mobile app solutions, with various impacts. AI is currently working at different levels, starting with deep learning, advanced machine learning, and natural language processing. This helps to generate new applications as well as existing ones. It leads to user interaction with such applications.

As far as we are informed, AI self-learning apps are now targeting different areas. Many mobile apps currently have a complex structure and many data. They enable them to engage the audience quickly through interactive and natural learning by the users. AI has now started to take shape in its far-reaching effect on mobile apps development companies. We already know how they can support applications to implement custom attributes.

Let’s have a detailed look at different aspects which explain how AI is changing the mobile app development process.

AI to impact our User Engagement

In the case of making user commitment and business growth, AI has been successful for various applications. A passive algorithm does not work to involve users based on users ' behavior. AI helps users to engage in their various user behavior and response patterns.AI-based applications accumulate a lot of user information and evaluate both user data and user behavior. User statistics such as user location, contacts, purchase trends, etc. will essentially provide users with a great deal of useful insight. It teaches us about AI's everyday actions so that applications can better accept the user. The introduction of AI in customer products is also fast.

Smart Home Gadgets and Applications of AI

The Internet of Things (IoT) and smart home apps push mobile apps more to penetrate our different ways of life. Our monitor is now immediately packed with AI-powered applications thanks to smart home appliances. For example, a clever AI alarm clock learns about our sleep patterns and attempts that we will understand from the bed. The AI level has been implemented in the linked mobile application. Therefore, intelligent gadgets in the mobile app provide another AI push.

Another reason for this particular convergence is the recent development of AI-based intelligent systems in different mobile companies. Apple Siri, Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant, and Microsoft Cortana are the most recent examples of these. The integrated Google Assistant to a music app will learn from our listening pattern and propose tracks accordingly. Over time, Siri has learned to articulate our voice, to translate it into text.

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Impact of AI and its Implementation in Mobile App Development

 Rising demand for Personalized User Experience

The demand for personal experience is our main operator for AI technology. According to us. We should demand more personal experience, all of them thanks to AI. We enjoy talking about what we want as a coffee shop app that positions our order. In the same way, different food technologies have advanced and have offered us customized menu ideas based on our target. Customized user experience promotes participation and AI plays an important role in mobile app solutions.

Let’s have an idea of different ways where such personalization with user experience is ensured in our daily lives.

1. The most generally established personalization is Voice Recognition. For some time, our voices are heard by the software. When our voice is recorded through the app, the apps respond to our voice commands.

2. Another aspect of personalization is machine learning. Now the apps learn about our user properties and over some time there are various situations.

3 Advanced app algorithms help us decrypt our purposes by analyzing our demographics, inputs, and behavior.

AI has shown its potential by being extremely popular in major companies such as Amazon and eBay. The expanding demands of the business customer contribute to the multi-dimensional and various facets of personalization. It increases our dedication and fulfills our features.

Know More - How AI will revolutionize the mobile app development

 Ai simulates human intelligence essentially by gathering and interpreting our data to provide better value and user experience in conjunction with fast, automatic business processes. That is why AI is actively being taken into account by companies. There is a high demand for versatility and flexibility to address specific concerns that make AI-based applications more and more profitable.

The popularity and fast growth of AI in various business and real-life applications are currently becoming a major phenomenon. Many companies in their respective applications use the AI to take advantage of their competitors. Therefore, AI is the best potential way of achieving better energy and interaction. AI continues to gain ground in mobile app development and we can surely expect future AI platforms to work together and combine our mobile interactions. The way we communicate with our intelligent devices will be revolutionized by artificial intelligence.

Conclusion:

It enhances our user experience and helps to define our preferences to produce relevant results. AI helps us to describe our interests from our previous decisions. It also allows us to make our experience more personalized. AI will improve our daily interaction with mobile applications. It will keep introducing mobile apps and make them better for us in many ways. You may get in touch with us at mobile App Development Company in Uganda for a free quote to develop a mobile app for your business. And helps Business owners to reach more customers who want to change their business towards app development, Blockchain, and Machine Learning Development software. The Company has a very good working environment. To know more about my company, Visit Fusion Informatics. For more queries please send a mail to get a free quote sales@fusioninformatics.com.

For More details visit: 

Mobile App Development Companies in South Africa

Mobile Apps Development Company in Kenya

Mobile App Development Companies in Ghana

Apps Development Company in Tanzania

Best Mobile App Development Companies in Zambia

[glitex]

Mobile App Developers in Kenya

Mobile application development company in kenya

Mobile Apps Developers in Kenya | Android Apps | IOS Apps

Android and IOS apps developers in Kenya

Our Packages includes Hosting, 24/7 free Support & Maintenance and therefore cost effective. We deliver mobile application development services in Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Sudan and beyond the region. Statistics from the Google Play Store show that over 60% of the apps on the store have never been downloaded, over 35% of them are downloaded but are inactive. This means mobile app development needs not only the skills of a mobile developer but a multitude of disciplines to realise a successful app. Glitex Solutions Limited offer a one-stop-shop for all your mobile app development needs for both iOS and Android.

[jacobhinkley]

Crypto Exchange Resumes Trading in India Despite Problems with Banks and RBI

Cryptocurrency exchange Belfrics has resumed trading operations in India after halting earlier this year due to banks refusing to provide payments solutions to the exchange. Belfrics has also added four more cryptocurrencies to its platform, with 20 more planned for the next six months.

Also read: Yahoo! Japan Confirms Entrance Into the Crypto Space

Belfrics Resumes Trading Operations in India

Belfrics, which claims to be “India’s fastest growing cryptocurrency exchange and blockchain development platforms,” announced on Tuesday that it has resumed trading operations in India. The exchange also said that it has added four new coins to its platform: bitcoin cash (BCH), ether (ETH), ripple (XRP), and litecoin (LTC). Prior to the additions, only BTC trading was available. The company further unveiled its plan to launch 20 new cryptocurrencies in the next 6 months.

Jabeer KM, the COO of Belfrics Group, commented:

India is a key market for us when it comes to crypto trading. With the launch of these new coins we are targeting a base of at least 2,500,000 new traders on our platform by December 2018.

In addition, the exchange has also launched “a dedicated app for live order-book trading of various altcoins.” The group’s Chief Innovation Officer, Santhosh Palavesh, explained that “traders can now securely link their assets with our Belfrics wallet…The new app will be available for both Android and iOS users.”

Founded in 2014 and headquartered in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Belfrics Group operates crypto exchanges in Malaysia, Singapore, Bahrain, Kenya, Nigeria, Tanzania, and India. The company has its development center in the Indian city of Bengaluru. Starting this month, traders can also enjoy crypto-to-crypto trading on its platform.

Problems with Banks and RBI Ban

Belfrics halted its crypto exchange operations in India in early January when the banks stopped providing payments solutions to the company, Inc42 described. Praveenkumar Vijayakumar, Belfrics Group’s founder and CEO, told the news outlet at the time that “Many payment service providers (PSP) [in India] have stopped giving services to [crypto] exchanges.”

In April, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) issued a circular banning banks and financial institutions under its control from providing services to crypto companies. “Before taking this decision, industry participants were not consulted, public debates were not initiated and public opinion polls were not undertaken. Even the findings of the committee were not published,” the CEO told Indian news service Ians. Recently, the central bank admitted that it issued the ban without proper research.

Regarding RBI’s ban, Jabeer KM elaborated in Tuesday’s announcement:

We understand that the RBI has reservations on trading in cryptocurrencies and digital currencies. But we are confident that they will be coming up with their own set of regulations for this industry. From our end, we are making sure that Belfrics Group is ready with multiple options for our Indian customers when crypto trading becomes regularized.

Since the RBI’s circular was issued, crypto industry participants have petitioned with the Supreme Court, challenging the ban. The Supreme Court reportedly agreed to hear the cases on July 3, earlier than the original date of July 20. The RBI ban is supposed to take effect on July 5. Meanwhile, the government plans to wrap up cryptocurrency regulations in the middle of next month.

What do you think of Belfrics resuming trading operations in India despite problems with banks and impending RBI ban? Let us know in the comments section below.

Images courtesy of Shutterstock and Belfrics.

Need to calculate your bitcoin holdings? Check our tools section.

The post Crypto Exchange Resumes Trading in India Despite Problems with Banks and RBI appeared first on Bitcoin News.

Crypto Exchange Resumes Trading in India Despite Problems with Banks and RBI published first on https://medium.com/@smartoptions

[savetopnow]

2018-03-10 00 ANDROID now

ANDROID

Android Advices

Nubia N3 Smartphone Announced with Dual rear cameras & 5000mAh Battery

Facebook Messenger Lite now receives video calling for Android

Android P Developer Preview now available for Google Pixel Smartphones

CENTRiC L3 Smartphone with 5″ HD Display & 3050mAh Battery Launched in India

CENTRiC A1 Smartphone Launched with 5.5″ Full HD Display & Quick Charge 3.0 Support

Android Authority

Diving deeper into Android P’s new notifications and quick settings

You can pre-register for Rayark’s rhythm game Cytus II on the Play Store (Update: Out now!)

NordVPN: Top tier service for $2.75/mo (temporary offer)

Baldur’s Gate: Siege of Dragonspear coming to Android (Update: Out now!)

Update to Samsung Internet Beta protects you from malicious websites

Android Central

Samsung reported to skip in-display fingerprint sensor on Galaxy Note 9

Watch: Samsung Galaxy S9+ video review

Grab a refurb Nexus 5X or 6P for as little as $141 today only

Fitbit's 'mass appeal smartwatch' will be the Fitbit Versa

Honor View 10 vs. Samsung Galaxy S9: What do you get for the extra $200?

Android Developers

Google Play: Keep building (Stories from successful startup founders)

What's New in the Android P Preview

Adding Picture in Picture to your App

Designing the future of our dreams (Innovation track - Playtime EMEA 2017)

Impactful research methods to supercharge your app or game (Innovation track - Playtime EMEA 2017)

Android Guys

Love TV shows? Try these games inspired by popular series

Gear Up: SōLIS intros line of Google Assistant-enabled home audio solutions

Save nearly 94% on a lifetime ZenMate VPN account

OUKITEL’s rugged WP5000 takes icy and steaming baths, keeps on ticking. (Promoted)

The five best cheap Android devices you can buy right now (March 2018)

Android Headlines

Smart Home Weekly: Making An Apartment “Smart”

Sprint Wants To Become “The 5G Company” With SoftBank’s Help

Android-Powered Nubia N3 Debuts With SD625, 5,000mAh Battery

Sony Xperia XZ2, XZ2 Compact Up For Pre-Orders In Europe

Deal: Refurbished Google Nexus 5X for $140, Nexus 6P for $240 – Today Only

Android Police

Epic Games' third-person shooter 'Fortnite Battle Royale' is coming to Android in the next few moths

Android P feature spotlight: Bug reports can now be accessed in the Files app

[Update: Sri Lanka and Tanzania too] Developers in Ecuador can now sell paid apps on the Play Store

Android P feature spotlight: Developer options has a hidden list of 'feature flags,' just like Chrome

Android P feature spotlight: Per-network MAC address randomization added as experimental feature

Droid Life

Fortnite Battle Royale is Coming to iOS and Android!

Video: Galaxy S9+ Unboxing!

Download: Install the New Markup App From Android P!

Hopefully, This Left Clock Dies With Android P Developer Preview 1

Gmail for Android Will Now Support ‘Inbox Types’

Reddit Android

Nokia Smartphone Revival Is a Costly Adventure

Introducing scrcpy, an app to display and control Android devices

Please star this feature request on the Google Issues Tracker, to raise awareness of not being able to use Substratum/unsigned overlays on Android P!

Xiaomi confirms that it is launching a compact powerhouse smartphone on March 14

Valve releases first details about Artifact - available on Android by mid-2019

TechCrunch Android

Android beats iOS in smartphone loyalty, study finds

Here’s the first developer preview of Android P

HMD unveils its new slate of Nokia Android smartphones starting at $85

HMD/Nokia’s smartphones join Google’s Android One program ‘leading the charge’

ZTE will deliver the first Android Oreo (Go Edition) handset for the U.S. market in March

[toomanysinks]

Boomplay, a Spotify-style music and video streaming service for African music and Africa, raises $20M

While Spotify dukes it out with Apple and other big tech names to target high-end users in mostly developed markets, a startup out of China has raised some money to expand its music streaming business in the massive but still nascent market of Africa.

Boomplay, a service founded by Transsnet — a joint venture between Chinese phone maker Transsion and Chinese consumer apps giant NetEase — has raised $20 million in outside funding as it looks to break into more sub-Saharan countries and continue to build up its database of music tracks.

The company currently has some 5 million music tracks and additionally videos on its platform — with a huge emphasis on African artists — with 42 million monthly active users, some 85 percent of which are on the African continent (primarily Nigerial, Ghana, Kenya and Tanzania), and adding on average about 2 million users each month, a mix of paid and free subscribers, the latter seeing ads when they use the service.

Relatively speaking, this is just a small dent in the African market, which has around 1.2 billion inhabitants.

The funding is coming from Chinese investors Maison Capital and Seas Capital, with other undisclosed investors. Boomplay is not disclosing its valuation, but Phil Choi, the head of international partnerships at Boomplay, confirmed that it was up on its previous round and that the company has raised $25.5 million to date — modest numbers, considering the hundreds of millions that have been poured into Spotify, Deezer and many other streaming services, but a size that fits what is still a very nascent target market.

“The board feels it’s better to be a stable company and work at a slower pace rather than taking on more funding and going too fast,” Choi added.

The Apple Music of Africa?

Some have described Boomplay as the Spotify of Africa (the same description one of its local competitors, Spinlet, also gets), but I think it sounds more like the Apple Music of Africa.

The company got its start in 2015 when Transsion — the biggest supplier of phones to the African market, with about a 40 percent share at the moment, a mix of feature and smartphones, says Choi — decided to build mobile data services that it could sell to consumers to make its mobile phones more attractive, and to potentially make a little extra service margin on top of hardware sales.

It turned to NetEase — one of the big Chinese mobile content developers that publishes games, has its own music service, and more (it even has its own Tik Tok clone, Vskit, pronounced “V-skit”) — in 2017 to help develop it and other content services, which were tightly integrated into the phone’s platform. In 2017 they formed a JV to run it called Transsnet. Boomplay — which also offers video and entertainment news (another Apple parallel) — is now a partially-owned subsidiary of Transsnet; it does not disclose the size of its stake.

The service still benefits from Transsion’s large market share, but it has also published mobile apps for Android and iOS that tap users on a wider range of smartphones.

And it’s also tapping an international growth opportunity, specifically by marketing itself to Africans that have emigrated to other parts of the world and continue to listen to music from the continent.

“Music has no borders, and we’re committed to providing a rich and high-quality music experience for all users – not just in Africa, but around the world,” said Boomplay CEO Joe He. “This investment will help us do just that, by fostering cultural interchange and helping people communicate through the universal language of music.”

Boomplay’s rise in Africa, meanwhile, comes at a time when streaming services that dominate in other parts of the world, such as Spotify and Apple Music, have yet to really break into the African continent. Spotify launched its first service in Africa in the continent’s most developed market — South Africa — in March 2018 and has yet to expand to more countries, while Apple — with its premium pricing — has by Choi’s estimate has sold less than 1 million iPhones in the region, which limits its potential growth.

Boomplay’s growth has — predictably — mirrored that of the handsets where it is preinstalled, but notably covers a number of countries in the sub-Saharan region, as well as a strong range of local music alongside more international tracks, by way of deals with large labels like Universal Music and Warner Music.

The role that China has played in developing tech in Africa has been an interesting one. It started years ago when Chinese companies like ZTE — looking for growth outside their home market — were winning big deals to build telecoms infrastructure at a time when tele-density on the continent was the lowest in the world. Rather than building fixed-line infrastructure, they built mobile infrastructure, and that eventually led to a wave of Chinese OEMs, making cheap feature and smartphones, becoming some of the biggest handset suppliers. “The Chinese government has really pushed investing in Africa since they see a lot of potential there,” Choi said.

Despite the very homegrown nature of the arts in Africa — specifically in areas like music and cinema — the development of services like Boomplay to deliver that content has been a natural progression in China’s wider tech growth in the region.

But if you follow the African market, you know that despite the big potential — of that 1.2 billion inhabitants, the average age is 21, Choi said, a great market for streaming music services — the economy is still underdeveloped, which hinders significant growth.

In the case of Boomplay, that translates to not just to adding more users in countries that rank as some of the poorest in the world, but in getting them efficient ways to pay if they do want to do so.

“We’ve seen healthy growth, but one of the problems is that there isn’t really a sustainable or efficient mobile payment system,” Choi noted. Processing payments, he said, “takes really long and can be unreliable, for example, halfway through a transaction, errors may occur.” He said the company already accepts Mpesa, one of the key mobile payment services that was originally founded in Kenya, along with other payment methods, but the plan is to add more to that soon.

Longer term, Choi said that will likely lead to more funding being raised. Wether that comes from China again or elsewhere will be interesting to watch. “Chinese investors see Africa as the China of 10 years ago,” he said, “so they feel they can apply the same models to it, and bring it up to being a very prosperous region.”

“Africa is full of opportunity, from its young demographics to its vibrant culture, and Boomplay sits in the middle of all of that greatness,” said Tony Li, Managing Director of Maison Capital, in a statement. “Boomplay has incorporated NetEase’s experience in the music streaming business with Transsion’s expertise in local operations, and in doing so Boomplay became the dominant player in the region in a very short period of time. As more of Africa comes online, we are confident that Boomplay will continue to be a major force in business and culture.”

source https://techcrunch.com/2019/04/05/boomplay-a-spotify-style-music-and-video-streaming-service-for-african-music-and-africa-raises-20m/

[fmservers]

Boomplay, a Spotify-style music and video streaming service for African music and Africa, raises $20M

While Spotify dukes it out with Apple and other big tech names to target high-end users in mostly developed markets, a startup out of China has raised some money to expand its music streaming business in the massive but still nascent market of Africa.

Boomplay, a service founded by Transsnet — a joint venture between Chinese phone maker Transsion and Chinese consumer apps giant NetEase — has raised $20 million in outside funding as it looks to break into more sub-Saharan countries and continue to build up its database of music tracks.

The company currently has some 5 million music tracks and additionally videos on its platform — with a huge emphasis on African artists — with 42 million monthly active users, some 85 percent of which are on the African continent (primarily Nigerial, Ghana, Kenya and Tanzania), and adding on average about 2 million users each month, a mix of paid and free subscribers, the latter seeing ads when they use the service.

Relatively speaking, this is just a small dent in the African market, which has around 1.2 billion inhabitants.

The funding is coming from Chinese investors Maison Capital and Seas Capital, with other undisclosed investors. Boomplay is not disclosing its valuation, but Phil Choi, the head of international partnerships at Boomplay, confirmed that it was up on its previous round and that the company has raised $25.5 million to date — modest numbers, considering the hundreds of millions that have been poured into Spotify, Deezer and many other streaming services, but a size that fits what is still a very nascent target market.

“The board feels it’s better to be a stable company and work at a slower pace rather than taking on more funding and going too fast,” Choi added.

The Apple Music of Africa?

Some have described Boomplay as the Spotify of Africa (the same description one of its local competitors, Spinlet, also gets), but I think it sounds more like the Apple Music of Africa.

The company got its start in 2015 when Transsion — the biggest supplier of phones to the African market, with about a 40 percent share at the moment, a mix of feature and smartphones, says Choi — decided to build mobile data services that it could sell to consumers to make its mobile phones more attractive, and to potentially make a little extra service margin on top of hardware sales.

It turned to NetEase — one of the big Chinese mobile content developers that publishes games, has its own music service, and more (it even has its own Tik Tok clone, Vskit, pronounced “V-skit”) — in 2017 to help develop it and other content services, which were tightly integrated into the phone’s platform. In 2017 they formed a JV to run it called Transsnet. Boomplay — which also offers video and entertainment news (another Apple parallel) — is now a partially-owned subsidiary of Transsnet; it does not disclose the size of its stake.

The service still benefits from Transsion’s large market share, but it has also published mobile apps for Android and iOS that tap users on a wider range of smartphones.

And it’s also tapping an international growth opportunity, specifically by marketing itself to Africans that have emigrated to other parts of the world and continue to listen to music from the continent.

“Music has no borders, and we’re committed to providing a rich and high-quality music experience for all users – not just in Africa, but around the world,” said Boomplay CEO Joe He. “This investment will help us do just that, by fostering cultural interchange and helping people communicate through the universal language of music.”

Boomplay’s rise in Africa, meanwhile, comes at a time when streaming services that dominate in other parts of the world, such as Spotify and Apple Music, have yet to really break into the African continent. Spotify launched its first service in Africa in the continent’s most developed market — South Africa — in March 2018 and has yet to expand to more countries, while Apple — with its premium pricing — has by Choi’s estimate has sold less than 1 million iPhones in the region, which limits its potential growth.

Boomplay’s growth has — predictably — mirrored that of the handsets where it is preinstalled, but notably covers a number of countries in the sub-Saharan region, as well as a strong range of local music alongside more international tracks, by way of deals with large labels like Universal Music and Warner Music.

The role that China has played in developing tech in Africa has been an interesting one. It started years ago when Chinese companies like ZTE — looking for growth outside their home market — were winning big deals to build telecoms infrastructure at a time when tele-density on the continent was the lowest in the world. Rather than building fixed-line infrastructure, they built mobile infrastructure, and that eventually led to a wave of Chinese OEMs, making cheap feature and smartphones, becoming some of the biggest handset suppliers. “The Chinese government has really pushed investing in Africa since they see a lot of potential there,” Choi said.

Despite the very homegrown nature of the arts in Africa — specifically in areas like music and cinema — the development of services like Boomplay to deliver that content has been a natural progression in China’s wider tech growth in the region.

But if you follow the African market, you know that despite the big potential — of that 1.2 billion inhabitants, the average age is 21, Choi said, a great market for streaming music services — the economy is still underdeveloped, which hinders significant growth.

In the case of Boomplay, that translates to not just to adding more users in countries that rank as some of the poorest in the world, but in getting them efficient ways to pay if they do want to do so.

“We’ve seen healthy growth, but one of the problems is that there isn’t really a sustainable or efficient mobile payment system,” Choi noted. Processing payments, he said, “takes really long and can be unreliable, for example, halfway through a transaction, errors may occur.” He said the company already accepts Mpesa, one of the key mobile payment services that was originally founded in Kenya, along with other payment methods, but the plan is to add more to that soon.

Longer term, Choi said that will likely lead to more funding being raised. Wether that comes from China again or elsewhere will be interesting to watch. “Chinese investors see Africa as the China of 10 years ago,” he said, “so they feel they can apply the same models to it, and bring it up to being a very prosperous region.”

“Africa is full of opportunity, from its young demographics to its vibrant culture, and Boomplay sits in the middle of all of that greatness,” said Tony Li, Managing Director of Maison Capital, in a statement. “Boomplay has incorporated NetEase’s experience in the music streaming business with Transsion’s expertise in local operations, and in doing so Boomplay became the dominant player in the region in a very short period of time. As more of Africa comes online, we are confident that Boomplay will continue to be a major force in business and culture.”

Via Ingrid Lunden https://techcrunch.com

[thefeedpost]

MallforAfrica goes global, Kobo360 and Sokowatch raise VC, France explains its $76M fund

Jake Bright Contributor

Jake Bright is a writer and author in New York City. He is co-author of The Next Africa.

More posts by this contributor

Harley-Davidson to expand EV lineup, may include scooters, bicycles Sokowatch closes $2 million seed round to modernize Africa’s B2B retail

B2B e-commerce company Sokowatch closed a $2 million seed investment led by 4DX Ventures. Others to join the round were Village Global, Lynett Capital, Golden Palm Investments, and Outlierz  Ventures.

The Kenya based company aims to shake up the supply chain market for Africa’s informal retailers.

Sokowatch’s platform connects Africa’s informal retail stores directly to local and multi-national suppliers—such as Unilever and Proctor and Gamble—by digitizing orders, delivery, and payments with the aim of reducing costs and increasing profit margins.

“With both manufacturers and the small shops, we’re becoming the connective layer between them, where previously you had multiple layers of middle-men from distributors, sub-distributors, to wholesalers,” Sokowatch founder and CEO Daniel Yu told TechCrunch.

“The cost of sourcing goods right now…we estimate we’re cutting that cost by about 20 percent [for] these shopkeepers,” he said

“There are millions of informal stores across Africa’s cities selling hundreds of billions worth of consumer goods every year,” said Yu.

These stores can use Sokowatch’s app on mobile phones to buy wares directly from large suppliers, arrange for transport, and make payments online. “Ordering on SMS or Android gets you free delivery of products to your store, on average, in about two hours,” said Yu.

Sokowatch generates revenues by earning “a margin on the goods that we’re selling to shopkeepers,” said Yu. On the supplier side, they also benefit from “aggregating demand…and getting bulk deals on the products that we distribute.”

The company recently launched a line of credit product to extend working capital loans to platform clients. With the $2 million round, Sokowatch—which currently operates in Kenya and Tanzania—plans to “expand to new markets in East Africa, as well as pilot additional value add services to the shops,” said Yu.

MallforAfrica and DHL launched MarketPlaceAfrica.com: a global e-commerce site for select African artisans to sell wares to buyers in any of DHL’s 220 delivery countries.

The site will prioritize fashion items — clothing, bags, jewelry, footwear and personal care — and crafts, such as pictures and carvings. MallforAfrica is vetting sellers for MarketPlace Africa online and through the Africa Made Product Standards association (AMPS), to verify made-in-Africa status and merchandise quality.

“We’re starting off in Nigeria and then we’ll open in Kenya, Rwanda and the rest of Africa, utilizing DHL’s massive network,” MallforAfrica CEO Chris Folayan told TechCrunch about where the goods will be sourced. “People all around the world can buy from African artisans online, that’s the goal,” Folayan told TechCrunch.

Current listed designer products include handbags from Chinwe Ezenwa and Tash women’s outfits by Tasha Goodwin.

In addition to DHL for shipping, MarketPlace Africa will utilize MallforAfrica’s e-commerce infrastructure. The startup was founded in 2011 to solve challenges global consumer goods companies face when entering Africa.

French President Emmanuel Macron unveiled a $76 million African startup fund at VivaTech 2018 and TechCrunch paid a visit to the French Development Agency (AFD) — who will administer the new fund — to get details on how it will work.

The $76 million (or €65 million) will divvy up into three parts, AFD Digital Task Team Leader Christine Ha told TechCrunch.

“There are €10 million [$11.7 million] for technical assistance to support the African ecosystem… €5 million will be available as interest-free loans to high-potential, pre-seed startups…and…€50 million [$58 million] will be for equity-based investments in series A to C startups,” explained Ha during a meeting in Paris.

The technical assistance will distribute in the form of grants to accelerators, hubs, incubators and coding programs. The pre-seed startup loans will issue in amounts up to $100,000 “as early, early funding to allow entrepreneurs to prototype, launch and experiment,” said Ha.

The $58 million in VC startup funding will be administered through Proparco, a development finance institution — or DFI — partially owned by the AFD. “Proparco will take equity stakes, and will be a limited partner when investing in VC funds,” said Ha.

Startups from all African countries can apply for a piece of the $58 million by contacting any of Proparco’s Africa offices.

The $11.7 million technical assistance and $5.8 million loan portions of France’s new fund will be available starting in 2019. On implementation, AFD is still “reviewing several options…such as relying on local actors through [France’s] Digital Africa platform,” said Ha. President Macron followed up the Africa fund announcement with a trip to Nigeria last month.

Nigerian logistics startup Kobo360 was accepted into Y Combinator’s 2018 class and gained some working capital in the form of $1.2 million in pre-seed funding led by Western Technology Investment.

The startup — with an Uber like app that connects Nigerian truckers to companies with freight needs — will use the funds to pay drivers online immediately after successful hauls.

Kobo360 is also launching the Kobo Wealth Investment Network, or KoboWIN — a crowd-invest, vehicle financing program. Through it, Kobo drivers can finance new trucks through citizen investors and pay them back directly (with interest) over a 60-month period.

On Kobo360’s utility, “We give drivers the demand and technology to power their businesses,” CEO Obi Ozor told TechCrunch. “An average trucker will make $3,500 a month with our app. That’s middle class territory in Nigeria.”

Kobo360 has served 324 businesses, aggregated a fleet of 5480 drivers and moved 37.6 million kilograms of cargo since 2017, per company stats. Top clients include Honeywell, Olam, Unilever, and DHL.

Ozor thinks the startup’s asset-free, digital platform and business model can outpace traditional long-haul 3PL providers in Nigeria by handling more volume at cheaper prices.

“Logistics in Nigeria have been priced based on the assumption drivers are going to run empty on the way back…When we now match freight with return trips, prices crash.”

Kobo360 will expand in Togo, Ghana, Cote D’Ivoire and Senegal.

[PHOTO: BFX.LAGOS] And finally, applications are open for TechCrunch’s Startup Battlefield Africa, to be held in Lagos, Nigeria, December 11. Early-stage African startups have until September 3 to apply here.

More Africa Related Stories @TechCrunch

More Africa Related Stories @TechCrunch

·         CowryWise micro-savings service opens high-yield government bonds to everyday Nigerians

African Tech Around the Net

·         More Than Half of Sub-Saharan Africa to Be Connected to Mobile by 2025, Finds New GSMA Study ·         Ethiopia’s Gebeya acquires Coders4Africa to accelerate its growth ·         Rwanda, Andela partner to launch pan-African tech hub in Kigali ·         Google’s free public Wi-Fi initiative expanded to Africa ·         Accounteer wins 2018 MEST Entrepreneur challenge ·         SafeBoda completes expansion to Kenya, now live in Nairobi ·         Uganda government sued over social media tax

Read more: feedproxy.google.com

The post MallforAfrica goes global, Kobo360 and Sokowatch raise VC, France explains its $76M fund appeared first on TheFeedPost.

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[un-enfant-immature]

XPRIZE names two grand prize winners in $15 million Global Learning Challenge

XPRIZE, the non-profit organization developing and managing competitions to find solutions to social challenges, has named two grand prize winners in the Elon Musk-backed Global Learning XPRIZE .

The companies, KitKit School out of South Korea and the U.S., and onebillion, operating in Kenya and the U.K., were announced at an awards ceremony hosted at the Google Spruce Goose Hangar in Playa Vista, Calif.

XPRIZE set each of the competing teams the task of developing scalable services that could enable children to teach themselves basic reading, writing, and arithmetic skills within 15 months.

Musk himself was on hand to award $5 million checks to each of the winning teams.

Five finalists including: New York-based CCI, which developed lesson plans and a development language so non-coders could create lessons; Chimple, a Bangalore-based, learning platform enabling children to learn reading, writing and math on a tablet; RobotTutor, a Pittsburgh-based company which used Carnegie Mellon research to develop an app for Android tablets that would teach lessons in reading and writing with speech recognition, machine learning, and human computer interactions, and the two grand prize winners all received $1 million to continue developing their projects.

The tests required each product to be field tested in Swahili, reaching nearly 3,000 children in 170 villages across Tanzania.

All of the final solutions from each of the five teams that made it to the final round of competition have been open-sourced so anyone can improve on and develop local solutions using the toolkits developed by each team in competition.

Kitkit School, with a team from Berkeley, Calif. and Seoul, developed a program with a game-based core and flexible learning architecture to help kids learn independently, while onebillion, merged numeracy content with literacy material to provide directed learning and activities alongside monitoring to personalize responses to children’s needs.

Both teams are going home with $5 million to continue their work.

The problem of access to basic education affects more than 250 million children around the world, who can’t read or write and one-in-five children around the world aren’t in school, according to data from UNESCO.

The problem of access is compounded by a shortage of teachers at the primary ad secondary school level. Some research, cited by XPRIZE, indicates that the world needs to recruit another 68.8 million teachers to provide every child with a primary and secondary education by 2040.

Before the Global Learning XPRIZE field test, 74% of the children who participated were reported as never having attended school; 80% were never read to at home; and 90% couldn’t read a single word of Swahili.

After the 15 month program working on donated Google Pixel C tablets and pre-loaded with software, the number was cut in half.

“Education is a fundamental human right, and we are so proud of all the teams and their dedication and hard work to ensure every single child has the opportunity to take learning into their own hands,” said Anousheh Ansari, CEO of XPRIZE, in a statement. “Learning how to read, write and demonstrate basic math are essential building blocks for those who want to live free from poverty and its limitations, and we believe that this competition clearly demonstrated the accelerated learning made possible through the educational applications developed by our teams, and ultimately hope that this movement spurs a revolution in education, worldwide.”

After the grand prize announcement, XPRIZE said it will work to secure and load the software onto tablets; localize the software; and deliver preloaded hardware and charging stations to remote locations so all finalist teams can scale their learning software across the world.

[safracatz]

How Your Business Does Going To Respond For A New Comer, IoT?

Business is about using time and money with a suitable system to have the organization below your control. This statement leads out the advantages. Several aspects must be happened to keep the way with this statement. This may depend on employee effectiveness, data shaping, tracking management, your performance with your employees and several others. But when it grows to management, a certain feature, particularly the records of your business, needs to be correctly prepared to increase your business.

The perspectives I discussed above are important for each company. So you can regulate the use of the method that suits the business. And according to the trendy method of technology, the Internet of Things is becoming more and more to create the best time for a time. It is used to control the electronic device using the Internet. The electronic device can be anything, such as industrial machinery, electrical appliances, etc. Controlling these systems can improve the efficiency of your company's financial situation. Let's be brief about the main advantages of the Internet of Things for an organization in terms of commerce.

See More - Enterprises benefit from IoT via mobile app development

1. Operating Expenditure

Most industries allowed a huge virtual loss related to the machine operating process. Due to the neglect of the employee, heads to the loss of the machine. It is estimated a dangerous defect for industries. To replicate this defect, joining the system with the IoT avoids the problems generated by careless employees. Upgrading the system with the Internet of Things will minimize the time required for maintenance and help compactly control the device. It will, therefore, be more beneficial to monitor devices and minimize failures or misalignments on the production line. Implementing the Internet of Things (IoT) in an industry also helps decrease energy costs and improve energy efficiency by monitoring and controlling the unnecessary use of power systems.

2. Tracking the Management

IoT helps track management data. It works quickly when records have been collected in cloud technology. Cloud technology is increasing rapidly in all areas. It uses a network to change the server to store the data. Combining the cloud to the corporate server to keep it very than hard storage will save time and money in using the data for performance. This will be more efficient when conducted with IoT because IoT is a part of intelligence to analyze data when it is created with artificial intelligence, where artificial intelligence will be further useful for organizing data. In one reason and understand the problem. The solution to achieve a better result for the decision of the management concerning the task or the process.

See More - How to leverage IoT advantages in mobile app development solutions

3. Customer Experience

When IoT is placed or connected for things, usage increases within mobile devices, which will increase the power of marketing by understanding the model of your movement utilizing your mobile. As I said before about artificial intelligence connected with IoT, it is beneficial to analyze the behavior of your use. For example, if your home is dominated by IoT, the behavior of your mobile movement is tracked and analyzed, which later enables you to view or align the company's advertising, such as e-commerce, on your device. Thus, it can increase the productivity of advertising by allowing the customer to know his needs.

4. Improve Productivity

Improving the productivity of the business is essential to increase profits. In terms of the Internet of Things, the industry can make a profit by following the availability of components. It is too important to note that the availability of components has a significant influence on productivity when it is required for the function or mechanism. IoT asks you to calculate making hours to plan employees' work by collecting employee data. This increases the function of the job by suggesting that the continuing tasks are notified by the employee. Thus, it can decrease interest and access features more accurately.

5. Ensure Safety

Handling equipment with greater care is important for all sectors. By using IoT, he will be more positive in handling the equipment. The IoT with artificial intelligence creates a pattern to follow the movement of the machine. Thus, when the machine becomes the work position for the process, an error is reported by the manager and leads to securing awareness of the maintenance of security against the incident. Every life is important to reach its goal. Thus, workers' lives are more important than work. Therefore, as a businessman, it is important to secure the safety of their employees. The IoT will improve the industry to avoid an incident thanks to artificial intelligence.

See More - How the IoT can make an impact on an app development process

Conclusion

Technologies are designed to gain support or the system that brings man to carry out his task compactly and securely. Internet of Things is a technology intended to allow the user to visit in control of his time by watching his devices with more flexible features. Maintaining a business is a reliable task to manage their employees with all the benefits. Thus, the implementation of the Internet of Things in business can pull the system with more control and higher efficiency. The concept of the Internet of Things will ensure the growth of the business virtually. Most companies have begun to implement this technology. In the future, developers would be in high demand because mobile app Development Company have a great expectation based on IoT app development.  You may get in touch with us at Best mobile app development companies in Kenya for a free quote to develop a mobile app for your business. And helps Business owners to reach more customers who want to change their business towards app development, The Company has a very good working environment. To know more about my company, Visit Fusion Informatics. For more queries please send a mail to get a free quote sales@fusioninformatics.com.

For more details visit:

Best Mobile App Development Companies in South Africa

Mobile App Development Company in Tanzania

Top mobile app Development Company in Nigeria

App Development Companies in Zambia

Apps Development Companies in Uganda

[theinvinciblenoob]

Jake Bright Contributor

Jake Bright is a writer and author in New York City. He is co-author of The Next Africa.

More posts by this contributor

Harley-Davidson to expand EV lineup, may include scooters, bicycles

Update: EV startups Alta, Energica, and Zero could reboot the motorcycle industry

B2B e-commerce company Sokowatch closed a $2 million seed investment led by 4DX Ventures. Others to join the round were Village Global, Lynett Capital, Golden Palm Investments, and Outlierz  Ventures.

The Kenya based company aims to shake up the supply chain market for Africa’s informal retailers.

Sokowatch’s platform connects Africa’s informal retail stores directly to local and multi-national suppliers—such as Unilever and Proctor and Gamble—by digitizing orders, delivery, and payments with the aim of reducing costs and increasing profit margins.

“With both manufacturers and the small shops, we’re becoming the connective layer between them, where previously you had multiple layers of middle-men from distributors, sub-distributors, to wholesalers,” Sokowatch founder and CEO Daniel Yu told TechCrunch.

“The cost of sourcing goods right now…we estimate we’re cutting that cost by about 20 percent [for] these shopkeepers,” he said

“There are millions of informal stores across Africa’s cities selling hundreds of billions worth of consumer goods every year,” said Yu.

These stores can use Sokowatch’s app on mobile phones to buy wares directly from large suppliers, arrange for transport, and make payments online. “Ordering on SMS or Android gets you free delivery of products to your store, on average, in about two hours,” said Yu.

Sokowatch generates revenues by earning “a margin on the goods that we’re selling to shopkeepers,” said Yu. On the supplier side, they also benefit from “aggregating demand…and getting bulk deals on the products that we distribute.”

The company recently launched a line of credit product to extend working capital loans to platform clients. With the $2 million round, Sokowatch—which currently operates in Kenya and Tanzania—plans to “expand to new markets in East Africa, as well as pilot additional value add services to the shops,” said Yu.

MallforAfrica and DHL launched MarketPlaceAfrica.com: a global e-commerce site for select African artisans to sell wares to buyers in any of DHL’s 220 delivery countries.

The site will prioritize fashion items — clothing, bags, jewelry, footwear and personal care — and crafts, such as pictures and carvings. MallforAfrica is vetting sellers for MarketPlace Africa online and through the Africa Made Product Standards association (AMPS), to verify made-in-Africa status and merchandise quality.

“We’re starting off in Nigeria and then we’ll open in Kenya, Rwanda and the rest of Africa, utilizing DHL’s massive network,” MallforAfrica CEO Chris Folayan told TechCrunch about where the goods will be sourced. “People all around the world can buy from African artisans online, that’s the goal,” Folayan told TechCrunch.

Current listed designer products include handbags from Chinwe Ezenwa and Tash women’s outfits by Tasha Goodwin.

In addition to DHL for shipping, MarketPlace Africa will utilize MallforAfrica’s e-commerce infrastructure. The startup was founded in 2011 to solve challenges global consumer goods companies face when entering Africa.

French President Emmanuel Macron  href="https://pctechmag.com/2018/05/french-president-emmanuel-macron-launches-a-usd76m-africa-startup-fund/">unveiled a $76 million African startup fund at VivaTech 2018 and TechCrunch paid a visit to the French Development Agency (AFD) — who will administer the new fund — to get details on how it will work.

The $76 million (or €65 million) will divvy up into three parts, AFD Digital Task Team Leader Christine Ha told TechCrunch.

“There are €10 million [$11.7 million] for technical assistance to support the African ecosystem… €5 million will be available as interest-free loans to high-potential, pre-seed startups…and…€50 million [$58 million] will be for equity-based investments in series A to C startups,” explained Ha during a meeting in Paris.

The technical assistance will distribute in the form of grants to accelerators, hubs, incubators and coding programs. The pre-seed startup loans will issue in amounts up to $100,000 “as early, early funding to allow entrepreneurs to prototype, launch and experiment,” said Ha.

The $58 million in VC startup funding will be administered through Proparco, a development finance institution — or DFI — partially owned by the AFD. “Proparco will take equity stakes, and will be a limited partner when investing in VC funds,” said Ha.

Startups from all African countries can apply for a piece of the $58 million by contacting any of Proparco’s Africa offices.

The $11.7 million technical assistance and $5.8 million loan portions of France’s new fund will be available starting in 2019. On implementation, AFD is still “reviewing several options…such as relying on local actors through [France’s] Digital Africa platform,” said Ha. President Macron followed up the Africa fund announcement with a trip to Nigeria last month.

Nigerian logistics startup Kobo360 was accepted into Y Combinator’s 2018 class and gained some working capital in the form of $1.2 million in pre-seed funding led by Western Technology Investment.

The startup — with an Uber like app that connects Nigerian truckers to companies with freight needs — will use the funds to pay drivers online immediately after successful hauls.

Kobo360 is also launching the Kobo Wealth Investment Network, or KoboWIN — a crowd-invest, vehicle financing program. Through it, Kobo drivers can finance new trucks through citizen investors and pay them back directly (with interest) over a 60-month period.

On Kobo360’s utility, “We give drivers the demand and technology to power their businesses,” CEO Obi Ozor told TechCrunch. “An average trucker will make $3,500 a month with our app. That’s middle class territory in Nigeria.”

Kobo360 has served 324 businesses, aggregated a fleet of 5480 drivers and moved 37.6 million kilograms of cargo since 2017, per company stats. Top clients include Honeywell, Olam, Unilever, and DHL.

Ozor thinks the startup’s asset-free, digital platform and business model can outpace traditional long-haul 3PL providers in Nigeria by handling more volume at cheaper prices.

“Logistics in Nigeria have been priced based on the assumption drivers are going to run empty on the way back…When we now match freight with return trips, prices crash.”

Kobo360 will expand in Togo, Ghana, Cote D’Ivoire and Senegal.

[PHOTO: BFX.LAGOS] And finally, applications are open for TechCrunch’s Startup Battlefield Africa, to be held in Lagos, Nigeria, December 11. Early-stage African startups have until September 3 to apply here.

More Africa Related Stories @TechCrunch

More Africa Related Stories @TechCrunch

·         CowryWise micro-savings service opens high-yield government bonds to everyday Nigerians

African Tech Around the Net

·         More Than Half of Sub-Saharan Africa to Be Connected to Mobile by 2025, Finds New GSMA Study ·         Ethiopia’s Gebeya acquires Coders4Africa to accelerate its growth ·         Rwanda, Andela partner to launch pan-African tech hub in Kigali ·         Google’s free public Wi-Fi initiative expanded to Africa ·         Accounteer wins 2018 MEST Entrepreneur challenge ·         SafeBoda completes expansion to Kenya, now live in Nairobi ·         Uganda government sued over social media tax

via TechCrunch

[djgblogger-blog]

Open soil science: technology is helping us discover the mysteries under our feet

http://bit.ly/2vP6PZj

Soil has many secrets: technology can help reveal its mysteries. Martin Bridgen, CC BY-SA

Have you ever taken the time to stop and consider the dirt under your feet? Leonardo da Vinci said: “We know more about the movement of celestial bodies than about the soil underfoot.” Yet, our very survival as humans - and life on this planet - is intimately linked with the health of a thin layer of soil enveloping the earth.

Soil provides society with essential food, feed, fibre and raw materials, as well as being home to a quarter of the earth’s biodiversity. Soils are also the largest organic carbon reservoir on Earth and although highly dynamic, are very fragile. Chop a forest down and it might grow back in 50 years, but lose 10 cm of soil and get ready to wait 1000 years to get it back. Without soil, our planet would be unrecognisable to us, and more like the barren and inhospitable surface of the Moon or Mars.

Until recently, we did not even know how deep the soil is below our feet. Like the best mysteries, a bit of digging is required for soils to be fully understood and for their history to be laid bare.

When they are visible, a range of questions arise. What does the variation in colour with depth mean? How much carbon is stored? Is the soil dense or light, damaged or healthy? Answering these questions is important, but presents a significant challenge and may require years of training.

Online soil resources

A group of researchers working on Open Soil Science data and technology met recently in the Netherlands to discuss current and future developments in citizen soil science. By developing electronic resources and making them freely available, we hope to share the secrets of the soil with a wider community and improve the distribution and availability of soil observations and our knowledge of soil properties across the globe. This will help us develop targeted strategies to conserve this fragile resource.

Soil Explorer landscape technology makes it possible to better understand soil properties. Darrell Schulze, Purdue University, Author provided

If you want to know more about the soil around you, the SoilGrids system provides open access to a diversity of soil properties and soil types. The online World Soil Information Service (WoSIS) and the Virtual World Soil Museum provide information about a diverse array of soil profiles worldwide, with high resolution images of soil profiles accompanied by detailed explanations of the individual soil horizons.

These portals (and there are many more) are a great starting point to get to know soil, so that farmers and land-users can understand the processes leading to soil development and how this affects soil health and ecosystem functioning such as carbon storage.

Apps for the ground

Different users may have different expectations for soil apps. Farmers and gardeners in the field are frequently interested in soil fertility, whereas teachers in the classroom may wish to explain soil diversity and soil function within the large natural variation in landscapes across the globe.

Regardless of user expectations, the use of smartphone apps and online resources can help people discover and understand various aspects and potential uses of soil, helping to highlight the beauty, diversity and importance of this underappreciated natural resource.

The mySoil app, developed by the British Geological Survey in 2012, is aimed at raising awareness of the diversity of soil properties across Europe and also has the capability to crowdsource photos and data on the soils around you. Designed for the non-expert, more than 50,000 people are exploring soils around them and have provided more than 4000 observations globally.

Soil Explorer designed by ISEE network from 2015-2017, shows how soils vary at different scales and why this matters. This app provides a framework of knowledge, in particular for users wishing to understand how soilscapes vary within the context of different landscapes and climates (why is the soil here red, but grey over there?, is my soil particularly wet compared with other soils?). For example, you can zoom into the areas recently flooded by Hurricane Harvey in Houston, Texas, and identify many of the flooded soils as “recent alluvium” (soil materials deposited by water), showing the strong link between soil properties and flooding. This can be used for decision-making, such as where to build houses when local area planning is inadequate or maps are not easily available. Maps of soil properties are based on the detailed soil survey data available in the US, with seven states online and more to be added soon.

Farmers and scientists in Kenya use LandPKS, an app to explore the ground. Adam Beh, Author provided

In Scotland, Soil Organic Carbon Information Technology (SOCIT), developed by the James Hutton Institute in 2015 uses the user’s location and the colour of the soil to estimate the concentration of organic matter in the topsoil. This app (available for Android and Apple) should soon extend its range to the UK and Europe. Soil organic carbon is the single most important indicator of soil fertility, and soils contain more carbon than vegetation and the atmosphere combined so that soil carbon storage - and understanding how to protect it - is vital to the the health of the global ecosystem, and therefore everyone on earth.

LandPKS (Land Potential Knowledge System) aims to improve the information available to land managers when making decisions related to productivity and sustainability. It guides the user through open soil and climate data to provide free, easy to use, locally appropriate information to optimize land management decisions. It was developed in Kenya and Namibia and is being tested in Tanzania as well as the United States.

So what’s the point of all the data?

All this soil data begs the question: what is it good for? One immediate use for globally accessible soil data is to identify which crops can be grown where. CropBASE (https://cropbase.org) aims to do just that, by combining soil, climate and crowd-sourced data to answer the `what, where and when’ questions that we will need to ask for future agriculture.

These are just a handful of apps and portals available to delve into the treasures of soil. We hope that by highlighting the complexity and importance of soils with modern technology we can raise awareness about the importance of healthy soils across the globe. This will help to reveal the rich diversity of soils between places and impart some basic knowledge for assessing soil properties.

Thanks to modern technology, unlocking the vital secrets of soils is becoming easier.

Eleanor Hobley receives funding from The Technical University of Munich and The German Ministry for Education and Research.

Darrell G. Schulze receives funding from the U. S. Department of Agriculture, Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service, and the U. S. Department of Agriculture, Natural Resources Conservation Service.

David A. Robinson receives funding from the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, part of NERC.

Ebrahim Jahanshiri isemployed by Crops For the Future Research Centre a research institute that receives funding from the Ministry of Agriculture Malaysia and guaranteed by both Malaysian government and Nottingham University.

Matt Aitkenhead receives funding from the Scottish Government's Rural and Environment Science and Analytical Services Division (RESAS), and from Innovate UK.

Niels H. Batjes receives funding from the Netherlands Government; ISRIC is an independent foundation by Dutch law.

Tomislav Hengl does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond the academic appointment above.

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Headline News from PaymentsNews.com - July 12, 2017 http://ift.tt/2tdDnuu

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