When Charles Murito’s parents sent him to good schools that had amazing libraries, they didn’t know that they were preparing him for his current role at Google as Kenya Country Manager in Kenya. Charles was raised in Limuru and attended Nairobi Primary and St. Mary’s before going to USA for his undergraduate. He has worked at various companies (Wananchi Group, MTV Africa, and Warner Bros.) and his mantra is, “have a sense of purpose in order to make a difference, on a micro and macro level.”
Watch Google Kenya's Charles Murito at Startup Grind Nairobi, and catch our highlights below.
Everything is a Startup - Including Your Home
According to Charles, Google Kenya is a startup. In fact, everything is when it just starts. Talking about his early career, Charles notes MTV was a startup in 2006 when they launched their African channel. A startup is any company that is struggling with certain resources and needs that one need to fulfill in order to deliver benefits to users. Under this definition, suggests Charles, even your home is a startup since there’s always some problem we are trying to solve.
No Child is Born Running
Thinking more broadly, Kenya's startup ecosystem is, too, in its startup phase. To grow, we must build a proper angel community in Kenya, and for this to be successful, we must have more companies registered, and have these entrepreneurs empowered to share their stories and help one another.
This is the natural process of building a startup community, with eventually successful companies becoming sources of mentorship and funding for up and coming startups. As a country, we need to build platforms and companies that will scale globally, and in so doing, employ our nation, says Charles Murito.
As a market, Kenya is similar to other African markets, as well as those of Latin America and parts of Asia.
For example OkHi a local mapping company is scaling to Nigeria and India, while Cellulant is available across 16 countries. Both seem like natural extensions of the business.
But building to scale takes time. Once product-market fit is established and the founders begin seeking investors, they must show potential funders the problem they are solving both locally and globally, have a prototype, and show that the solution is picking up customers, according to Murito. This means building a company to last, rather than chasing a quick buck, and focusing on the product rather than an exit.
No Success Without Glory
To tell Kenya's story, Murito asked an impertinent question: “What is everyone else doing across the world that we aren’t doing in Kenya?”
They are creating original content, he says, meant for the global audience.
Kenya's content, by comparison, is generally created for and consumed by a hyper local audience. With stories so deeply customized to a Kenyan viewer or reader, stories of Kenya's startup ecosystem cannot scale beyond its borders.
To become relevant, Kenya must tell compelling stories that connect widely. For this work, Kenya celebrates people like Wanuri Kahiu who are telling stories like From A Whisper, being watched globally.
As Kenyans, we must celebrate our successes and the lessons learned from our failures alike. It is these lessons that will teach fellow founders how to eventually succeed, suggested Murito.
Aim for the Stars & Work on the Moonshots
"I’ll always shoot for the stars. Even if I don’t reach them, I’ll land on the moon - and that’s still pretty far," says Murito.
Google has always aimed to encourage creativity. One such project, Beba Pay, has become a launching pad to other big ideas. A digital payment card, Beba Pay was created through a partnership with Equity Bank, and now offers Kenyans the ability to use NFC & MasterCards at many outlets across the country. This partnership opened up the digital payments ecosystem in the country, allowing the creation of Pepea card, my1963, Jambo Pay - Nairobi's most popular digital wallets.
As a company, Google viewed the partnership as a long term play, allowing more people to come online and make transactions. They are still eyeing over 500,000,000 Africans who will be online in the next 5 years - and know they'll be much more valuable customers if they can actually transact online, compared to simply surf. With commerce now on Kenya's web, more businesses are soon to go online, and maps are soon to follow.
Education Builds the Nation
Charles began getting restless while in London. He felt the pull of Kenya, wanting to become part of the change happening in the country. The tool of empowerment, he believes, is connection to the internet, which will open up the whole nation to new information, access to education, possibilities for the creation of a business - and in so doing, balance out the opportunities of the nation's youth.
Education should provide a pathway to create something and build the nation's greatest talent. For Google's part, the company has a handful of initiatives to encourage growth, including Google for Entrepreneurs and Google Developers Launchpad, both aimed at mentoring entrepreneurs.
Kenya is also home to the Strathmore Digital Advertising Academy, established to equip students and professionals with digital advertising skills to build their business. Google also launched Digify Africa, with the aim training 1 million Africans in digital skills to enable them to scale their businesses.
Charles Murito’s own passion for content and arts has led him to support the local cultural scene, too, enabling artists to run their own exhibitions and sell their art to both locals and tourists.
His parting advice: “Have some ambition. Figure out what your purpose is and once you do that, use it as your North Star, your guiding star.”