It is high time Africans began to learn how to beat competition and standard because we are in a global world where the giants are flexing muscles to remain relevant and it is almost impossible to avoid external and internal competition. Without doubt, many African wannapreneurs and entrepreneurs will be discouraged through counter argument drawn from the death of Mxit. Why will you build another social network? Don’t compete with the “silly con” valley… blah…blah…blah. These expressions may be reasonable considering established facts and figures, but I challenge the ego of facts and logic; how factual is fact and how logical is logic that they pretend not to contain elements of “Illogicality”. Indeed , we can’t avoid this challenge; it is time to flex our mental and physical muscles to prevent doom.
" Amazon is coming to Nigeria" ! And so f**k what? Anyway, another one will come to thwart your niche; I am also coming. We are all looking for opportunities. So, think out of the box – fact, logic, illogicality,sentiment,etc., are the “box”. Success, failure and competition have come to kiss us. We can not run away – flex that tiny muscle!
I don’t know exactly why I feel this post (and african startup founders) need this video for some motivation (about muscles):
The kid in the middle represents konga/amazon/jumia, square/paypal/paga, linda/nairaland (the real startups/businesses and their [future] competitors).
The one on green short represents developers after hearing about linda’s banana island property and talking boy represents myself and everyone else talking about what they wanna do and how we think it should be done even though we have almost no experience or data.
I leave my fellow developers and startup founders with this sweet music:
Hey @Ayobami_Ogundiran I can assure you startups die every.single.day! Not for conspiracy reasons of the big bad ‘silly con’ valley (as you say) but simply because ‘customers’ don’t want what a startup is offering. Mxit doesn’t prove that they died because of any ‘African’ factors (based on what I’ve read), so I don’t see how you can use their experience as a proxy for other ‘African founders’.
And I know you have interest in this ‘social platform’ space (judging from your earlier posts) and maybe you didn’t get the reception you expected/wanted (judging from Radar comments), but my advice to you is look for validation with your ‘customers’. Get data…and follow it (not your hear). Mxit had a great ride and now it’s over, if there’s any lesson to be learnt, you have to execute like demons to survive a competitive environment.