German luxury fashion house Hugo Boss opened its Ksh 173.1 million store at the Westgate Mall to capture a growing wealthier Kenyan middle class who opt for global branded fashion. Kenya will be the gateway to the East Africa market for the 94-year-old fashion house which has 31 stores in 26 countries across Africa according to Hugo Boss Africa region team leader Andreas Pfeiffer. “We decided to start the Nairobi outlet with our anchor brand then expand in the future,” said Andreas Pfeiffer, the Hugo Boss head of Africa operations. “We have started with men’s line as the anchor in…
Author: Khusoko
Khusoko
Khusoko provides market insights into Africa's business investment as well as global trends that impact East African businesses.
Loss-making fashion retailer Deacons (East Africa) PLC board has resolved to be placed under administration due to financial difficulties. “The board of directors of the company have resolved that as a result of the financial difficulties being faced by the company, it is in the best interest of the company and its creditors for the directors to place the company into administration subject to compliance with the provisions of the Insolvency Act,” said Deacons CEO Muchiri Wahome said in a statement. “The primary objective of placing the company under administration is to enable it achieve a better outcome for the…
Liquid Telecom Kenya sees strong growth in business internet services, which accounted for 56% of total sales in 2017, compared with 47% the year before., according to its second 2018 sustainability report. The report revealed that internal reorganisation and value initiatives have helped drive the company’s rapid revenue and profit growth to achieve consistently strong sales growth of 20% a year. “We believe the strength of this business performance reflects the better value and wider range of services we have been able to offer as a result of the financial, transparency and efficiency gains from our sustainability initiatives,” said Adil…
The Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) will go ahead and penalise Standard Chartered Kenya, Equity, Diamond Trust, Co-operative Bank and KCB Group for failing to report suspicious transactions in connection with the theft of funds at the National Youth Service (NYS). Read: CBK Fines 5 Kenya Banks for transacting illegally with the National Youth Service “CBK has reviewed each bank’s response to the penalty assessment and has concluded that the submissions were not sufficient to alter the findings of the investigations and the penalties assessed. Consequently, CBK has levied the penalties as assessed.” the regulator said on Friday in a statement.…
Safaricom has upgraded its Lipa na M-Pesa system to enable customers to make faster and private cashless payments at more than 2,500 sales points by issuing each cashier with distinct till number. This is a change from the previous situation where each shop had a single till. As part of the process, Safaricom and the merchants also re-integrated the till numbers under the new Daraja M-PESA Application Programming Interfaces, which allow for deeper integration. “Millions of customers and thousands of merchants increasingly prefer Lipa Na M-PESA when it comes to payments. Our enhanced integration of Lipa Na M-PESA for the…
Twiga Foods has raised Ksh1 billion investment from the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation (IFC) and the Global Agriculture and Food Security Programme. The investment was co-led by TLcom, a pan-African venture capital (VC) firm with participation from previous investors DOB Equity, 1776, Adolph H.Lundin and Wamda Capital. Twiga Foods is a Kenya-based startup that connects smallholder farmers in rural areas to informal retail vendors in cities. Twiga’s mobile commerce platform enables vendors to order fresh produce for a fair price from farmers across Kenya as and when required. Read : Twiga Food Becomes Kenya’s First Domestic Company to Test Farmers’…