African Tech Round-Up

Safaricom and Craft Silicon both took an “L” this past week. As it turns out, they neglected to trademark the Little Cabs brand name before launching their ride-sharing service some weeks ago. And now, they’ve had to drop the word “Cab” from their brand after the “Little Cab” trademark-holder went to court to defend his right to use that name. From now on, they are to be known as Little. The whole situation is more than a little embarrassing to say the least, and reminds me of the wisdom MiPhone Founder and CEO, Alpesh Patel shared on the show some months ago, about how important it is to “dot the i’s and cross the t’s” when it comes to securing one’s commercial intellectual property. Nevertheless, I’m sure the folks at Safaricom and Craft Silicon have learned their lesson. This week’s African Tech Round-up also features a chat Andile Masuku had with Brendan Horan. Brendan is an executive vice president of MiX Telematics— a fleet and mobile asset management solutions business that’s listed on both the Johanne