This was the clarion call by Stephan M. Wagner, Professor of Supply Chain Management, Head of Department(Dean),Zurich when he was speaking to staff and students from the Faculty of Business and Management Science gathered at the University of Nairobi towers, Main Campus.
Prof. Wagner spoke passionately on the need for corporates to engage startups because of their innovations. He pointed out that in Africa, Kenya is among the leading tech innovations hub. Others in the continent are South Africa, Nigeria and Egypt.
He pointed out that about 42% of startups die in the first one year, mainly due to wrong strategic orientation or direction by the management, lack of market for their products and services, limited access to capital from venture capital or commercial banks, talent disconnect or not getting the right manpower, poor business governance and lastly, too many government regulations like in the case of Kenya.
He called on Corporates to come to the aid of startups by organizing startups competitions, networking among startups and building startup ecosystem. Encouraging startups incubations, organizing accelerators where startups get a chance to meet venture capitalists and get funding for their budding ideas.
Speaking on behalf of the Faculty of Business and Management Sciences, Dr. Thomas Ombati, encouraged students keen on doing research on startups to look into their areas of operations like technology, transport and logistics. "What makes buyers or customers buy from a given startup ? What makes startups attractive?" he asked.
Students were urged to read widely and publish in high impact journals and to avoid those journals which charge to publish articles. By paying for publications, the editors get compromised.
