Of course no one will make it simply because no one really needs it... We would want it but no one really needs it. It's like vitamin pills... Everyone agrees they are great... But a smaller percent takes them. What you need in a market this small is to establish a real pain. Make a painkiller not an idea people think is good but are unwilling to fork out real money.

Our love for things western means we never get to try out stuff, unless a muzungu makes the thing (and if at all it will be made its the musings who will do it), I mean all those roi do not add up, the financial sense is not present since the population is poor and no one will buy the thing.

But come to think of it, if only we took some time to study our backyards then come up with relevant curriculum based on the same instead of copy pasting what akina mit have, then maybe the engineers might have seen sense. But for now they are busy trying to come up with a new m-farmer app.

I know - right? Ma m-vitu ni mob! all of them using USSD...

One would be... go to @muchr and tell him - I want to make an ugali making machine! I want you to commit X dollars for it! I want you to give that guy (pointing at @tycho) X dollars to keep in escrow! if @Muchr and 100k others take up your offer (kickstarter style) - you are in business! But if your strategy is to build it, brand it, ship it and they will come.... you will not be in business for very long! As some wise guy once said - "Build it and they will come," is not a strategy; it's a prayer!!!

Good to see that you have conditionally committed to the ugali maker... based on price!

I asked a couple of questions - none of which you have answered... how much are you willing to pay for the ugali maker? is the pain of cooking ugali enough to make you think of buying a machine for X dollars to cook it?
2) Remember my assertion that people upgrade away from Ugali? this is just an observation that as soon as people have more disposable income i.e. have X dollars to spare for your contraption - they don't eat ugali as much as you thought they would - I would like to hear your response to this observation. The reason Unga is a big deal is exactly explained by this... the people who eat the solid paste frequently are actually the ones that won't afford to buy version 0.1! The many poor people rich in votes but a bit short on cash!
3) Steve Jobs was the master of reality distortion - something that you have been caught in... iPad 1 was not the 1st tablet... I pointed you to the failure that was the Apple Newton plus the fact that Microsoft had like a tablet in 2002! (remember the expression - the second mouse eats the cheese?).

I am not being negative for no reason, I am asking fundamental questions... really! This is not a science project. Ideally the guy who is making this contraption needs to have a plan.... Anyone watched the underpants gnomes episode of south park?


The key for him is STEP 2! remember Apple did not need to have the iPad flying off the shelves to be 'successful' - you as the ugali maker - needs to!
You need to figure out step 2! @WazuaAdmin - can we have some neon lights here... pointing at the statement YOU ARE NOT APPLE!

I repeat - Answer the following questions to build your case - really simple things you would think:
1) what is the problem (pain you are solving, the job that the person buying the gizmo is hiring it to do)?
2) what is the cost of the solution to 1 above?
3) who are the people you are selling your whatyamacallit to and where are they?
4) what is the cost of getting the thingamajig to their doorstep (or supermarket)?
5) do these people think that the problem is worth spending the amount specified in step 2 + step 4 above?
6) how many people answer affirmatively to the question in step 5 above?

@Tycho introduced an interesting aspect - the process. I say - if you want to build an ugalimaker... start a kickstarter! and test 1 to 6 BEFORE committing cash and waiting for them 'to come'.

or maybe - let's throw away all initial analysis and pesky questions from naysayers and 'believe' we are steve jobs and attack the market after inventing our thingamabob! It's entrepreneurship right? it has everything to do with belief and passion!

Ati you just nailed it in your last sentence...full circle

I guess his job is half done.

The idea is the beginning of everything, nothing exists today without that. The argument was that the Ugali maker cannot be viable since there's no market. Mine was that to blow that off...now it would be nice if someone actually got that IDEA from ndemo and run with it...because buyers like me are waiting

The jamaa should go for it. There's a market for everything, how you sell it is what matters. It would be a lie to assume there's no market

I know times have changed, the days when a guy working in his workshop inventing a bicycle Tyre tube and the same going on to have lots of success are gone.

Siku hizi returns are the fore most consideration, and the days when the scientific minds were mostly idle are gone, the same now are begging for customer care jobs huko telcos (no offence to the men and women who sort our issues on the phone), while chasing around loans to get the latest drive.

But I honestly think as a society we are messed up, we are copying too much what the west have, sadly that includes their standards, on that route we will never accomplish anything, our people will continue to be without tap watter because we think the building code ya britain has to followed when building our dams.

We will continually die in our houses since we have no transportation, since our standards for building roads are copy pasted from usa and the cars allowed on our roads have to meet the same emission standards as the Europeans.