“Sote” which in Swahili means “everybody” is the idea around which the Sote Hub was formed. Back in 2010, in Voi,Taita Taveta, an idea was born from the SOTE ICT Project. The hub is mainly focusing on being a business incubator for graduates, exposing them to mentorship, training, and networking opportunities over a 12-month period while changing the norm where tour guides, not techies, rule the roost.
Through this, Sote Hub hopes young entrepreneurs can turn their ideas into viable commercial entities, creating jobs for themselves and others while also promoting the culture of using ICT to create innovations that will not only help the particular students in the schools within rural areas facing limited or no ICT exposure but also help the educators as well.
Sote Hub is building entrepreneurs, designers, and programmers from , and they have a clear pathway to forming sustainable and profitable business that solve societal challenges and have the potential to employ hundreds of other.
This has been made possible through funding they have been receiving for the last five years by grants from Slovak Aid, but there is potential for a partnership with USAID as they plan to expand outside Kenya to countries like Rwanda, Tanzania, South Africa and Ghana over the next five to 10 years.
The numbers are quite impressive, reaching out to over 5800 students and 200 teachers, Sote Hub is now boasting with over 18 startups registered for incubation over the next 12 months focusing on building apps and solutions in health, technology, design, environment, education, entertainment, transport, security, property management and media.
The Hub addresses certain shortcomings whereby the education systems in most Sub-Saharan African countries do not invest in skills development as the focus is in providing the prerequisites of a white collar job in the formal and urban sector leaving one unprepared for the “real” world.
By expanding to Kwale it means the hub believes in the high competitive edge in terms of trade, industry, mining and tourism due to its strategic location and natural assets. However, the youth unemployment and underemployment remains a major challenge within the area.
Image Credit: SOTE Hub
