Ransford Owusu

Esoko

Esoko is a pioneering technology company powering Africa's digital revolution. The company does this through the development of simple but powerful mobile and web-based tools and services that empower organizations seeking to provide critical services to the last mile. Our mission is to improve the revenues of Africa's rural people and we hope to drive economic empowerment for Africa's rural folks through digital and financial inclusion. Esoko started in 2005 as an experiment to see how the emergence of mobile technology in Africa, could improve the lives of rural communities across the continent. The first project enabled the delivery of market prices via SMS, in support of work that FoodNet was doing with MTN in Uganda. In addition, Esoko set up a call centre to support local languages and address issues with literacy. Over time we realized farmers needed much more than price information, and added weather alerts, crop advice, and linking buyers with sellers. Various research finds such services can improve incomes for farmers by roughly 10%. The company then leveraged its technical platform and field force for the collection of information, using tablet devices and smartphones. This technology, Insyt, became the backbone of many large scale social protection programs in Ghana – helping agencies convert from paper, thus reducing cost, time and errors in targeting beneficiaries. Organizations all over Africa have used our technology to collect and disseminate different types of information on people and markets via smart phone, tablet, web, SMS and voice SMS. Esoko has evolved over the years but remains committed to improving the welfare of rural communities by empowering them – and the businesses that serve them – through mobile technology. Join us!