Africa’s Talking C.E.O Bilha Ndirangu Steps Down After 7 Years Of Leadership
Nairobi, Kenya, 14th June 2021 — After a successful 7-year tenure, Bilha Ndirangu will be stepping down as Africa’s Talking CEO to pursue other interests on the continent. Bilha will continue to serve on the board of directors and Co-Founder, Samuel Gikandi, will take up his previous role as CEO.
Prior to becoming CEO, Bilha championed the company’s strategic expansion and commercial growth as the company’s CCO. In her role as CEO, she doubled down on these efforts and reassured our mission of a developer-first company. Bilha’s vision and strategic direction continued to empower Software Developers to build sustainable and scalable businesses across the continent. Africa’s Talking currently supports more than 80,000 developers and 6,500 businesses who can access telco services through AT’s SMS, USSD, Voice, Airtime and IoT APIs to scale their business communications solutions.
Bilha’s tenure spanned a period of incredible growth as the company went from a little over 8 employees to scaling to over 100+ employees. Alongside the leadership team, she saw AT scale from one office in Kenya to 11 physical offices across Africa , including presence in over 20 countries. She also oversaw the expansion of the company’s product portfolio, including solutions such as Marketplace and AT Developers.
The Africa’s Talking fraternity (board, employees, shareholders and stakeholders) have been privileged to have experienced the meaningful change Bilha brought to Africa’s Talking and are committed to our continuing track-record of enabling developers to build sustainable and scalable businesses by democratising access to communications and payments infrastructure across the continent.
We take this opportunity to wish her all the best in the next chapter of her career.
“I will always be grateful that Bilha took a chance on us as the founders of AT when she joined a fledgling startup in 2014. She has left an indelible mark on the organization and that will be her enduring legacy for us and for the developer ecosystem. I am confident that she will make great contributions to this continent and beyond as she starts a new chapter. We will continue to engage with Bilha at a board level, gaining from her insights and experience as we continue to serve developers within the ecosystem.” said Africa’s Talking Co-Founder, Samuel Gikandi.
“I am thankful for my time at Africa’s Talking and the opportunity I had to work and learn with an incredibly talented and dedicated group of people. Over the years, our accomplishments were inspiring, particularly the fantastic team (ATeam) we have at Africa’s Talking (AT) and our impact on the African tech ecosystem. AT has established itself as a predominant choice for software developers looking to integrate payments and communications solutions in their applications to build impactful and scalable solutions. After a fantastic run, I am ready for my next chapter and will stay close to the company as an advisor. Working with the ATeam has been an excellent learning opportunity and gratifying as I watched people grow and propel the company’s vision. I’m forever grateful for the chance to have been part of the AT story.” said Africa’s Talking outgoing C.E.O, Bilha Ndirangu.
About Bilha Ndirangu
Bilha Ndirangu is the Chief Executive Officer at Africa’s Talking (AT), a Pan-African mobile technology company with its headquarters in Nairobi. Africa’s Talking is a Pan-African technology company providing software developers a way to bring their ideas to life and help them build sustainable businesses with ease. As CEO, Bilha is in charge of guiding the company’s vision and opening new doors through strategic partnerships. Prior to joining AT, Bilha was a senior project manager at Dalberg Global Development Advisors in its Nairobi office where she advised varied clients including national governments, multilaterals, foundations and private sector companies. Her projects spanned multiple sectors ranging from technology, agriculture and energy. As the first employee of the Dalberg Nairobi office, she also helped grow the office from one consultant to a team of forty consultants advising clients across Africa. Additionally, Bilha was also recently accepted into the Endeavor Network; a network that supports and mentors entrepreneurs who have demonstrated a potential for rapid scale and expansion of their business.
Have any questions? Reach out to Shamsa Abdulkadir at sabdulkadir@africastalking.com.
About Africa’s Talking
Africa’s Talking is a Pan-African business started in 2010 to help developers and enterprises alike bring their ideas to life with ease. We do this by integrating with the different telecommunication companies (telcos) and aggregators and exposing their services through a unified platform that anyone can consume. Currently, we have 6 product APIs (SMS, USSD, Voice, Airtime, Payments and Internet of things (IoT)) with coverage in over 20 African countries. Our platform now serves over 80,000 developers and 6500 businesses all across Africa and beyond. We are making huge strides towards aiding most, if not all, companies and developers in Africa to build exceptional solutions and sustainable Pan-African businesses.
