
Show HN: Africa's Top Tech Talent On-demand - gichuru
https://www.kuhustle.com/
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iamjeff
Hi Gichuru. My first introduction to you was when I read a TechCrunch article
3 years ago about one of your hacks [1]. The article portrayed you in a very
positive and your pitch was something that I identified with immediately. Glad
to see you taking another larger bet with KuHustle and all the best. Anyway,
at the risk of sounding completely tangential, I have been eager to get some
software development bootcamp training and, while Andela [2] is perhaps the
gold standard here, is out of reach for an inexperienced guy like myself. Now,
Moringa is an ideal alternative, but $2,500 of tuition fees repaid over a 24
months period [3] seems like the sort of thing debt nightmares are made of. I
really want to learn to code and need your advice about cheaper bootcamps that
have an opening (usually) around September. Back to the thread: really cool
concept in an otherwise unproven market. Congratulations on it and all the
best going forward. Wish I could be more helpful than a simple
congratulations, but I hope that it counts.

[1] Twpple Hack, Built By Kenyan Duo, Connects Small Businesses With Social
Media “Big Wigs”- [https://techcrunch.com/2013/10/27/twpple-hack-built-by-
kenya...](https://techcrunch.com/2013/10/27/twpple-hack-built-by-kenyan-duo-
connects-small-businesses-with-social-media-big-wigs/) [2]
[https://boards.greenhouse.io/andela/jobs/221859#.V1E-kpMrKRt](https://boards.greenhouse.io/andela/jobs/221859#.V1E-kpMrKRt)
[3] [http://moringaschool.com/finance](http://moringaschool.com/finance)

~~~
iamjeff
*edit Congratulations on it and all the best going forward. Wish I could be more helpful than just dishing out a simple congratulatory message, but I hope that it counts.

~~~
gichuru
Thank you @iamjeff

Thank you for the kind words. Most people on here will advise you to start
coding right away and I agree with them 100%. 2-3 hours everyday, use
codeacademy or one of those websites and reference stack overflow when you get
stuck. By September you will have a product or two that you can share on
Hacker News

~~~
iamjeff
Thank you for the input. That is something that I would like to do; perhaps
September I can hit you up with a demo as well. Thank you reminding me that it
can be done- in a way, I feel like I may have really needed that. Once again,
all the best.

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gichuru
Hi, I'm Sam, we built Kuhustle after we discovered a large pool of growing
Tech Talent in Africa that was untapped. Africa already has a community of
freelancers on other online platforms but the local market is largely
overlooked. Today we are thrilled to announce version 1.0 that allows our
freelance community to get vetted and find work.

We would love to hear what you think about Kuhustle 1.0 and happy to answer
any questions or comments!

~~~
JBReefer
How significant is the savings to using African talent over, say, Eastern
European or Asian?

What's the most commonly spoken language by your freelancers? French/English
or something less globally competitive?

What region do most of your freelancers come from?

Godspeed and good luck!

~~~
gichuru
Thank you @JBReefer !

Some of the advantages include a large english speaking population. Africa has
54 states, of which 23 are english speaking countries and 21 have their
official language as French but speak English as well, the second would be
countries like Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania have a closer time-zone proximity to
Europe and finally we have thousands of young graduates looking for work. The
pricing difference is negligible at around 5% lower for top tech talent in
comparison to Europe.

The biggest deterrent has always been the price of internet connectivity and
that has recently become very affordable at around $50 for 10 Megabyte due to
high internet penetration and not to mention mobile money. Kenya happens to
have had the 10 largest community on Elance before the merger with Odesk and
that has been our testing market.

Thank you and blessings

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CreativeAkili
If you can curate the top talent and address trust + quality issues then
there's something. Perhaps even borrow from Andela's models of continuous
training for the talent.

~~~
gichuru
Thank you @CreativeAkili !!

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ochieng
Pretty much the kind of site that the Tech Community has been craving for in
Kenya. Creating employment for the youth. Good work kuhustle.co.ke!

~~~
gichuru
Thank you!

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geofree
Terrific idea, I'd love to see some basic comparison to other outsourced
regions (eastern europe, india, etc). Size, growth, price.

~~~
gichuru
Hi @Geofree, The tech industry in Africa is a $2.7B market growing at
estimated 8.5% annually, its extremely segmented and data may vary from one
region to another. The pricing is almost similar to india, no language
barriers and timezone difference is closer to Europe. We have the advantage of
the first mover in the region and hopefully have better data in a year or two.

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majani
What is the incentive for an employer or freelancer to choose this over a
global marketplace?

~~~
gichuru
Thank you @majani,

Kuhustle is a global marketplace. The incentive is the guaranteed quality of
service compared to other traditional freelance platforms. By plugging in a
product managers between the employer and freelancer, Kuhustle is able to take
away the process headaches of product design and delivery and offer greater
convenience to the client.

