Powering innovation: Safaricom’s role in engineering advancement in East Africa

With unwavering determination and an unquenchable thirst for computers, Felix Mmene changed his mind from pursuing a law career to engineering.

He delved headfirst into the world of coding, programming and technology to pursue his passion in computer science.

Mmene works at Safaricom as Cluster Tribe Technical Lead and is a trailblazer engineer in every word. He shelved his interest in legal studies after high school and decided to do computer packages instead, stumbling on his hidden talent in the process.

“I discovered a new thing that did provoke my interest, and that was computers. I began researching and before I could join university, I changed my course from doing law to computer science,” he said.

Since then, Mmene fell in love with computers, nurtured his talent and chose a career out of it. “I am able to move an idea into life and see the value of that idea being alive in people’s lives.”

At Safaricom, Mmene said, he has a space to express himself and learn on his own by trying out new things. Safaricom has given staff an opportunity to come up with different solutions for a problem, he said.

“Unlike other areas where you feel you are so boxed into one thing, Safaricom allows us to experiment, and I have had a chance to improve in many things from the time I started,” he said.

He said Safaricom has been intentional in growing engineers across the board. His colleague Mitchell Mueni introduces herself with courage and enthusiasm as “an engineer at heart”.

She is the M-Pesa product manager for third-party integrations at Safaricom. Mueni has pursued software engineering for more than seven years and has been a product manager at Safaricom for one year.

Passion and hard work drove her to pursue an engineering career despite it being a male-dominated field.

“When I was young, I liked everything to do with systems and software. I used to pen the radios and help anyone having problems with their phones. At a young age, I knew I would be in system engineering,” Mueni said.

While in primary and high school, she aligned her studies to focus on the subjects that would lead her to pursue an engineering course.

“Being a lady, I was already within the craft; I knew what I was doing. It is more of when opportunity meets preparedness. Getting into the field was more of great opportunity,” she said.

Mueni incorporates artificial intelligence to help in coding and other engineering works. AI has helped to write code in whichever context of prompting languages they prefer.

“I would love if we could incorporate AI further into how we can use it to transform lives. At Safaricom, we believe in transforming lives, we could use it to bring zero harm,” she said.

“Most of my career has been in software engineering, mostly within the front-end craft. I love Java Script and everything about it,” she said.

As a product manager at Safaricom, she deals with how partners and businesses are onboarded within the M-Pesa Super Applications.

“Now I am within the specific field of super apps. We have M-Pesa super apps for consumers and businesses. The business one is for our merchants and the consumer one is for the general public,” she said.

“For those two, we have many applications called the third-party integration of various partners. If a partner has a product, they can come on board and their apps can be on the super apps, which have more than 14 million downloads as of today.”

Mueni said Safaricom has made their lives as engineers easy by providing tools to help integrate their work.

She learns a lot from her colleagues, who are knowledgeable on the craft.

“We learn from our peers and get to have a better way to code that is futuristic. It is easy to pass on from one engineer to the next. It helps you to become a better engineer,” she said.

PASSION FOR THE CRAFT

For Duncan Kabira, the passion for engineering began at a young age with inspiration from his parents. His curious mind led him to open up every gadget he could get his hands on. His eyes would light up with wonder as he explored the inner workings of the device.

“This brought out a lot of curiosity in me as I tried to understand how they work and what the little details inside meant,” he said.

“It propelled me towards my educational trajectory, where I decided to pursue a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering.”

The early fascination with engineering only grew stronger with time and now, as a successful engineer, his enthusiasm from the field remained the same.

Kabira works at Safaricom’s Information Technology department. In his role at Safaricom, he deals with hardware, storage, databases and all about technology to propel it as a service provider.

He said Safaricom is working with various partners on cloud computing, including the Kenya Wildlife Service. Safaricom is “at the forefront” in integrating technology for better services. He said technology has evolved, providing a lot of information for people to learn easily online.

“We want to be the partner of choice when it comes to enterprise and organisations to provide infrastructure as a service, cloud services internally and locally,” Kabira said.

“We see ourselves as key players in providing services for other organisations who would necessarily not be interested in scaling out big data centres.”

Safaricom has partnered with universities to influence the curriculum to align what is taught in schools with what is happening in the professional field.

“We have programmes where we reach out to young professional engineers to understand how technology is advancing and the areas they need to focus on.”

Through outreach programmes and internships, they provide young engineers with experience of the industry.

Safaricom is also implementing cloud-based services providing examinations to give engineers certifications on what they offer. Kabira called on young engineers to embrace technology as it is an integral part of learning.

DECODE 3.0

Safaricom held a three-day Engineering Summit from March 18 to 20 titled Decode, providing a platform for young engineers, scientists, tech enthusiasts, innovators and stakeholders to engage in discussions and envision the future of engineering together.

Under the theme “Charting East Africa’s Digital Destiny”, the event championed young innovators’ role in transforming Kenya’s engineering landscape through innovation, inclusivity and sustainability.

Safaricom CEO Peter Ndegwa, who flagged the 2025 Engineering Summit, said engineers have been provided with a dynamic platform to showcase their technical prowess and connect with the broader tech community.

He said it is a testament to Safaricom’s commitment to being the technology partner of choice for young innovators on the digital landscape.

Safaricom Decode served as a platform to showcase engineering excellence, cutting-edge technology advancements and thought leadership.

This emphasised on the alignment with national strategies, the promotion of financial inclusion and the responsible use of technology, all in pursuit of shaping Kenya’s digital future. Safaricom is using AI in numerous ways to better their services.

“As a tech organisation, we look forward to providing our customers with highly personalised services and experiences across all our platforms,” Ndegwa said.

Safaricom’s AI-led operations is based on three copyrights. The first one is AI customer experience, where they are creating a more streamlined and engaging customer experience. This has been made possible through Zuri (an artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot assistant).

The CEO added that they integrate technology to pre-warn customers when they are about to be defrauded. He said Safaricom has used technology to solve societal challenges.

“Through the services we offer, we empower people to opportunities and knowledge,” he said.

He called on young people to embrace their skills and knowledge through the opportunities.

“If you are a student and are not examining what AI can contribute, whether you are an engineering student or not, explore the area,” he said.

Speaking during the same event, ICT PS John Tanui encouraged young engineers to use technology to create and produce more products for the country.

He said the government will continue to look at the policy space and how to facilitate manufacturing in the country. This, he, said, will not only apply to smart devices but also to other products.

“Malaysia exports 50 times what we export, South Korea exports 100 times what we export, and they beat us in the focus sector, the electronics, electricals and smart space,” Tanui said.

“I want to encourage our young people and enterprises like Safaricom to focus. It is not only big companies like Safaricom but also others.”

He said there should be a strong linkage between the industry and the academia, adding that the state is willing to facilitate the process.

“We have seen the manufacture of fibre using the Safaricom network manufactured locally,” the PS said.

“Two years ago, 100 per cent of fibre was being imported into the country. “Today, a significant percentage is actually produced in our country. This is starting to happen in terms of smart manufacturing.”

He challenged young people to explore what other products can be manufactured, saying engineers are trained for one purpose: to create and produce things.

“That is a privileged position. Let us take advantage of this and encourage our techies to play their role and create products in our country,” he said.

LIFETIME EXPERIENCE

Safaricom Decode served as a platform to showcase engineering excellence, cutting-edge technology advancements and thought leadership.

It also emphasised alignment with national strategies, promotion of financial inclusion and the responsible use of technology, all in pursuit of shaping Kenya’s digital future.

Participants were treated to a showcase of the country’s and Safaricom’s engineering practices and products in fintech, such as the Virtual Reality experiences and games, and other innovations from partners and sponsors.

The third edition of the annual Safaricom Engineering Summit provided a platform for young engineers, scientists, tech enthusiasts, innovators and stakeholders to engage in knowledge exchange and discussions and envision the future of engineering.

Exhibitions included Safaricom, Huawei and Oracle.