KARANJA MACHARIA

Co-Founder & Chief Executive Officer, Mobile Planet

Karanja Macharia is a Co-Founder and the Chief Executive Officer of Mobile Planet Limited (MPL). MPL is East Africa’s largest Wireless Application Service Provider (WASP). Over the last ten years, Karanja has been in charge of Strategy and Product Development at MPL and has successfully steered the company from a three (3) person start up to a dynamic team of thirty two (32).

He was responsible for developing the initial core software that has been successfully run by Safaricom Limited over the last nine (9) years and currently generates tens of millions of SMS’s a month. This basic set of software tools has been used by Mobile Planet and Safaricom to introduce a wide array of firsts in Africa.

Karanja counts many firsts amongst his achievements in the region. The latest was his role in the sale of a minority stake of MPL to Google Inc., the first investment the technology giant made in Africa.