The guys at Ushahidi (means “testimony” in Swahili), widely known in Kenya for mapping real-time citizen reports and crisis-related information to help civilians avoid conflicts, just announced a couple of interesting things a few days ago.

They managed to secure a $200,000 financing from Humanity United, an organization focused on ending modern-day slavery and mass atrocities, and will move on from local Kenya to the whole African continent and maybe to the whole world, soon.

“The Ushahidi platform will soon empower anyone in a crisis situation to utilize the tool for their own community, and provide a central place for citizens to easily post critical information via mobile phone or the Web,” said Randy Newcomb, President and CEO of Humanity United.

Another reason for the press release is the new layout of the site which is now easier to be use. Design by a small group of volunteer developers, these guys will get at least my applause for coming up with a solution so fast.

Last thing, the Ushahidi platform is going to be available worlwide, pretty soon and more important, it’s going to be free.

MIH Internet Africa is a division of MIH Internet (part of the Naspers group). Their mandate is to build cool web and mobile products for the emerging African market. MIH Africa was in the news recently when they acquired a majority stake in Afrigator, the African blog aggregator.

At present they host Haiya, a Kenyan site delivering music/entertainment news and blogs. They have some exciting and challenging products in the pipeline targeted for the Nigerian market, which is the largest internet audience in Africa. In our series of office photos we previously featured another Naspers unit, MIH Swat.

Previous office photos:

MIH SWAT
24.com Digital
At Play interactive unit
Quirkstation
MXIT

We have confirmed in the past that the Apple iPhone will be released later this month and what the iPhone pricing could look like.

While Vodacom did not want to disclose the exact launch date of the Apple iPhone in SA – due to confidentiality agreements with their suppliers – company spokesperson Dot Field confirmed that the iPhone will likely be in stores late September.

Moments ago Bandwidth Blog got the scoop in the latest South African internet acquisition. MIH Print Africa have acquired a majority stake in African blog aggregator Afrigator. This will be huge for the local startup as MIH Africa has investments all over Africa which will help Afrigator reach a larger audience in the African continent. The acquisition also means funding to market and further develop the Afrigator platform. With large internet audiences in SA, Kenya, Egypt and Nigeria Afrigator is in a great position to gain critical mass by combining the audience (bloggers, readers) in these countries. MIH Africa’s objective is to build audiences and communities in Africa and with Afrigator’s platform they can launch into the emerging market to quickly gain market share and also leverage Afrigators existing base.

“We could not have chosen a better partner in MIH Print Africa as their strategy for Africa aligns perfectly with ours and is an important development for the social media space across our continent – validating the importance of blogging and social media in Africa.”

We have covered Afrigator extensively in the past with their beta and mobile launches. Development of Afrigator has been at a good pace considering the team worked on their project part time. The majority stake acquisition opens the doors for the founders to work on the project full time. Two of the minds behind Afrigator, Justin Hartman (Avusa iLab) and Stii Pretorius , will be moving down to Cape Town to develop Afrigator full time.

Below: Stii (right) already settled in the MIH Africa offices.

This means together with funding and gaining access to a larger audience, Afrigator’s platform will also quickly evolve with dedicated development resources. The guys at Afrigator have created a great product in their spare time – its exciting to think what they will build focused on their startup full time.

“Fundamentally this deal is hugely beneficial to all our users as we can all finally focus on Afrigator full-time. We have also employed Lester Hein as our Product Manager who will join the team at the beginning of October and we plan to expand our development team in the near future. “

The acquisition comes as no surprise with investments by 24.com in local social networking company, Blueworld, and minority stake acquisition by cellular giant Vodacom in local social platform Zoopy.

Cape Town has been dubbed ‘Silicon Cape’ (named after Silicon Valley) and is really living up to the title. All the top talent in SA is moving to the Cape with tons of quality startups and innovation coming out of the mother city. Investment for local startups have been scarce to come by and with deals such as Blueworld, Zoopy and now Afrigator it really helps with investor confidence. There is now scope for startups to grow profitable businesses and investors to exit and get return on investment.

The Naspers group’s social media strategy has also really taken off in recent months with local internet guru Matt Buckland moving to 24.com as GM of online publishing and social media (Laaik.it, play.24.com, Spaces, 24.com blogs etc), Rafiq Phillips moving to MIH Swat and then the acquisitions of Blueworld and Afrigator.

Kudos to the Afrigator guys – Mike, Stii, Justin and Mark – for the scoop and acquisition news!

Related posts

MIH Swat office photos

Disclaimer: Charl Norman is co-founder of Blueworld and works within the Naspers/MIH/24 group. Afrigator’s future strategy explained in this post is mere speculation on my behalf.

MNET is the TV powerhouse in South Africa with a decent online portfolio as well. They recently relaunched their online presence for all their channels featuring more social networking features and fresh layout designs. Looking at the other South African TV stations with a web presence e.g. ETV and SABC they are leagues ahead with their online products.

Their offices has a homely feel to it creating a relaxed non corporate working environment. Thanks to Wezzo and Graeme for the photos.

Development wing of the house

Meeting room and waiting / relaxation area

Editors/Video Editors wing

Monitoring shows / Wii / General entertainment. Notice the Big Brother Africa message strap

More copywriters and editors

Outside shot of the M-Net New Media house. There’s a working fountain below, courtesy of Wez

More outside space and a bit of a garden

If you want your office space featured – mail us some pics – check top right for readers email addie