African Venture: Greed Kills - Comments (0)

Category: Behind the Lines,Venture in Africa
Author: John Malone
Date: 22nd June, 2006 @ 10:44:54 AM

You hear success breeds success. I don’t agree.

Success breeds moral failure, certainly.

Greed and envy are two ugly monsters that, when they rear their heads, slime all over things.
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The African Venture Grows Up - Comments (0)

Category: Behind the Lines,Venture in Africa
Author: John Malone
Date: 21st June, 2006 @ 04:27:34 PM

The joint venture we started with the JKUAT was inconveniently called “The JKUAT-MMS Information Technology Centre.” We didn’t mind the second billing because, despite the fact that MMS provided the main manpower and funding for the curriculum development, and the initial computer and software capital, it was the JKUAT that was providing the brand for the education, and that was very important.

Additionally, the university supplied a couple of broken down buildings (scarcely more than concrete huts) – which we shared with a university program – and the dirt between and around them. The university – actually, professors Thairu, and Vice-Chancellor Ratemo Michieka – helped the venture succeed by keeping money-grubbing faculty away from the funds being generated, and out of the classrooms.
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My African Joint Venture (J/V) - Comments (1)

Category: Behind the Lines,Venture in Africa
Author: John Malone
Date: @ 03:19:39 PM

I became an investor in Kenya, in east Africa, in 1993. I started a company named “Diamond Systems, Ltd.” and we began, as our motto said, to deliver “World Class Computers at World Market Prices.”

We became something of an overnight sensation in Kenya, especially Nairobi, because we conducted ourselves in a nearly unprecedented way: (1) we did not pay bribes (sitoi kitu kidoogo); (2) we did pay customs taxes; (3) we advertised our prices in the newspaper (so that owners knew what their employees actually paid for computers).

Almost overnight, we became very well known, and attracted the attention of one of the most influential educators in Kenya, Professor Henry Thairu, the equivalent of the Dean of Faculty at the only national technical university in the country, the Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology.

Professor Thairu and I became known to each other, and agreed that the future of Kenya, in part, rested in technical training in information technology. We also discovered that each of us was a believer is Jesus Christ, so we had that in common, and our relationship found a bond of trust and communication that facilitated our working together.

Our joint venture, springing from our discussions, envisioned a poor country’s Leland’s farm (Stanford) with a technology park associated with the campus. That park would be in Phase II of our venture. The primary work was to get a curriculum in place to certify, give diplomas, and degrees to students who were not able to be enrolled in the university due to lack of seats, despite having qualified by test score.

The joint venture was duly drawn up. When countries (Kenya) are involved, the proper document to accomplish this is a “Memorandum of Agreement (MOA).” Professor Thairu, notably an honest and competent administrator in an environment not known for such traits, had the document drawn up, and guided it through all the bureaucracy of the university for approval.

The finished MOA was a 50-50 partnership between my company (Micro Mini Systems, Inc.) and the university (JKUAT), with the stipulation that the operation would be managed by Diamond Systems, Ltd. of Kenya.

The venture was launched at the beginning of 1997. It was an unbridled success from the outset.

Where’s The Radio Broadcast? - Comments (3)

Category: Behind the Lines
Author: John Malone
Date: 12th September, 2005 @ 12:21:26 PM

It would be pretty wearying to write the whole story of what happened to our radio broadcast.

In short, it got replaced with something more attractive to Wilkins Communications, despite our contractual provisions.

We were on 3 stations: Indianapolis (WBRI), Kansas City (KCNW), and Omaha (KLNG). We paid, through our local church, $7,000 per month for the first year, and then $5,500 per month according to a contract signed this May. Our contract was a revolving one, this time for six months until the end of October, with a provisional 30-day notice to terminate.

On August 24th, we received a fax communication that threatened to take us off the air August 31st unless certain payments – which were not all due, by the way – were made. The brother in our church responsible for payments offered to wire transfer funds, despite the wrongness of the charges. He was told by Mitchell Mathis, VP of Wilkins Communications that it did not matter: we were off the air.
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