The Foyo Group, a Kigali-based startup dedicated to conceiving, designing and developing mobile applications and providing consultancy management services, is in the process of signing a partnership contract with MTN Rwanda.
The service provider partnership contract between the Foyo Group and MTN Rwanda will see the two corporations share revenue.
The Foyo Group forms part of the kLab innovation hub, in Kigali, and Aphrodice Mutangana, the managing director of the Foyo Group, told HumanIPO kLab is where he meets mentors and business people.
“I help… people who frequent kLab to conceive business ideas [and] improve their business ideas. I show them how to prepare business models and strategies,” said Mutangana.
Mutangana said he works on his business between Monday and Thursday and dedicates Thursday and Friday afternoons to helping others improve their existing businesses.
The Foyo Group was established in November last year with the first challenge to setting up the business being a lack of skills to develop mobi applications. Mutangana however, found an IT partner who took over the application development.
“The second challenge was the startup capital because I didn’t have any source of revenue,” said Mutangana, who addressed this challenge by creating partnerships.
The Foyo Group has created “M-Health”, an application based on the principal “you are what you eat” and is dedicated to disseminating information on a balanced diet through daily SMS alerts, each charged at RWF65 (US$0.10). The application is soon to be released.
Mutangana said the application was built with two modules, the first being a subscription process after which daily SMSs are sent concerning health and the other is an interactive platform providing the client a space to ask health related questions.
“We use a specific developed mobile application short code SMS in combination with a short code USSD that sends daily SMSs concerning the composition of a balanced diet to consume to stay healthy.”
Mutangana believes M-Health is an important service because Agnes Binagwaho, minister of health, said: “A major cause of malnutrition was mainly [due to a] lack of awareness on proper diets. Some people are ignorant of what they should eat and how, but otherwise there is no need for Rwanda to have malnutrition.”
In terms of M-Health’s interactive platform, Mutangana said a user can post an inquiry or request advice, which will be addressed by an outsourced medical specialist within a defined field relevant to the inquiry or advice asked.
M-Health covers topics regarding the pharmacy, nutrition, general medicine, cardiology, gynecology, palliative care, pediatrics, diet, surgery, and internal medicine.
Once a user has subscribed, the application requests information regarding the user’s name, age, gender, blood group type, weight, height, body mass index, allergies, a disease the user may be suffering with, and any other relevant information the user wishes to enter.
“We are currently planning to launch M-Health in the coming days in Rwanda [and] then outside of the country,” said Mutangana
The M-Health application also provides users with benefits including a 5 per cent discount from participating clinics and pharmacies. It enables the user to select the language the SMSs should appear in.
The Foyo Group also has a social objective in which 15 per cent of net profit will be invested in social affairs, five per cent will pay for breakfasts for participating pediatrics, another five per cent will be used to reinforce the well being of a selected group of vulnerable and poor people, and five per cent will go to the startup.
