A Bigga Boda - XAccess' Cycle in Kenya

_Patrick Donohue — Wed, 05 Oct 2005 19:34:35 -0400

Originally posted to the BRINQ Workshop by Patrick Donohue of BRINQ and the Base of the Pyramid Protocol.

After five months of intense work in communities in Kenya and Brazil we've got a long backlog of stories to share. So now that we've got a short breather we thought we'd post a few. This one from Kenya came up recently when we were asked via our colleague & mentor Stuart Hart, "Have you heard of these XAccess guys?"

Actually, yes we have!

In June the BoP Protocol team headed out to the shores of Lake Victoria in Kisumu, Kenya to visit with the XAccess and KickStart folks who were modifying an innovative bicycle for the local market. XAccess is the non-profit sister of XtraCycle, maker of the world's first Sport Utility Bicycle, and KickStart, the NGO formerly known as ApproTEC, is a long time provider of enterprise enabling technologies to low-income communities. KickStart is helping XAccess to commercialize its bicycle in Kenya as the "Bigga Boda", an upgrade to the existing "Boda Boda" bicycle taxis, so named from their early days on the border of Kenya and Uganda where the taxi riders cries of "Border! Border!" eventually morphed into the "Boda Boda" of today.

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A Bigga Boda - XAccess' Cycle in Kenya