Uhuru CS Appointed President Of London Tech Giant

JUMO, a technology company building next-generation financial services for emerging market entrepreneurs, has hired former Kenyan ICT Minister Joe Mucheru as President. In this new role, Mr Mucheru will support the company to deliver its growth goals, navigate the regulatory landscape, and build the firm’s presence across the African continent.

“JUMO is revolutionising the lending space in Africa, connecting entrepreneurs and individuals to the financial products they need to grow and prosper,” Mr Mucheru said. “I am hugely excited to be joining a business that is helping capital providers make attractive returns at the same time as supporting measurable impact.”

Founded in London, JUMO has built an intelligent platform that enables banks to reach millions of new customers with credit and savings products. JUMO is focused on making it easier for capital providers to reach new customers at affordable prices while making predictable returns.

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Mr Mucheru is the former Kenyan Cabinet Secretary in the Ministry of ICT, Innovation and Youth Affairs. He was appointed by then President Uhuru Kenyatta and served between 2015 and 2022. He brings a wealth of government experience and in-depth knowledge of pan-African tech to the JUMO executive team and board.

Previously, Mr Mucheru was the head of Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) for Google, based in Nairobi, serving as Google’s first SSA employee. He joined Google in 2007 where he led the delivery of strategy, business planning and operations and was key to setting up Google’s presence on the continent.

Prior to Google, he worked at Wananchi Online, the parent company of internet service provider Zuku, a company he co-founded in 1999.

Mr Mucheru is a global board member of UNICEF Generation Unlimited, the world’s first public-private-youth partnership working to skill and connect the world’s 1.8 billion young people to opportunity, as well as a Trustee of the University of Nairobi Foundation.

He previously held board positions at the M-Pesa Foundation Academy, a state-of-the-art residential high school in Kenya funded by M-PESA, Vodafone and Safaricom, Bitpesa (now Aza Group), an international money transfer platform, and GiveDirectly, a non-profit allowing donors to provide direct cash transfers to those in need. He is also the former Chairman of the African Telecommunications Union.

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In 2010, he was awarded the Moran of the Order of the Burning Spear (MBS), as well as the Elder of the Golden Heart (EGH) in recognition of his contribution to ICT in Kenya. He is a member of the African Leadership Network, the Kenyan National Prayer Breakfast, and the East African Business Summit.

“We are honoured to welcome Joe to JUMO. He brings an invaluable perspective given his experience as an entrepreneur, Google executive and regulator,” says Mr Andrew Watkins-Ball, JUMO Founder and CEO.

In 2022, JUMO appointed Nichola Pease as Non-Executive Chair and Michael Ball, the former CFO of World Remit, as Chief Financial Officer. To date, the JUMO platform has been used to make 130 million loans, totalling $4 billion, to more than 20 million people and small businesses in Ghana, Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Zambia and Côte d’Ivoire.

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