GES 2015 in Nairobi
Challenge Hack 1: The Shared Economy and Emerging Markets
Saturday, July 25, 2015
Moderator: Edwin Macharia, Dalberg
Panelists:
- Nicola D’Elia, Airbnb
- Jambu Palaniappan, Uber
- Chris Garcia, TapEx
Estimated number of people: 35
• Thoughts on the shared economy
o More than creating opportunities, it is about creating conditions for entrepreneurship to survive (Nicola)
o Understanding your non-negotiables and your flexibilities (Jambu)
o Shared economy is the future (Chris)
o About the optimization of resources, i.e., assets like land and building are underutilized, and operating on a global scale (Nicola)
o Opportunity to address inefficiencies in existing service delivery systems (Nicola)
o Understanding the relevance of your business model outside your local region (Jambu)
• The need to have a foundation of trust:
o Focus on peer-to-peer solutions and network for vetting (Jambu)
o Trust shifts: first based on people, then based on brand (Edwin)
• Taking advantage of the trust created:
o Customers might be willing to pay more
o Turning a social asset into something tangible, ex., can an Airbnb or Uber rating translate into financial credit (Jambu)
• The concern over starting something easily replicable by competitors:
o Comes down to execution and customer service (Chris)
o A function of the quality of service and experience (Nicola)
o Better to have a product which 100 people love rather than 100,000 sort of like (Nicola)
• Challenge of legal and policy framework:
o Most legal systems not capable of supporting the shared economy (Nicola)
o Need to collaborate with all stakeholders to identify advantage to them (Nicola)
o VOTE, to compel legislators to address laws related to the social economy (Chris)
o Getting to a place where line between yours/mine will be crossed (Jambu)
o Deregulation is the way forward (Chris)
• Conclusions:
o Start now and start small, focus, build a brand, fundraise and up scale (all)
o Shared economy is bringing back our lost social interaction (Nicola)
o The social contract has to evolve (Jambu)
o Important to advocate for companies which operating in the shared economy (Chris)
o The largest beneficiaries of the shared economy are those at the lower socio-economic levels (Edwin)