Admin Access

On this episode of Admin Access, Dominic and Evans step out of their usual seats to host "Where Margins Go to Die", a live panel at the recent Jirani edition on what it takes to move products, services and opportunity across Africa. They are joined by Anthony Wanaina of Quartrix, Kim Jackson Njeru of Naivas, Darshan Chandaria of Chandaria Industries, and Liz Wambua of Glovo.The case study is a single Velvex kitchen towel. The episode follows the margins of that one product as it travels from the factory floor, onto the truck and the supermarket shelf, and finally to the customer's door. The panel covers manufacturing, retail, logistics and on-demand delivery, with each guest laying out the economics of their link in the chain and the pressure they feel from the others. Liz shares that Glovo is still yet to break even after six years in Kenya. Anthony explains why a truck in East Africa covers a fraction of the monthly distance of its European counterpart while costing about the same. Kimjackson Njeru and Darshan Chandaria weigh in on whether delivery platforms are partners or competitors, and how private labels sit next to established brands on the same shelf.The episode also asks what founders should understand about margins before trying to build distribution in Kenya, and why so many players in this space have ended up in the graveyard.To keep up with our panelists , check out their LinkedIn:Liz Wambua :https://www.linkedin.com/in/liz-wambua/ Darshan Chandaria :https://www.linkedin.com/in/darshanchandaria/Kimjackson Njeru :https://www.linkedin.com/in/kimjackson-njeru/Check out Quatrix Global :https://quatrixglobal.com/_______________________________________________________________Join Dominic & Evans as they explore the world of tech and share their bold takes with guests on Admin AccessSubscribe to our podcast, drop a like, comment, and hit the notification bell to stay updated with our latest content.Don't forget to spread the word! Sharing is caring! 🌟Follow us on social media:📸 Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/adminaccess_💼 LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/company/admin-access/ ♪ TikTok:https://www.tiktok.com/@admin.access_ Interested in partnering with us? Drop us an email at: [email protected] 📧

On this episode of Admin Access, Dominic and Evans unpack the simple rules every business lives or dies by, guided by a book Evans has been reading, and bring back the question the Twiga episode left open: why do startups really fail?Evans makes his case, citing that behind the market forces and the funding stories, most businesses come down to how much they sell, how much they spend on what they need to make it, and how much it costs to keep the business running. The goal is to grow sales while keeping the other two as low as possible. He argues that investment complicates this, because money pays for making and running a business, while sales have to come from customers. Every raise becomes a bet that customers will show up in the numbers investors imagined, and a startup valued on sales it has yet to make starts the race already behind, with its costs growing faster than its demand. They get into why cutting costs looks like failure to the outside world even when a company is simply becoming more efficient, and why every funding round demands a bigger story than the last. They also question how some companies survive for years without making a profit. Evans’s working theory is that the business itself has value, through its brand, its people and its customers, and that deeper markets give struggling companies more time to find a buyer. The episode wraps with advice for founders to be honest about what you actually sell and what it costs you to get there, because the numbers will catch up one way or another.To keep up with Dominic’s and Evan's Journey, check out their LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/dominic-mulinda/https://www.linkedin.com/in/evans-kanyithia-munene_______________________________________________________________Join Dominic & Evans as they explore the world of tech and share their bold takes with guests on Admin AccessSubscribe to our podcast, drop a like, comment, and hit the notification bell to stay updated with our latest content.Don't forget to spread the word! Sharing is caring! 🌟Follow us on social media:📸 Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/adminaccess_💼 LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/company/admin-access/ ♪ TikTok:https://www.tiktok.com/@admin.access_ Interested in partnering with us? Drop us an email at: [email protected] 📧

On this episode of Admin Access, Dominic and Evans unpack Aliko Dangote’s $16 billion refinery in Lamu, where ground was broken on 30 September with Kenya’s president and several regional leaders in attendance. Dominic separates it from Dangote’s IPO, which relates to the existing Lagos refinery, and frames the Lamu project around three questions nobody has fully answered: whose oil, whose money, and what is in the contract.Dominic walks through a refinery planned for 700,000 barrels a day, alongside a 1,000 megawatt power plant sending half its output to the Kenyan grid. Evans asks why Kenya and not Tanga, and the pair dig into the crude supply problem: Turkana’s projected output, far larger than the operator’s first-phase figure, the missing pipeline to Lamu, Uganda’s crude tied to the pipeline to Tanga, and a rival refinery plan on the Tanzanian coast. With Kenya using about 116,000 barrels a day and the wider region roughly 450,000, Dominic argues the refinery is built for a market much larger than the one it sits in, which raises questions about exports, fuel imports and protection for local refining.They also look at a project reportedly funded about 70% by debt, Kenya’s proposed stake coming from the new National Infrastructure Fund seeded by the Kenya Pipeline IPO and the Safaricom stake sale, and Uganda’s quiet bet through its own stake in Kenya Pipeline, which Dominic reads as Museveni hedging whichever way Tanga goes. Evans pushes back on the idea that business confidentiality should apply when governments are involved, and Dominic points to the Adani deal that collapsed after its details leaked, and to the court cases already underway.The episode wraps with the bigger question of energy independence. They agree the refinery brings jobs and power, and Dominic calls it an energy upgrade that leaves the independence question open. They split on demand: Dominic expects electric vehicles to take a significant share of the road within a decade, while Evans leans on the Lindy effect and expects things that already exist to keep existing.To keep up with Dominic’s and Evan's Journey, check out their LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/dominic-mulinda/https://www.linkedin.com/in/evans-kanyithia-munene_______________________________________________________________Join Dominic & Evans as they explore the world of tech and share their bold takes with guests on Admin AccessSubscribe to our podcast, drop a like, comment, and hit the notification bell to stay updated with our latest content.Don't forget to spread the word! Sharing is caring! 🌟Follow us on social media:📸 Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/adminaccess_💼 LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/company/admin-access/ ♪ TikTok:https://www.tiktok.com/@admin.access_ Interested in partnering with us? Drop us an email at: [email protected] 📧

On this episode of Admin Access, Dominic and Evans dig into Uber's exit from Nigeria and Uganda, and what it means for two assumptions that have long gone unchallenged in tech: blitzscaling and Africa as the next big market. Dominic argues Uber's downfall in its largest African market comes down to one thing, they never had a defensible moat. They didn't own the drivers, the cars or the customers, which meant they could only ever compete on cost, funding their way to scale rather than owning it outright.The duo unpack what actually makes a moat work, network effects for Meta, ecosystem lock in for Apple and Google, and why Uber's software layer was never enough on its own. That leads into a wider debate on whether blitzscaling is dead or simply was never bulletproof without something defensible underneath it.From there, the conversation turns to the "Africa is the next big market" assumption, using AI adoption as a litmus test. Evans makes the case that population size and smartphone access don't automatically translate into spending power, and that the money still flows disproportionately from the US and Europe even in supposedly saturated markets. Dominic pushes on whether it's really about purchasing power or about undercutting competition from Bolt and inDrive eating into Uber's already thin margins.The episode closes with a look at Tesla's cybercab strategy, and why owning the fleet outright might finally deliver the business model Uber always wanted, along with a more reflective moment on what "success" really means for a startup once reality, and administration, catches up with the hype.To keep up with Dominic’s and Evan's Journey, check out their LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/dominic-mulinda/https://www.linkedin.com/in/evans-kanyithia-munene_______________________________________________________________Join Dominic & Evans as they explore the world of tech and share their bold takes with guests on Admin AccessSubscribe to our podcast, drop a like, comment, and hit the notification bell to stay updated with our latest content.Don't forget to spread the word! Sharing is caring! 🌟Follow us on social media:📸 Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/adminaccess_💼 LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/company/admin-access/ ♪ TikTok:https://www.tiktok.com/@admin.access_ Interested in partnering with us? Drop us an email at: [email protected] 📧

On this episode of Admin Access, Dominic and Evans unpack the collapse of Twiga Foods, the Kenyan agritech that raised over $185 million before splitting into two companies and landing in administration. Dominic makes his case for the episode: Twiga didn't die when it went into administration, it was already dead long before, administration just made it official.The pair trace Twiga's arc from its 2014 founding by ex-Coca-Cola exec Peter Njonjo, built on cutting out the brokers between smallholder farmers and mama mbogas, through its pivot into non-perishables, its own trucking fleet and depots, and eventually buying a 650-hectare farm that undercut its original thesis. Evans makes the case that Twiga never really disrupted Marikiti-style informal markets, it just tried to out-compete them, subsidised by venture money rather than by fixing the underlying margins.They get into the mechanics of venture funding itself, why a plateau reads as decline, why growth has to compound year on year, and why "administration" is really just the moment the music stops. That leads into the leaked "Project Easter" slides, a strip-it-for-parts scenario that Dominic argues is standard practice elsewhere but nearly impossible to execute transparently under Kenyan and African insolvency law. Dominic draws a parallel to Boeing offloading Wisk and its autonomous units, and to Google's acquisition of Motorola for patents alone.The episode wraps with a detour into Bending Spoons, the Italian company quietly buying up "yesteryear" SaaS names like Evernote, Airtable, Meetup and WeTransfer once they've fallen from grace, and why African markets don't yet have a legal path for that kind of second-life acquisition. Evans closes with an ecosystem metaphor: dying companies aren't wasted, they're the insects that recycle value back through the system.To keep up with Dominic’s and Evan's Journey, check out their LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/dominic-mulinda/https://www.linkedin.com/in/evans-kanyithia-munene_______________________________________________________________Join Dominic & Evans as they explore the world of tech and share their bold takes with guests on Admin AccessSubscribe to our podcast, drop a like, comment, and hit the notification bell to stay updated with our latest content.Don't forget to spread the word! Sharing is caring! 🌟Follow us on social media:📸 Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/adminaccess_💼 LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/company/admin-access/ ♪ TikTok:https://www.tiktok.com/@admin.access_ Interested in partnering with us? Drop us an email at: [email protected] 📧