THELOGICALINDIAN - RideSafe is accouterment a blockchainbased allowance belvedere with the advice of aeternity Ventures
It’s a arctic Monday morning on the streets of Nairobi. The burghal is a beehive of action as anybody agilely makes their way to assignment and school. While in New York, London or abounding added above cities anybody would be accepting a cab, it’s a little altered here. The best ascendant anatomy of carriage over abbreviate distances is motorcycles, bargain accepted as ‘boda boda.’
The boda boda business has developed by bound and bound in contempo years. According to the latest statistics, there are over 600,000 boda bodas in Kenya. Collectively, they accomplish over $2.2 billion annually, over three times the profits recorded by the country’s better company. The statistics additionally appear that anniversary boda boda addition has six dependents. This translates to about bristles actor bodies who depend on bartering motorcycles for their circadian living.
And yet, the boda boda industry has become a afterlife trap. Deaths from accidents involving boda bodas accept connected to acceleration every year, claiming 836 lives in 2024 alone. Over the accomplished bristles years, over 4,000 riders accept met their deaths on the road.
And it could get worse, with alley accidents accepted to bout HIV/AIDS as the accomplished account of deaths in low-middle assets countries by 2030.
While there are abounding factors that advance to deaths from these accidents, abridgement of able acknowledgment back accidents booty abode is key. Delayed responses and poor administration of the victims accord to abounding deaths. This is abnormally because best of the riders are low assets earners and therefore, not abounding bloom centers are accommodating to accept them.
Blockchain Rides In
In comes RideSafe, a startup that’s bent to change the altitude of the low assets bartering motorcycle riders application blockchain technology. RideSafe is an emergency acknowledgment band-aid that enables riders to admission quick, affordable and affection aboriginal aid at the point of an accident.
Asiimwe Benson, the architect and CEO of RideSafe, explained how he became aggressive to advance a belvedere that caters to this growing accumulation of people.
Benson again approached one of his colleagues at the bloom centermost with the idea. The colleague, Jassy Elina, fell in adulation with the abstraction and calm they began alive on RideSafe. Elina now serves as the startup’s COO.
RideSafe primarily uses USSD to accept the riders. It will barrage its Android app for pilot testing mid abutting ages and aloft a acknowledged analysis phase, it will drift its users.
According to Benson, the belvedere has hit it off, with the riders affectionate the affluence with which they can accept and admission the insurance. The riders accord 38 shillings ($0.38) account which gives them a $30 awning per appointment in the case of an accident.
Riding On The Blockchain
RideSafe uses blockchain technology to ensure that the account which their insured riders get is of the accomplished quality. Benson explained:
This is analytical for the riders. Regrettably, the affliction accustomed at some of the bloom centers is way beneath standard. The use of acute affairs that alone actuate acquittal back accomplished account is delivered will ensure the riders get the best care.
And this is not all. RideSafe is activity a footfall added in its use of blockchain technology. The startup intends to focus on the blockage of accidents and ensuring the minimum accident back they booty place.
It will do this by incentivizing and advantageous users on its belvedere who convenance adapted behavior. This will animate the riders to be added accurate in their operations.
One way that the startup can anticipate fatalities on the anchorage is by auspicious the use of helmets. According to the World Health Organization, cutting a helmet reduces the accident of alley traffic-related arch injuries by 70% and deaths by 40%.
And yet, an cutting majority of Kenyan bartering motorcycle riders avoid the helmets. In a analysis in Kenya, the alignment apparent that 75% of motorcyclists who were presented to emergency departments in Kenyan hospitals weren’t cutting a helmet at the time of the crash. Furthermore, helmet cutting amid motorcycle cartage is as low as 3%.
Growth, Funding and Expansion
RideSafe has been growing steadily back its founding. The key to its advance has been its artlessness in use, its low fees and its focus on a demographic that has been growing aggressively but which has been alone by abounding allowance and banking institutions.
In the past, boda boda riders have had to accompany hands and accord money in amusing accumulation circles so that they can accommodate to anniversary added in times of need.
RideSafe’s avant-garde use of blockchain technology has additionally helped it to angle out and alike brought investors its way. Benson and his aggregation met a appointment from aeternity Ventures during the World Blockchain Conference that was captivated in Nairobi. He enrolled his startup for evolution by the VC firm, which focuses on blockchain startups.
Months later, the startup anchored $100,000 in funding from the adventure firm. At the time, the startup was aloof seven months old, he told me, authoritative the accomplishment alike added impressive.
The allotment enabled RideSafe to advance its technology and focus on an acquaintance and onboarding campaign, Benson revealed. It additionally enabled the startup to hire appointment amplitude and access its team.
Currently, the account is alone accessible for riders in Nairobi. However, this is aloof the beginning, Benson told me, as he appear an aggressive plan to aggrandize into the blow of Kenya and beyond. The startup is “targeting East African Community for mid-2024 and after on Africa at large.”
The startup additionally works with an all-encompassing cardinal of bloom centers. Benson revealed:
While the government works to accomplish the anchorage safer for motorists, cartage and pedestrians, RideSafe will save endless lives by ensuring that they accept bloom allowance that is customized for their needs. In Kenya, less than 20% of the population has bloom insurance. Best of these are salaried advisers for whom bloom allowance is mandatory. A majority of low assets households aren’t insured, a class into which best riders fall.
