Joshua Okello
Co-Founder & Team Leader of Cipher256, Joshua Okello has an impossible passion for technology, innovation and literature (writing & poetry). He is a developer, poet, writer and blogger.
He represented the continent in the Microsoft Imagine Cup Worldwide finals (2012), and represented Uganda in 2013 Pivot East competition.
Joshua does freelance writing on technology and business for various magazines and newspapers including the UK-based Technology Banker magazine and has also been the Microsoft Student Partner for Makerere University.
Joshua Okello is part of the team behind ‘Winsenga‘. The first ultrasound-like app on a windows phone! It helps you (or midwife/doctor) monitor your baby’s heart rate and health during pregnancy and labour. But it doesn’t just help you monitor, it suggests courses of action and suggest referrals.
Joshua Okello and Aaron Tushabe explaining how Winsenga works
UGO Uganda caught up with the ‘tech geek’ to find out more on his passion for technology, what inspires him and the challenges he meets in the tech field.
What is Cipher256?
Cipher256 is a tech start-up that focuses on delivering high quality, innovative and relevant community-centric solutions. We believe in the power of technology and disruptive solutions to transform communities, and aim to deliver these solutions affordably with contextual relevance.
Tell us about a project or accomplishment that you consider to be the most significant in your career.
I have had many incredible accomplishments but have never really paused to consider which was the most significant. But I would have to go with WinSenga, because it has opened numerous doors for myself and the amazing team I lead.
For the last 3 or so years, we’ve been iterating and improving a smartphone-based ultrasound-like device that will ultimately help reduce infant mortality especially in developing countries like ours. It was the turning point in my career as a 2nd year computing student at Makerere University, about 3 years ago.
As a young entrepreneur, what are some of the challenges you face?
I think we face the same challenges as most entrepreneurs except that we also bear issues that affect us largely due to our young age.
The challenges we’ve faced have been difficulty in raising capital, respect (credibility) – usually young in the business world is synonymous with inexperience, lack of mentorship and sound youth supporting infrastructure.
What do you think is the reason why we have fewer females in the tech field, in Uganda?
The mind-set that their male counterparts are necessarily built for and better at ‘STEM fields’ (academic disciplines of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics).
Sadly, this notion is held by both the females themselves and society that directly or inadvertently re-enforces it.
What advice do you have for them?
May be I am an underground feminist, but I believe that if another human being can do it, it exists within the realm of possibility that you can also do it. Secondly, I think that society has a much bigger and pivotal role in this by encouraging girls from an early age not shy away from STEM fields.
If Sudhir Ruparelia walked into your office and handed you a million dollars to launch your best entrepreneurial idea, what would it be?
I do not think it is possible to gauge an idea as the best until it actually pays off. Point is, whatever you call the “best idea” would be one which has already been turned into a product and you’re ripping so big that it naturally becomes your best BUSINESS idea.
That said, that million dollars would be invested in WinSenga. It’s demand, potential market and impact is local and global, in developing and developed countries, just with different use cases.
What is the best product you ever created?
My team and I haven’t created our best product yet. But we are always working on one awesome thing or another.
What inspires you?
Impact. I am passionate about technology and building things but it is … the impact of the technology that really keeps me doing what I do.
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