Guinea: Fadima Diawara, founder of the smartphone brand “Kunfabo”

For more than a year, Guineans have been using a new brand of smartphones, “Kunfabo”. Designed by Guinean entrepreneur Fadima Diawara, this smartphone is 100% African, with applications that meet the needs of Africans. Today, the tech entrepreneur dreams of conquering the African mobile phone market.

A lawyer by training, Fadima Diawara is now a tech entrepreneur. Driven by her passion for gadgets and technological innovation, the young Guinean decided to create her own brand of smartphones and to make low-cost phones available to Africans, allowing them to communicate more easily.

Fadima graduated in law from the General University Lansana Condé of Sonfonia in Conakry (Guinea), and then continued her training in administrative management and accounting in Spain. In 2013, she started her professional career as an administrative manager and worked in several multinational companies such as Bershka… She also practised marketing for decoration products. In 2016, she resigned from her job to start her own business and turned to a field that fascinates her, technology.

In 2017, she created the smartphone brand, “Kunfabo”, which means “to be in touch” in Malinké, a West African language. “The idea came to me because I realised that there is a strong demand in the technology and communication sector. Kunfabo came to meet this need to create an African brand that represents us and that Africans can identify with,”she told BBC Africa. Even if the mobile phone market in Africa is invaded by international giants, for the young entrepreneur, it is a vast field where everyone has a say and can offer quality products.

Her smartphone therefore intends to adapt to the needs of Africans. Certified by international standards, notably those of the European Union, and equipped with an Android 9.1 operating system and 4G coverage, Kunfabo offers typically African applications. These include “Find me”, which allows users to geolocate health areas and local pharmacies throughout Africa; “Afro Cook”, an African recipe application; and a messaging application with mobile payment developed by a Cameroonian start-up.

It was in 2020, after three years of hard work, that the entrepreneur finally introduced her smartphone in Africa, particularly in Guinea. But the road to the design of her smartphone was paved with many challenges, including financial, logistical and socio-cultural. As the tech world is still very male-dominated, she had to face many criticisms as a woman.“In this environment, you have to be able to impose yourself through your ideas, your vision, your creativity…”she told BBC Africa. A mother, entrepreneur and student, since she is also pursuing an MBA in “digital entrepreneurship and business management”, the tech entrepreneur confides that she was able to overcome all these challenges through perseverance, determination and organisation…

Today, Fadima Diawara is one of the few women entrepreneurs who have designed a smartphone. Thanks to her project, she was able to win several awards, including the Prize for the most original start-up in Spain in 2020, the Prize for the Best Entrepreneur of the Year from the city of Girona in Spain. She was also one of the winners of the Africa  Summit in 2020.