After Jeff Gasana graduated from the Kigali Institute of Science and Technology (KIST), he help form SMS Media Rwanda, EPROM’s latest industry partner. Some of Jeff’s most commercially successful SMS applications have been unique to the Rwandan market, ranging from auto insurance to local market price information to matchmaking. In 2007, Jeff developed an application that enabled graduate high school students to access their national exam results without having the travel to the capital, and 30,000 students now use the service annually. 

 

In the beginning of 2008 SMS Media partnered with Electrogaz, the national electricity company, to sell prepaid electricity scratch-cards. Using the proven airtime scratch-card model, entrepreneurs purchase the prepaid electricity cards in bulk and then sell them throughout Rwanda. Not only has this created thousands of jobs, it saves Rwandans from having to travel into Kigali and wait in line to purchase electricity at the main Electrogaz office. While the system has only been operational since the beginning of 2008, already 30% of the country’s electricity consumers are now purchasing their electricity through their mobile phones using the SMS Media “Power Card”.

    

Beyond selling prepaid electricity, SMS Media is also partnering with KIST to enable EPROM students in Rwanda to deploy and sell their own SMS applications using existing short-codes with a 50/50 revenue-sharing agreement.