Silicon Elsewhere: Nairobi, Global China, and the Promise of Techno-CapitalA free ebook version of this title is available through Luminos, University of California Press's Open Access publishing program. Visit www.luminosoa.org to learn more. Heralded as Africa's "Silicon Savannah"—a cradle of innovation—Nairobi has become a technology and innovation capital for Kenya and for the continent at large. With a national strategy that has prioritized digital technology for the last two decades, many Chinese digital champions, smaller startups, and investors have since chosen Nairobi as their African landing pad. Mapping the interface between Nairobi's innovation scene and China's digital presence there, Silicon Elsewhere tells a unique story of ingenuity and adaptation, failure and speculation, and hopefulness and pragmatism. Andrea Pollio's ethnography draws on interviews with cautious venture capitalists, renegade entrepreneurs, dedicated bureaucrats, and ambitious data scientists to explore the competing meanings of contemporary techno-capital. Moving between leafy coworking spaces and the temperature-controlled rooms of brand-new data centers, Pollio locates Nairobi among the experimental capitals, not peripheries, of technological change in the early twenty-first century. |
Other editions - View all
Silicon Elsewhere: Nairobi, Global China, and the Promise of Techno-Capital Andrea Pollio Limited preview - 2026 |
Silicon Elsewhere: Nairobi, Global China, and the Promise of Techno-Capital Andrea Pollio No preview available - 2026 |
Common terms and phrases
Africa algorithmic Alibaba Bank Beijing Beijing connection boda boda building business model Chao chapter Chen China's digital Chinese companies Chinese investors chinku phones Cirolia colonial continent cross-border Culture Daiyu Danny decade digital economy digital Global China digital technology e-commerce Easytransfers entrepreneurs ethnographic example experimental experiments explained Fastlee featurephones fintech frontier fund geopolitical Government of Kenya handsets hardware hawala Huawei industrial informal infrastructure innovation interlocutors investment June KAIST Kenya labor last-mile logistics M-Pesa Mamapay matatus mobile money Nairobi Ndemo needed neocolonial Nokia operating payment Peripheries Planning political Pollio precarity promise queer Safaricom shanzhai Shenzhen Shoppist Silicon Elsewhere Silicon Savannah Silicon Valley Silk Road sinophobia smartphones social standards start-ups story strategy technical techno techno-capital techno-optimism tion told trajectory Transsion University Press urban venture capital