The cost of smart phones, especially on the Android platform has dropped sharply across the World and especially in Africa. This development has opened up the way for business applications to move into the mobile space. Among the first to launch in Africa is Turnkey Africa’s Turnquest Bima 360 platform. Bima 360 was launched Thursday morning in Kenya, after preceding September launches in Nigeria and Ghana.

The product was launched by Turkey Africa CEO Kizito Makatiani, in collaboration with Kenya’s permanent secretary at the Ministry of Information and Communication Bitange Ndemo, at the Nairobi Serena.
Turnkey Africa develops an Insurance platform called TurnQuest. Since 1998, the company has grown to serve 10 insurance firms in Kenya and five insurance providers in Nigeria since its 207 entry into the Nigeria market. The firm had revenues of more than Ksh 60 million last year.
TurnQuest Bima 360 brings most of the platform’s features required by insurance sales agents to mobile phones and tablets. Through the applications, sales agents have the ability to generate quotations, generate proposals, apply for loans and advances, as well as having access to the knowledge base.
Shikoli Makatani, Turnkey Africa Chief Operating Officer (COO) says that insurers benefit from improved response time form their agents, reduced point of sale costs and a cost effective infrastructure amongst others. Bima 360 can be integrated into the already existing platforms.
Makatani says that the product was developed from their understanding of the insurance industry and after Turnkey studied the mobile phone and saw that it held potential for the sector. The firm then studied areas in insurance industry that aligned to the mobile sector. To Makarani, products have received positive reception from their clients. Most of the clients demand for immediate installation of the product, an issue that Makatani refers to as a good challenge as the firm is not currently in a position to roll out Bima 360 all at once to all their clients.
On the choice of the Android platform as an exclusive platform for the application, Makatani says that they would first figure out the popularity of other platforms before developing on them. He says that Android devices have experienced a faster drop in prices resulting in wider adoption. He adds that Research in Motions Blackberry platform is not an open developer platform leading to high development costs while he does not consider Nokia’s Symbian platform as a stable (suitable) platform for running applications.