Copia Global has been selected among a small number of startups from around the world selected to host a Global Entrepreneurship Laboratory (G-Lab) project.
The selection came in collaboration with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Sloan School of Management, founder of the international entrepreneurial program.
Copia Global was founded in 2013 by Tracey Turner and Jonathan Lewis and is headquartered in Nairobi, Kenya. The company leverages a network of local agents to connect with customers in the form of their choice, including in person, by phone, text messaging, USSD or smartphone app.
Since 2000, MIT Sloan’s G-Lab teams have worked on business problems with more than 482 startup and growing companies on 643 projects located in 54 emerging and frontier markets across the globe in such critical areas as strategic growth, new market entry, pricing, marketing, benchmarking, fundraising, and financial strategy.
In light of the global pandemic, G-Lab’s action learning theme this year is B2G-Lab, Back to Growth.
The international student team helping with the Copia Global research includes; Chun Man Chow, PhD, MIT Department of Chemical Engineering, Keitumetse (Tumi) Molamu, MIT Sloan Master of Science in Management Studies, Kunal Sanghani, MIT Leaders for Global Operations Dual Degree Program and Cathy Wu, Harvard Law School, who is a cross-registered student enrolled in the course. The three will collaborate virtually with Copia Global to research on successful marketplace supply chains in a developing world context.
In a statement, the G-Lab team said, “It has truly been a great pleasure working with Copia Global over the past few months on this meaningful project. From day one, we were quickly brought on board and started working closely with Copia colleagues on a series of assignments. Throughout this entire process, we have been grateful for their openness and hospitality. We are fortunate to be the first MIT G-Lab team to work with Copia, and we look forward to seeing the amazing things that they will accomplish in the future.”
The MIT Sloan School of Management, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA, is one of the world’s top-ranked academic sources of innovation in management theory and practice. With students from more than 60 countries. The school develops effective, innovative, and principled leaders who help to advance the global economy.