Isaya Yunge/COURTESY
President William Ruto’s daughter Charlene Ruto’s traditional engagement to Tanzanian technology entrepreneur Isaya Yunge has thrust the spotlight on the innovator behind a career built on technology, entrepreneurship and digital solutions for young Africans.
Yunge, the man at the centre of Charlene Ruto’s Koito ceremony, is the co-founder and chief executive of SomaApps Technologies, the company behind SomaApp, a mobile platform that connects African students with scholarship opportunities.
According to multiple reports gathered by The Star, his technology journey was shaped by an ambition to use digital tools to solve problems affecting young people.
SomaApp was developed after Yunge and his team identified a problem: many local and international scholarships go unclaimed because potential beneficiaries do not know they exist.
The platform seeks to bridge that gap by bringing scholarship opportunities together and matching students with opportunities for which they may qualify.
But SomaApp is not his only venture.
Yunge has also founded KAYA, a smart speaker that uses artificial intelligence to collect Africa-related data, and Somafit, a smartwatch designed to monitor health indicators including blood pressure and heart rate in real time.
His wider ambition is to accelerate the adoption of mobile software, artificial intelligence and Internet of Things technologies in Tanzania and across Africa.
Yunge’s academic and professional journey has taken him beyond Tanzania.
He holds a bachelor’s degree from the Institute of Finance Management and has studied at the University of Cambridge.
He has also undergone training by the Swedish Institute on sustainable business models and has pursued studies in leading change at Cambridge.
His profile has been built not only around business but also youth leadership and advocacy.
In 2006, he was elected chairperson of the Junior Council of the United Republic of Tanzania.
He later represented young people at international forums, including speaking at a G8 Summit in Berlin after being selected as a UNICEF Africa Youth Ambassador.
His achievements in technology have also earned him recognition.
In 2017, his startup won the GSMA Mobile Money Africa Hackathon award for best startup in Africa.
He was subsequently named among Forbes Africa’s 30 Under 30, an annual recognition of young entrepreneurs and change-makers on the continent.
Yunge also received the Queen’s Young Leaders Award in 2018 from the late Queen Elizabeth II for his work using technology to develop sustainable solutions and improve communities.
In 2019, he was named among Tanzania’s 50 most influential young people.
Behind the accolades, however, Yunge has described a difficult childhood that was far removed from the privileged circles in which he now operates.
He was raised by his grandmother and spent part of his childhood herding goats and cattle and working around rice plantations.
His interest in technology intensified in 2014 after attending a talk by American economist Jeremy Rifkin on the Fourth Industrial Revolution, the sharing economy and collaborative commons.
The experience, he said, reinforced his belief that digital technology could provide solutions to some of Africa’s challenges.
Today, Yunge employs several people through SomaApps and continues to advocate for a technology-friendly environment for startups and innovation.
He is also an alumnus of the Harvard Ministerial Leadership Programme and has positioned himself as an advocate for youth participation in developing technology-driven solutions.
His engagement to Charlene, therefore, brings together two young people with prominent backgrounds and public profiles.