Xiaomi has had plans to launch its devices in Kenya for close to a year now. The company through its official distributor, Mobile in Africa, announced sometime last year that it was going to launch its devices in Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa.
Mobile in Africa (MIA) went ahead and launched the devices in Nigeria and South Africa and promised it would do the same in Kenya soon. The delay in Kenya was because of the lawsuit by Mi Fone against Xiaomi and Mobile in Africa using the ‘Mi’ branding on some of its smartphones. as far as I know, this issue is yet to be sorted and right now no one in Mobile in Africa or Mi Fone is willing to talk about it.
According to MIA, they have also been sorting the M-Pesa, Airtel Money and Orange Money functionalities before launching these devices. If you read my review of the Xiaomi Note 2, you may have seen that my biggest issue with this phone is that M-Pesa doesn’t work as you expect it to. It looks like this has now been sorted and that is why MIA is officially launching the devices in Kenya.
There are some retailers who have been stocking Xiaomi devices on their own, if you bought one from them, chances are that your mobile money wallet (M-Pesa, Airtel Money etc.) is not working as expected. You will probably be forced to get a new device as Xiaomi has not said anything about fixing this issue for devices that are already on the market.
Pricing and Availability
According to Mobile in Africa, you will be able to get the Redmi 2 Pro for Ksh 14,999 and the Redmi Note 2 for Ksh 21,999. The phones will be available in most retail shops in Nairobi’s CBD and other towns including Tricom and Orange stores. Partnering with retailers such as Tricom shows you that MIA wants to reach as many customers as possible. They will not be available from Safaricom stores because they are dual SIM devices, Safaricom isn’t a fan of those. You should start seeing MIA’s marketing activities promoting these devices as from this week.
As for other Xiaomi devices, MIA has confirmed to me that those will be coming later. The as the flagship Mi5 is with the CAK going through Type Approval process before it is launched, am not sure how long this will take. I will keep you updated on this if and when I get more information.
As mentioned above, we have already reviewed the Redmi Note 2 which you can check out using the link below.
Read More: Xiaomi Redmi Note 2 Review
