Are the Equity Bank and Safaricom engines running out of steam?

When the history of 21st Century Kenya is written, the Equity Bank story will feature. Some of the narrative we will be expecting is, how did this former building society come from behind the high street banks to be the home of half of Kenya’s banked population, amassing a “membership” of 3 million and growing the category while at it?

The other corporate story we will be gagging for is the Safaricom one – how heavy investment and rapid innovation cycles drove brand penetration from under 200,000 less that 10 years ago to more than 14 million users in 2009.

An additional category which has seen a game-changer take the lead is TV – like Equity Bank, Citizen TV went the grassroots way and now commands the attention of a quarter of TV viewers with its regular fare of locally produced programmes and home-grown presenters. No doubt, another good story waiting to be recounted. But while Citizen appears to have the legs to continue its impressive advance, the growth of Equity Bank has slowed while that of Safarciom has plateaued as illustrated by comparative TGI data from 2006 through to Q3 2009.

Is history about to be re-written again?