Olubunmi Odejimi
Our man crush for today is Ghanaian-British tech entrepreneur and founder of ‘Mymanu’, Danny Manu.
Mymanu is an innovative technology brand on a mission to unleash limitless potential. It is the manufacturer of the first live voice translation earbuds with HD sounds in the world.
The earbuds can live translate over 40 languages. The product, called Click, is said to be “the world’s first truly wireless earphones” with live voice translation supporting 40 languages.
Danny Manu studied at Oxford Brookes University and describes his mission in life as striving to improve lives. He was recently recognized by Google for his contributions to science, arts and culture.
The Bristish-Ghanian engineer knew language can be a major hinderance to human interactions. And even though giant strides have been made over the years to lessen the communication gaps through various translation tools but challenges remain. That is why Danny Manu’s auto-translate earbuds are revolutionary. Just imagine being able to converse effortlessly with a Chinese, even though you have never learnt a word of Mandarin before.
Danny built his business through self-financing. This was down to the challenges Black startups in the UK face in accessing capital or venture funding.
In the light of the above, Manu had to explore other means to raise funds for his startup. He used his personal savings, own sales and funds he raised from crowdfunding sites.
When COVID-19 struck, the Manchester business owner saw a business opportunity in producing Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and other safety equipment to help protect people in the Manchester area from the pandemic.
He established Medybird to go into the production of PPEs and other safety equipment and within weeks, he supplied much needed PPE and subsequently shipped out over 15 million PPE to countries in need.
