Rocío Pérez Ochoa is one of the reclusive tycoons running ventures in Kenya with a great impact on society.
In 1999, she graduated with a PhD after pursuing particular physics in Geneva, Switzerland, in one of the premium institutions for research in the world.
After school, she landed a job at a hedge fund and moved to the City of London. In the financial center, Ochoa had an outward great life from her education, career, and even family.
However, motherhood changed all that redefining her life completely. Ochoa welcomed a daughter in 2004 and a son in 2007.
Motherhood's journey pushed her to start questioning her priorities in life and what if her career would be meaningful to her family.
"Making rich people richer does not really matter," she stated while announcing her next move in life.
Ochoa enrolled for another course for a master’s in climate change which then informed her decision to invest in Kenya.
In 2015, she launched Bidhaa Sasa. According to Forbes Lifestyle, she invested Ksh231 million (USD 2 million) of her own money into the new venture.
Bidhaa Sasa is technically a retailer. It sells products to rural women, many of them small-holder farmers, that include cookstoves, a tool for drying crops, and solar lamps.
She founded the Bidhaa Sasa with the aim of supporting green start ups in emerging markets. It also mentors entrepreneurs by offering advice on effective ways of raising capital, business planning and modelling, and strategy.
"Bidhaa Sasa defies those easy definitions, as both a throwback to a past when capitalism was pretty clearly a force for good – at the same time it’s on the front lines of the future by virtue of its deep connections to women, who are a rising force in the global economy," Ochoa remarked.
The Center is also raising money for its own fund to invest in social entrepreneurs, which often struggle and hardly survive after the small startup phase.
The company has also extended its roots to Uganda having over 140 employees in the two East African countries.
