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Safaricom drawn into dispute between solar firm and trader over M-Kopa name

Monday, January 11, 2016 — updated on December 12, 2020 - 3 min read

US President Barack Obama when he visited the M-Kopa stand at the Power Africa Innovation Fair last year on the sidelines of the Global Entrepreneurship Summit in Nairobi. M-Kopa and an import-export firm are claiming exclusive rights to the trade name. PHOTO | AFP

Safaricom has been sucked into a dispute between pay-per-use solar energy provider M-Kopa and an import-export firm claiming exclusive rights to the trade name.

Mkopa Investments has sued Safaricom, M-Kopa Solar and its parent firm Mobile Ventures Kenya Limited, claiming the firms have infringed on the trade name it has owned since December 1997.