From ITWebAfrica.

A foundation honoring slain African technology entrepreneur Carey Eaton is being planned.

In June, the 41-year-old Eaton, co-founder of One Africa Media, was murdered during a robbery in Nairobi — an event that shocked Africa’s tech world and resulted in an outpouring of tributes.

Eaton, who grew up in Kenya, is best known for leaving his chief information officer job at Australian Internet company SEEK to return to Africa to build car classifieds website Cheki.

Cheki took off in Africa and formed part of the One Africa Media group that includes other classified and travel websites such as South Africa’s Private Property and StayNow.com.

One Africa Media subsequently raised $20 million from SEEK Australia and an investment from Tiger Global.

Carey’s brother, Calvin Eaton, is planning to set up a foundation to honor the One Africa Media co-founder by helping up-and-coming technology workers and startups in Africa. Calvin Eaton also works at One Africa Media in Nairobi.

“Carey’s passion was to mentor and give input to any local tech entrepreneur,” Calvin Eaton told ITWeb Africa. “He was particularly concerned with the lack of skills of young people across Africa entering what will be the largest workforce in the world by 2040.

“The foundation is developing programs in these two areas of his concern: tech skill education and entrepreneur mentoring. A number of partners connected with the businesses and further afield have expressed their desire to support such a venture.”

BRCK CEO and Ushahidi co-founder Erik Hersman is involved in the Carey Eaton foundation.

One Africa Media CEO, Justin Clarke served as joint CEO with Eaton at One Africa Media.

“Carey really believed that ICT (information and communications technology) could change the face of sub-Saharan Africa,” Clarke told ITWeb Africa. “He believed in the people, the opportunity and wanted to be part of the solution.

One Africa Media has close to 600 employees and offices in Nairobi, Durban, Cape Town and Lagos.

Clarke and One Africa Media’s chief financial officer run the business out of Durban, South Africa.

“Carey was a great leader, and he touched a lot of people with his generous spirit, so we really feel the loss deeply from an emotional point of view,” Clarke told ITWeb Africa.
“But we are nearly 600 people now and we have been building capacity across all the businesses — so the machine continues to run on without him.

“In fact there is a renewed commitment to make great things happen in his memory.”

Police are still investigating the murder.

Read more at ITWebAfrica.