A former in-house lawyer with Uber and Microsoft has joined US law firm Covington & Burling as a senior adviser in Johannesburg.
Covington & Burling has hired Robert Kayihura, formerly a legal director in Africa for Uber and Microsoft, as a senior adviser on regulatory and policy issues, based in Johannesburg.
With a background working with software systems, after qualifying as a lawyer, he worked for Lane Powell in the law firm’s Seattle headquarters, before setting up his own business, running a data processing company which had its main operation Uganda.
Kayihura joined Microsoft in 2007, initially as a transactional lawyer in Washington state, before moving to the office of the general counsel and then relocating to Johannesburg as director of legal and corporate affairs for Microsoft in sub-Saharan Africa excluding South Africa in 2012.
He then spent two-and-a-half years with Uber, initially as regional senior counsel for sub-Saharan Africa, during which time he launched the company’s legal and regulatory affairs team for the region, rising to become legal director for the Middle East, Africa and Pakistan.
During his time at Uber he oversaw legal and regulatory affairs for the taxi company’s operations in South Africa, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Nigeria and Ghana.
As such, he has extensive experience of dealing with the issues that arise for technology companies, particularly with regards to regulation and policy in Africa and beyond. Those have included technology licencing, transactions, data protection, finance, dispute resolution, risk and corporate responsibility.
The hire comes at a time when Africa is a particularly vibrant market for start-ups that use mobile technology. Financial technology (fintech), has taken off across the continent, with the spread of mobile phones combined with a lack of traditional banking services, while further developments are now being fuelled by the arrival of blockchain technology and major corporations such as Orange and Vodafone getting in on the act.
Covington opened its South African office last year, led by Ben Donovan, one of four lawyers to join the firm from Chadbourne & Park.
