Kahi LUMUMBA is the President of the Totem Experience (TX) group, which brings together several activities including TX Agency, the digital communications agency, TX Factory, the digital content and concept creation studio, and ADICOMDAYS, which for ten years has been bringing together the largest community of digital communications players in Africa.
Kahi LUMUMBA agreed to answer our questions about his activities and, in particular, about the 10th edition of ADICOMDAYS, which will take place on April 9 and 10 in ABIDJAN.
You head up the Totem Experience communications group and launched Adicomdays around ten years ago. What sets you apart from a "traditional" communications group?
TOTEM EXPERIENCE is the dream of building something unique in the sense that we have built the first digital agency network in French-speaking Africa.
Today, we are the largest group in the region, thanks to this strategic positioning. Not only do we support large groups with significant financial stakes, such as Visa, Orange, and ECOBANK, but we also have a second, highly complementary element: our content creation studio, which sets us apart by creating content tailored to specific uses.
We are constantly on the lookout for content and formats that work, whether they are short formats, web series, etc. We have really dug deep to create elements that have a real impact. But what really sets us apart is our focus on community spirit: Adicomdays is the annual event that brings together the most influential players in African digital technology.
Before returning to ADICOMDAYS, in which countries are you established or active, and who are your main clients?
Our DNA is pan-African, but we also have a presence in Senegal, Burkina Faso, Benin, Mali, Guinea Conakry, Ivory Coast, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. We have around 50 employees, half of whom are based in Abidjan. The rest are based in the various countries I just mentioned.
Our strength with our network is that we are also able to support large groups headquartered in Paris, Casablanca, Jobourg, or Dubai in carrying out pan-African campaigns. We recently carried out a campaign for Orange, for example. We also ran a campaign for TotalEnergies ahead of the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations, and another for Coca-Cola during the last World Cup. Thanks to our network, we have the capacity to run campaigns in 15 countries.
Adicomdays has become the largest B2B event for digital communication in Africa. Who is this event aimed at?
We have three target audiences that will be heavily represented at Adicomdays: digital entrepreneurs, content creators, and influencers. We will also have all the digital marketing managers from the region in attendance.
The speed at which infrastructure and usage are growing requires us to be truly involved beyond our business, to bring young players and professionals on board as much as possible in this great adventure, in this transformation that the continent is undergoing.
What will be the main theme and content of the upcoming ADICOMDAYS?
Our observation is that today there is a real battle for attention, meaning that young people are extremely connected via various networks, and it is our mission to use all the tools at our disposal—storytelling, content, influence—to enable stakeholders to create meaningful communities that generate impact.
Whether it's brands or content creators, our real focus, over the next few years we need to give them the tools they need to take the next step, and that's really what we're looking forward to in the near future: helping everyone to create communities. We believe that to have an impact, whether economic or social, you need to have the expertise to create digital communities.
Today, we want to focus less on training and more on business, return on investment, data, and trends that can be exploited. We really want people to understand that when they come to ADICOMDAYS, we will not only talk about trends, but we will also discuss the tools to exploit them.
When you look back on the progress made over the past ten years, what makes you most proud?
What makes me most proud is all the lives that have been transformed thanks to ADICOMDAYS.
It's not just an event, it's a real community of people who get together once a year.
I have many stories of people who have found jobs in the digital sector, people who have met players from French-speaking African countries, for example, and who have been able to develop events in these countries or grow within local digital communities with new clients.
We have dozens of examples like this, and that's what makes us most proud.
What do you think are the priority areas for the next 10 years?
What remains to be built over the next 10 years?
First of all, it should be noted that the digital penetration rate in Africa is around 50%. Some might say that this is a rather low rate when compared to the West, but we believe that, on the contrary, it highlights the immense potential we have.
We have spent a lot of time in recent years looking at how to deliver on our promise to educate and train the market, i.e., to ensure that the entire market has a grasp of certain fundamentals.
Today we have a new generation that is extraordinary, that has mastered tools like never before, but that also wants to understand how we can monetize all of this.
My big dream is that Adicomdays and the digital ecosystem in general will also contribute to solving the problems of employability and monetization that we are facing on the continent. This is going to be extremely important over the next 10 years, and it will be at the heart of our business.