Entrepreneurship, speaking, business, travel, and the long road in between
Håvar Bauck
Building across Africa through entrepreneurship, business development, and hospitality advisory
I am a Norwegian entrepreneur, advisor, and speaker based in Nairobi, with more than two decades of experience building businesses, partnerships, and market opportunities across East Africa and the wider continent. My work combines entrepreneurship and business development with a strong focus on hospitality advisory, backed by deep experience in tourism and travel technology.
What I do
I work with hotel owners, investors, developers, founders, and companies across Africa, combining hospitality advisory with business development, growth, partnerships, and market expansion.
In hospitality, I support projects from early strategy and positioning through operator selection, and investment preparation.
Alongside this, I speak at conferences and industry events and write regularly about business, tourism, hospitality, technology, and Africa’s changing economic landscape.
Consulting / Advisory
Strategic advice across hospitality, business development, growth, market entry, and partnerships, backed by hands-on experience building companies and operating across African markets.
Hospitality development and advisory
Supporting hotel owners, investors, and developers in shaping viable projects, choosing the right partners, and moving from concept toward operation.
Business development and partnerships
Building commercial opportunities and partnerships that open markets, drive growth, and create long-term value.
Founder & strategic advisory
Working with founders and leadership teams on direction, capital raising, scaling, and difficult strategic decisions.
Speaking
I speak on entrepreneurship, hospitality, tourism investment, travel technology, and building businesses across Africa, drawing on more than two decades as a founder, operator, and advisor.
Recent appearances include The Hotel Expo, Africa MICE Summit, Africa TravelTech Summit, Africa Youth in Tourism Innovation Summit and Challenge, Africa Tourism Leadership Forum, and AfricaCom.
Selected moments
Advisory work, industry engagements, and speaking across Africa.
In the Media
Selected interviews, features, and media coverage across entrepreneurship, travel, technology, and business in Africa.
The Machine Has Started Shopping
“We are entering the most consequential period of disruption in hotel distribution since the rise and consolidation of the OTAs.”
Launch of Silva Gigiri (KTN)
“Kenya is standing out with the quality of its hospitality. That was already the case. This is a step up to the next level”
Making of a hospitality tech powerhouse
“Africa is vast, fast-growing, and still underserved by technology tailored to its unique hospitality landscape. Our priority is to strengthen our presence in key…
Håvar Bauck Portrait Interview (Finding Humans in Tech)
‘This whole continent represents endless opportunities, and at a personal level, the people’s energy for life and ambitions is on another level. The innovations…
I work with fI work with hotel owners, investors, developers, founders, and companies on hospitality projects, business development, partnerships, and growth across Africa.
bauck.com – since 1998
I started building bauck.com in plain HTML with Windows Notepad, inspired by the first personal websites that began appearing at the time.
In the days when the web was new and felt open, curious, and slightly improvised in the best possible way.
bauck.com has been online ever since, making it one of the oldest continuously running blogs on the internet.
From the blog
Business, hospitality, tourism, travel, and the spaces in between.
Originally built as a personal blog, bauck.com still combines professional analysis with travel, ideas, and more personal writing, with a growing focus on hospitality, tourism investment, technology, and African business.
Beyond Business
Travel has always been part of my story.
It has shaped how I move through the world, how I notice things, and how I make sense of places, people, and change. I document landscapes, cities, encounters, detours, and the unexpected moments that tend to matter more than planned.
Some of it is about movement. Some of it is about curiosity. Over time, that has grown into a substantial archive of images, observations, and travel writing built from the road.
