Hello Everyone!
Here’s the latest news on Connect Africa.
Welcome to Melanie, Hilton and Brett!
I’m delighted to welcome Melanie Malema who joined us in July. Melanie brings with her a wealth of NGO and Development Sector experience and will be responsible for operational management out of our Rivonia office (kindly provided by TC3 and Galaxy Media).
Welcome also to Hilton Theunissen and Brett Belinsky who have agreed to be non-executive Directors of Connect Africa Services in South Africa .
Hilton, formally of the Shuttleworth Foundation, is expanding the Shuttleworth tuXlab initiative (computer centres in schools) across Southern Africa within a new organisation called Inkululeku.
Brett has built a strong reputation within the South African business and banking communities over the past 25 years and sits on the boards of several companies as an independent non executive director, including Connecting Africa (no relation!), a satellite installation & maintenance company working in 38 countries around Africa. He is also involved with his wife in T.E.A. their own bespoke tailor and fashion design house – very useful for when you need that special custom made suit or outfit.
Rachael Barber (Head of Global Community Investment, Barclays Corporate Affairs) and Julia Zilberman (Senior Manager, European Bank of Reconstruction & Development) remain as non-executive Directors of the UK registered non-profit, Connect Africa Technologies.
Section 21 Registration (South African non-profit registration):
We are currently in the process of registering Connect Africa as a Section 21 Non Profit Organisation (“Connect Africa Services”) in South Africa and this will be a big step in enabling us to secure future development funding, not to mention government related contracts.
A big thank you to Elias Mashilo, Rachel Maja, Melanie Malema and Ashley Masondo (Digital Links International) who all kindly agreed to be “subscribers” in the registration process.
Funding & Sponsorship!
At the beginning of September we received our first funding from the Southern Africa Trust. A Big thank you to Neville Gabriel and his team at the trust for all their hard work. It’s a timely and crucially valuable grant that enables us to cover the all-important operational costs for a while to come.
A big thank you too to Iveco who have generously extended their sponsorship of the Iveco “Daily” van for another 6 months. Without the vehicle Connect Africa couldn’t operate and I cannot exaggerate just how much we appreciate this contribution. Iveco have a new Managing Director, Eduardo Chvatal who was instrumental in getting us this support and we look forward to working with him and his team in the future.
We’ve also been very fortunate to receive $18K worth of software from Microsoft through their Unlimited Potential (UP) program and we look forward to putting some very valuable tools to good use. Thanks specifically to Chose Choeu and Themba Mdlalose at Microsoft South Africa who were instrumental in securing us this grant.
We’re currently in discussions with the Development Bank of Southern Africa for the proposed roll-out of Connect Africa across South Africa from 2007 to 2010 and we intend for this to form the basis of our expansion strategy. This relationship is filled with potential and we’re all working hard to make it happen.
Wizzit Successes!
Our relationship with Cellular Banking pioneers Wizzit has been an immediate success. Elias, our Limpopo Operator arranged for over 30 people to be trained as Wizzkids (local people able to process Wizzit bank account applications) in and around the Mokopane region. Since then interest in this high-tech, cost effective banking service has been tremendous, including 65 applicants from a single hotel!
The Wizzit service has also enabled Elias to pay the electricity charges for many rural people who were having trouble accessing or getting to Eskom’s recharging facilities. For a small fee he instantly pays their fee using his cell phone and his Wizzit account. He gets a text in return with a recharge pin code for their meter and the recharge is complete. This saves rural people not only time but also a trip into town that can cost R50 or more each way.
Limpopo Field Trials:
We have now successfully completed nearly six months of field trials in the Mogalakwena Municipal region in Limpopo Province, South Africa . The Municipality, in particular Business Services Manager, Morutse Ntsoane, have been instrumental to the success of these trials. Many lessons have been learnt and both Connect Africa and Mogalakwena Municipality are ready to move to the next phase, namely to roll the service out across the whole municipal region.
It is proposed that this region will then provide a model for the national roll-out across South Africa (proposed for 2007 to 2010) and the rest of Africa (10 countries by 2015).
Franchisee Prospects:
This newsletter is also going out to the many people that have expressed an interest in becoming Franchisees with Connect Africa over the last few months and I look forward to firming up on our operational requirements early in 2007. In the meanwhile you’ll all be kept updated on our progress.
Next Steps:
Our priority between now and the end of the year is to comprehensively cover the Mogalakwena Municipal region with a further 2 mobile units and build this into the model for our national and international roll-out strategy to commence early in 2007.
Funding is always top of our agenda, particularly now at these early stages when there is little or no revenue being generated. Melanie has been tasked to submit and manage several funding applications to corporate and development organisations and I hope to be able to announce some good results in our next update.
I hope you have found this mail interesting and if you have any comments or questions please don’t hesitate to drop me a line.
All the best.
Dion