Tech (695)
The center will help boost access to quality digital education and offer employment opportunities and innovative solutions in Senegal.
IT company Atos and 01Talent Africa launched Monday (July 4) a collective intelligence center in Dakar, Senegal. The center will offer digital training, starting from September 2022.
During the launching ceremony, Alpha Barry, Head of Atos Africa, elaborated on why Africa is the perfect continent to develop the collective intelligence center project. “With an average age of 19, Africa is the youngest continent in the world and will represent 40% of the world's population by the end of the century. By working with 01Talent in Africa, we are giving these young people the opportunity to unleash their creative potential to contribute to the innovation and digital transformation of the continent," he indicated.
“This initiative is part of a strategic partnership that aims to accelerate the digital transformation in Africa, by enabling the massification of world-class digital skills through an innovative and inclusive training of excellence on the continent,” the two partners inform.
For 01Talent Africa’s strategic director, Karim Sy, “this strategic initiative confirms the commitment of 01Talent and Atos to the creation of an African technology ecosystem strengthened by the training of world-class talent, essential to the accomplishment of the continent's digital transition.”
“This is a huge opportunity to create jobs for young people and value for local businesses. Everyone becomes an actor of change,” he stresses.
The collective intelligence center baptized Zone01 will be inaugurated in September 2022, welcoming the first cohort of 120 young talents selected during a competitive stage. After Dakar, the two partners intend to launch a new Zone01 in Egypt, Morocco, and Mauritania.
Samira Njoya
The lab hosted by Orange Digital Center is an opportunity for project developers and companies to test the quality of their tech products and services. It will let them carry out small-scale tests before the launch.
Orange inaugurated, Thursday (June 30), its first African 5G Lab in Dakar, Senegal. The 5G Lab is dedicated to the experimentation and development of 5G-compliant products and services. The lab was ianuguared by Sékou Dramé, CEO of Sonatel Group, and Michaël Trabbia, Orange Chief Technology and Innovation Officer.
According to Michaël Trabbia, 5G is a tool that can be leveraged to boost companies' and nations’ growth. This is why Orange is committed to a co-innovation approach to help create futuristic products. "Territorial anchoring is key in the Orange 5G Lab program to support the digital transformation of economic players, and help everyone take advantage of the potential of the 5G," he said.
Orange 5G Lab Dakar is housed at the Orange Digital Center in Dakar in a 108 m² room with several sections that can be used as demonstration space for virtual reality and augmented reality services, a gaming space, or a co-working space. The space has case studies carried out in several areas (e-Health, smart port, smart édu, smart Agri) in partnership with technology providers Huawei and Nokia. It also has innovation demonstrations carried out by Caytu in partnership with the Dakar American University of Science and Technology (DAUST) and Senvital in partnership with Sonatel corporate medicine.
Orange 5G Lab Dakar is the 14th technology space of its kind to be inaugurated by the French telecom group in all its markets. Apart from Senegal, Orange has 5G Labs in France (10), Romania (1), Belgium (1), and Poland (1). More than 1,200 companies and local authorities have already benefited from the technology space, 114 of which have been able to experiment with their products and services.
In Senegal, the introduction of 5G combined with new technologies such as Big data, AI, and augmented reality aims to stimulate the transformation of the Senegalese society and economy in key areas such as agriculture, public health, education, entrepreneurship, and youth employability.
Ruben Tchounyabe
Since 2016, Cameroonian tech entrepreneur Vincent Onana Binyegui has multiplied actions to improve education access, in rural zones notably. The flagship product he developed, Teachmepad, allows access to educational content offline. The assembly plant is the next step in his project.
Teachmepad Mobile Limited, the developer of the solar-powered educational tablet Teachmepad, seeks €5 million to set up an assembly plant in Cameroon. For that purpose, it launched a pre-series A round last Friday, June 1. The capital sought will be divided as follows: €420,000 in equity crowdfunding and €4.573 million in loan crowdfunding. The pre-series A round will be closed on June 1, 2023, we learn.
The project has been reviewed by the national investment corporation SNI’s technical teams, revealed Teachmepad Mobile Limited founder Vincent Onana Binyegui at the end of a work session called by the Ministry of Economy.
The plant, dubbed Teachmepad Mobile Industry, will create 200 direct jobs, the founder stresses. In the framework of the project, Teachmepad Mobile Limited will acquire a unit, whose daily production capacity is 5,000, from China. In its first year of operation, the plant will operate at 20% of its capacity with 10 employees and progressively go at full throttle with a team of 205 people.
During the work session, SNI suggested the government should provide support to scale the project and make it bankable for additional technical and financial support. SNI also suggested a partnership with a technical partner, a mobile components manufacturer preferably, to guarantee the supply of needed components.
In 2021, Teachmepad Mobile Limited concluded a funding round launched in 2020 by raising about €1.219 million from Cameroonian and French investors. With the funds secured, it acquired a 5-hectare plot that will host the assembly plant, carried out 3D printing of the commercial prototypes, and performed some administrative tasks and the studies required for the plant installation project.
Teachmepad is an educative tablet that allows access to educational content, like Wikipedia, offline. It was developed to boost education in rural areas with poor internet and electricity access and a low number of teachers. The tablet has received the African Intellectual Property Organization (OAPI)’s patent.
Currently, Vincent Onana’s goal is to make TeachmePad the choice tablet in African countries for easy data collection, general census, and related works since the tablets can function in “remote areas with electricity and internet access problems.”
Ruben Tchounyabe
To help prepare Africa for the ongoing technological revolution, Orange initiated a set of actions in the markets where it operates. The Women’s Digital Center is part of those actions.
Orange Solidarity Madagascar inaugurated, Wednesday (June 22), Madagascar's 41st Women’s Digital center. The infrastructure, located in Fort Dauphin in the Southeast region, was built in partnership with the regional directorate of the Ministry of Social Protection, the Manarina association, the 8th March Committee, UNESCO, the Association of Women Journalists, and the Anosy regional tax department. The inauguration ceremony was attended by Frédéric Debord, CEO of Orange Madagascar, and Benja Arson, President of Orange Solidarity Madagascar.
Women’s Digital centers are installed in every region of Madagascar. They give long-term training to unemployed and unqualified women, teaching them digital skills, like how to use the internet and some professional software. In the framework of the Women’s Digital center program, more than 9,000 Malagasy women have been trained since 2013.
In addition to the Women’s Digital Center, the same day, the country’s 173rd digital school was inaugurated. The infrastructure is also based in Fort Dauphin and, it is the fourth being inaugurated in that region. It is hosted at EPP Bazar Centre and will accommodate up to 400 learners every year. For its operations, it received digital kits from Orange Madagascar, and teachers were trained by the telecom operator’s paid volunteers.
Through these actions, Orange is committed to helping Africa play its part in the ongoing global tech revolution. The Covid-19 pandemic prompted most African countries to accelerate digital transformation. Notable actions were taken to namely support digital inclusion, improve the digital divide and promote equality in digital education. To accelerate digital literacy, startup accelerators and tech innovation awards were also created.
Adoni Conrad Quenum
Entrepreneurship is the sector that creates the most jobs in Africa. However, many project initiators still fail to make their businesses more sustainable due to several factors. The Cameroonian government is trying to correct that.
Cameroon’s SME promotion agency APME presented, Monday (June 20) two digital applications to support project initiators. The first app, Notapme, is a rating system assessing SMEs’ financial strength. As for the second, MyOBus, it is an online business plan builder.
According to Jean Marie Louis Badga, director-general of the APME, the two apps will help the agency and its decentralized units in many ways. For instance, they will help “improve the bankability of the projects initiated by the SMEs supported by the agency by providing them with training materials on business plan development and by emitting an opinion on their credit risk based on a set of measurable and factual elements.”
The two apps allow project initiators to simulate in real-time business creation or development models and have remote assistance. They will also allow users (SMEs notably) to always assess their credibility, and improve the indicators usually taken into account by financial institutions during the credit awarding process.
Notapme and MyOBus were developed in the framework of the APME’s strategic positioning to reinforce its support mechanism. They also broaden the range of non-financial services offered by the public agency.
For Jean Marie Louis Badga, the two apps will let banks and investment firms have more information on loan requesters’ credibility and financial health. The apps will also help those financial institutions improve their risk management while diversifying their offers.
At the same time, Notapme and MyOBus will improve development partners' and backers’ intervention strategies by reinforcing their operational capabilities and increasing the orders they place with local SMEs, therefore increasing the latter’s capacity to go international.
"The two digital platforms are now part of our entrepreneurial ecosystem and open better opportunities for Cameroonian SMEs," said Achille Bassilekin III (photo, center), Minister of Small and Medium Enterprises, Social Economy, and Handicrafts.
Ruben Tchounyabe
The final phase of the AfricaTech Awards was held in Paris, on the sidelines of Viva Technology 2022. Three start-ups were awarded out of the 45 competing since May 2.
Weee Centre, Chefaa, and Click2sure are the winners of the first edition of the AfricaTech Awards, respectively in the climateTech, healthTech, and fintech categories.
The winners were selected last Saturday in Paris, France during an event hosted by Proparco and the International Finance Corporation (IFC) while New Energy Nexus, Cassava Technologies, and Orange S.A sponsored specific categories.
According to IFC’s Managing Director Makhtar Diop, “Africa is buzzing with innovative tech solutions that can help address climate change, promote food security, and expand financial inclusion. [...] Yet over 80% of African startups report difficulties in accessing funding. Initiatives like the AfricaTech Awards, which bring together entrepreneurs, governments, and investors, are key to attracting the resources and support that tech startups need to scale their innovations across the continent and beyond,” he adds.
Weee Centre, the winner in the climate tech category, is a Kenyan start-up founded in 2012. It provides e-waste management services and carries out "safe" green operations to protect the environment and human health.
Chefaa (winner in the healthtech category) is an Egyptian startup founded in 2018. It makes it easy for people suffering from chronic diseases to order drugs from pharmacies and get them delivered to their doorsteps or renew medical prescriptions.
For Click2Sure, the winner in the fintech category, it is a South African startup founded in 2015. It is a software as a service (SaaS) startup created to make life easier for companies operating in the insurance sector.
Adoni Conrad Quenum
In several low and middle-income countries, healthcare is still delayed by the poor technical services offered by health centers. The funding will help address the situation by improving medical diagnosis, which comes first before any medical intervention.
UK government agency National Institute of Health Research (NIHR) recently released about US$3.6 million to support the development of digital diagnostic tests for infectious diseases in seven African countries. The information was disclosed by the Imperial College London, in a release published, Tuesday (June 14). According to the release, the funding was awarded to researchers at the Imperial College London and those of 13 collaborating institutions in Burkina Faso, the Gambia, Ghana, Kenya, the Netherlands, Sudan, Uganda, the United Kingdom, and Zambia.
“We will evaluate the potential of digital diagnostic technology to tackle common problems including malaria and other childhood infections. The researchers in the project have a wide range of expertise, from electronic and design engineering to clinical medicine, health systems research, and mathematical modeling,” explains Dr. Aubrey Cunnington, Reader in Paediatric Infectious Diseases and head of the digital diagnostic test development project.
“The project addresses a huge unmet need for access to accurate diagnostics in low- and middle-income countries. [...] At present, less than half of the population of Africa has access to essential, accurate diagnostics. This makes it difficult to identify and administer the correct treatments, and to target disease prevention where it is most needed,” he stressed.
The NIHR funding is part of its Global Health Research Group (GHRG) program, which supports research partnerships between research institutions in the United Kingdom and in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). The GHRG aims to generate scientific evidence that can improve health outcomes for low-income people by helping improve health practices and guide policies.
“Over the next four years, the funding will enable the GHRG to develop and evaluate next-generation digital diagnostic tests for infectious diseases,” the Imperial College indicates. To develop the tests, researchers will use Lacewing, a hand-held device developed by an Imperial College team. The device performs highly sensitive detections with an accuracy similar to that of large lab machines but it is portable, low-cost, and rapid, we learn. “The results are immediately linked to a smartphone which enables data transmission to monitor the real-time detection of different diseases in different locations,” the Imperial College London concludes.
Ruben Tchounyabe
Some ten years ago, Cameroon quicked-off plan to shift to e-governance. Some administrations are not making enough efforts to digitize their services but others are stepping up investments to keep up with trends in an increasingly connected world.
Cameroon’s Ministry of Public Service signed, Monday (June 13), a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with incumbent telecom operator Camtel. The aim of the MoU is to ensure the optimal availability of the online services offered to users and data security.
According to Minister of Public Service, Joseph Le (photo, left), under the MoU, Camtel will facilitate the Ministry’s staff access to the files and applications submitted by users thanks to its secure and redundant internet connection as well as broadband interconnection (via specialized optical fiber or radio waves). The incumbent operator will also permit the public to easily submit applications for civil service competitions online and allow the quick issuance of civil service certifications and the optimal management of the integrated payroll management system SIGIPES in regional offices.
During the signing ceremony, Camtel’s MD, Judith Yah Sunday (photo, right), explained that the incumbent operator would provide the various services expected by the Ministry of Public Service by leveraging its data centers. Indeed, the MoU was being worked out since May 4, 2021, when Minister Joseph Le carried out a guided tour at Camtel’s Zamengoé data center. The visit was called by Judith Yah Sunday in preparation for the operationalization of the integrated payroll management system SIGIPES.
In the past five years, the Ministry of Public Service carried out a number of digital transformation reforms to improve the services it offers users. The digitization reforms are carried out in line with the country’s strategic plan Digital Cameroon by 2020, which has “modernization of the public administration” as one of its key aims.
Ruben Tchounyabe
In 2020, the Orange Group accelerated initiatives to become a multiservice operator in Africa. In that regard, it made strategic investments, which are gradually contributing to the expansion of its service offerings.
Telecom operator Orange Côte d’Ivoire launched, Monday (June 13), its e-health platform. Baptized Orange santé, the platform was launched in partnership with DabaDoc, a Moroccan heathtech backed by Orange Group in June 2021.
Currently, with Orange Santé, users can only book medical consultations. However, additional services will be added by 2023, allowing the diaspora to pay for e-consultations or users to carry out medical consultations online.
Orange Santé is specially dedicated to Ivorian health centers and professionals. It allows them to list their services, digitize their management, and create digital health records. It also offers health professionals more visibility and helps optimize their schedules.
The launch of Orange Santé is part of Orange Group’s strategy to become a reference operator and a key actor in the e-health segment in the Middle East and Africa. With the service, DabaDoc -which has been operating in the Maghreb for about eight years now- helps Orange address the doctor shortage ongoing in Africa and sustainably impact rural areas.
By 2023, Orange Group plans to launch Orange Santé in other Sub-Saharan African countries in addition to Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria, and Côte d’Ivoire, where the service is already operational.
Muriel Edjo
Currently, there are over 1.3 million kilometers of subsea cables in the world. By 2030, those cables will be replaced and the network expanded. The ITU wants to capitalize on that network to enhance climate protection.
The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) is currently developing two standards regulating the operations of SMART cables. SMART here is an acronym for “Scientific Monitoring And Reliable Telecommunications.” Therefore, the cables being regulated by the new standard will provide scientific sensing in addition to telecommunication signals.
SMART cables are the upgraded version of subsea cables. They “include tried‑and‑tested environmental and hazard‑monitoring sensors in cable repeaters, which house devices amplifying the optical communication signals at intervals along a submarine cable,” the ITU explains.
“Three sensors measure ocean‑bottom temperature as an indicator for climate trends; pressure for sea‑level rise, ocean currents, and tsunamis; and seismic acceleration for earthquake detection and tsunami alerts. Sensors should be operational at all times, and all detected data will be transmitted to cable landing stations at the speed of light,” it stresses.
The ITU's standardization efforts are based on the minimum requirements established by the Joint Task Force on SMART Cable Systems, which was formed in 2012 with the support of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of UNESCO (UNESCO-IOC) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). The new standards are expected to be completed by 2024.
According to a release published by the ITU last June 8, the first cable system to dedicate a commercial telecom fiber to environmental sensing was EllaLink, the Brazil‑Portugal trans‑Atlantic cable system. It illustrates how telecom technologies can be leveraged for development.
Muriel Edjo
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In Africa, the poor internet penetration rate is partially due to the high cost of electronic devices. A Malian joint-venture framed by French and Malian groups wants to tackle that issue.
Malian joint venture Danew Talla Electronics will soon set up a laptop and tablet assembly plant in Bamako. The information was disclosed by its CEO, Renaud Amiel, at the end of an audience with Prime Minister Choguel Kokalla Maïga last Monday (June 6).
According to Renaud Amiel, the plant will supply the local and West African markets. For Choguel Kokalla Maïga, who promised the government’s “full support”, the various products assembled will eventually help reduce the digital divide and create job opportunities for the youth.
In Africa, the high cost of electronic devices is one of the obstacles to internet access and the development of the digital sector. To address the situation, Danew Talla Electronics will sell quality laptops and notebooks at about XOF65,000 (US$106.3) with models going for sale at about XOF100,000.
The plant’s estimated production capacity is 600,000 tablets and laptops annually and the production phase is expected to start by September 2022. The venture is expected to create at least 200 direct jobs and up to 1,000 indirect jobs in the long term.
Renaud Amiel explains that the Danew Talla Electronics will also train 1,000 Malians in laptop repairing and maintenance. “We will create a national network of about 1,000 people with tablets and all the tools and software necessary to repair and service our products,” he said.
Ruben Tchounyabe
The new center is in line with the ambition of Rwandan President, Paul Kagame, to make the country Africa’s tech hub. It is the German group’s first subsidiary in Africa.
German electronics group Rohde & Schwarz opened its new software development lab in Kigali, Rwanda, last Monday (June 6). The lab was inaugurated during a ceremony attended by Rwandan President, Paul Kagame, on the sidelines of the 2022 ITU World Telecommunication Development Conference.
The recently inaugurated lab is both the Munich-based company's first subsidiary and research and development site in Africa. In the continent, the German group renowned worldwide for investments in future technologies (the 6G, quantum tech, IIoT, and AI) used to only carry out commercial activities.
Rohde & Schwarz will continuously expand the new laboratory as it did for its Singapore subsidiary, which has become a major Asian hub over the past 25 years. It will notably expand the scope of its operations to include cybersecurity and support to local students and engineers.
“Africa is an enormous growth market and Rwanda is a trailblazer in digitalization. Rohde & Schwarz is making a long-term commitment for sustainable growth and stability. We want to develop products for the global market together with our team in Rwanda,” said Peter Riedel President and COO of Rohde & Schwarz
Ruben Tchounyabe
With the memorandum, the two parties intend to join forces for effective digital actions. It demonstrates their understanding of the likely failure of unconcerted actions.
Smart Africa Alliance and the Digital Cooperation Organization inked, Monday (June 6), a memorandum of understanding to accelerate digital transformation in Africa. Under the memorandum, the two parties notably intend to exchange digital solutions and knowledge, create a commercial environment conducive to the development of innovative firms and empower women, the youth, and innovative entrepreneurs.
The intended actions will complement the measures already taken by Smart Africa Alliance and DCO member countries to boost connectivity (a basic requirement for effective digital transformation), accelerate digitalization in strategic socio-economic sectors, develop local digital talents and facilitate digital inclusion by 2030.
According to Lacina Koné (photo, right), CEO of Smart Africa Alliance, the MoU “will increase a lot to south-south cooperation, specifically with the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries.” He praised the partnership with a “like-minded organization” with whom the Smart Africa Alliance can collaborate on common objectives to enhance the growth of member countries’ economies.
As for Deemah Alyahya (photo, left), DCO Secretary-General, she expressed her belief “in the power of collaboration with like-minded organizations to enable digital prosperity for all.”
“We are very excited to activate our relationship and partnership. The digital economy is very fast in growth. We expected that by 2030, it is going to be more than 25 percent of the global GDP and now we know that by 2030, it is going to be 70 percent of the global GDP,” she added.
The memorandum was signed on the sidelines of the 2022 ITU World Telecommunication Development Conference currently being held in Kigali, Rwanda. The conference, which opened on June 6, will end on July 16. Smart Africa Alliance is a network of 32 African countries that share the common goal of leveraging the digital sector for development on the continent. Similarly, the Digital Cooperation Organization was founded by Bahrain in 2020 to facilitate a global and inclusive digital economy. Its membership includes Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait, Nigeria, Oman, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia.
Ruben Tchounyabe
In Africa, the stigmatization of HIV-positive people hinders the effective control and prevention of AIDS. In Nigeria, where nearly 1.9 million people are HIV-positive, technology has demonstrated its ability to improve their care.
Nigeria’s institute of human virology (IHVN) and healthtech startup Vantage Health Technologies revealed, Thursday (June 2), their successful implementation of an AI-powered project to keep HIV-positive people on effective and sustained treatment. Thanks to an AI-powered solution developed by Vantage, the IHVN was able to predict and “positively influence the behavior of high-risk HIV/AIDS patients.”
“The Patient Retention Solution is an AI-driven model that uses data from patient history to predict if patients will miss their next clinic appointment with the assumption that missing the appointment means the patient will drop off treatment as they are not present to collect their medication,” explains Annika Lindorsson Krugel, Solutions Manager of Vantage Health Technologies.
Once the prediction is completed, a list of the patients most likely to miss their appointments is transmitted to clinical staff who would then take action to prevent the likely outcome. They for instance call or send SMS to patients, and even visit the patients that do not have phones. Interviews are also carried out to provide psychological support to every at-risk patient before an appointment.
For Mercy Omozuafoh, Programme Manager for Care and Support with the IHVN, “the project has demonstrated the effectiveness of proactive tracking of Patients Living with HIV (PLHIV).” It “has made us understand the importance of interventions we are implementing,” she adds.
“The predictive model was rolled out to about 30,000 patients at the General Hospital Kudwa at Bwari in the Federal Capital Territory, the Dalhatu Araf Specialist Hospital in Lafia in the Nasarawa State, and General Hospital Ahoada in the Rivers State,” a press release informs.
“Our estimate shows that between 1.8 to 1.9 million Nigerians are currently living with HIV/AIDS. Of this number, 1.6 million are already on treatment. So, we have 300,000 more to go,” the national AIDS control agency NACA’s boss Dr. Gambo Gumel Aliyu told The Guardian ahead of World AIDS Day 2021.
According to the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), one of the challenges in combating the epidemic in Africa remains keeping HIV-positive people on sustainable treatment. Also, according to a case study by Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice, the main barriers to treatment adherence “included stigma, side-effects, logistical challenges, economic barriers, and forgetfulness.”
“The study found that caregiver support, peer support, and understanding one’s status helped patients overcome these barriers,” it concluded (according to a release published by Vantage Health Technologies).
Ruben Tchounyabe