![[Africa Tech Week] Automating efficiency, driving innovation](Images/2018/08/business_automation.jpg)
[Africa Tech Week] Automating efficiency, driving innovation
With a growing body of research pointing to improved efficiency and cost savings for institutions that have embraced innovation, technology has this week informed business decisions across public and private sectors.
This, inspired by a proliferation of modern and ubiquitous innovations that have continuously redefined business operations.
Pandya Memorial Hospital based in Mombasa on the Kenyan coast has joined the list of hospitals that are automating their business processes and improve the cost-to-value structure. This week it implemented the SAP Business One technology to automate its inventory. In Kenya, SAP has previously introduced mobile cloud based solution for cervical cancer screening.
Still on automation, The Kenya Pipeline Company has completed the migration of its manual procurement to the new Supplier Relationship Management (SRM) platform. This will offer an online e-procurement platform through which KPC will automate its entire procurement process. The automation follows the launch, years back, of a platform that allows organizations to get reliable and vetted suppliers for various products and services electronically,a spirited campaign by Kenya to address runaway corruption. This as experts agree that focused intent to reduce cost of operation and ownership of ICT infrastructure is still the driving force behind any ICT procurement and integration strategy today.
South Korea's largest telecommunications company, KT Corp has completed a new digital system for national identification in Tanzania marking its growing presence in the continent. The compant had earlier this year announced it would expand its cooperation with African countries in the field of ICT.
And what points to multinational technology company Google's strategy to redefine the ICT landscape in the continent, it has announced that Nigeria, Africa's most populous nation, will be the first on the continent to receive its free public Wi-Fi service. This is after it launched a Google Station to provide free high-speed Wifi in the country. Other notable investments Google has made in Africa include Artificial Intelligence research center in Ghana, a smartphone for the African market, a massive digital skills training programme targeting millions of youth and Master’s in Machine Intelligence among others.
In matters partnership, Kenyan mobile consumer feedback company mSurvey has announced a new partnership with Safaricom’s M-Pesa that enable merchants across the country access customer feedback via Lipa Na M-Pesa through mSurvey’s platform. The two companies have previously partnered to measure Kenya’s cash and digital economy and to launch first cash economy research platform in Africa.
In South Africa, Mastercard and Entersekt have collaborated to enable Nedbank’s customers to make QR payments to Masterpass, Pay@, SnapScan, and Zapper merchants and billers through the Nedbank Money app, whether they are paying online or at a physical point of presence. This comes even as Mastercard continues to call on banks and payments companies to drive solutions allowing small and informal merchants to accept digital payments at lower cost in order to deepen financial inclusion.
Liquid Telecom has delivered the first Microsoft ExpressRoute service peering in Africa – offering customers better performance, tighter security and lower latency.
In Rwanda Telcos are seeking mobile money interoperability approval from the relevant regulator in the country which will allow the service providers to begin commercial negotiations. This has come as initiatives promoting interoperability across the continent continues to take shape from South Africa, Ghana and Tanzania.
The SAP Skills for Africa programme that seeks to train graduates on critical digital skills has been opened in Nigeria. This follows succesful previous initiatives in East Africa and Morocco.
