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Plan to grow ECape ICT sector

By Itumeleng Mogaki, ITWeb junior journalist
Johannesburg, 22 Jul 2004

The Eastern Cape Development Corporation (ECDC) has brought together a team to work on growing and consolidating the province`s 295-company ICT sector, and bring more black entrepreneurs into the market.

Raven Naidoo, who has been central to the Western Cape`s IT sector growth plans and is now tackling the Eastern Cape, says: "The team hopes to bring companies together to address common issues, provide information, sharing opportunities, and joint project activities."

"The province`s small, vibrant and diverse sector needs a little more nurturing and support in order to grow its ICT sector," says Abu Abdulatief, Eastern Cape ICT sector manager.

"Most ICT companies serve the local market and are small and medium enterprises [SMEs]. There are a few software companies, mainly involved in hardware, software and support functions.

"Researching the strength, weaknesses and opportunities in the Eastern Cape ICT industry, and appointing a project manager to drive the incubator hub, has been a challenge," says Abdulatief.

"The Eastern Cape has only seven black IT companies, and there have been concerns among local companies about a growing trend for large companies to claim BEE [black economic empowerment] status and use this to shut out local companies from procurement opportunities."

"The Western Cape is also struggling with the need to ensure that more black entrepreneurs enter the ICT market," says Naidoo. "This is a challenge that needs to be addressed both at the generic and sector level.

"The team is looking at what Cape Town has done to move forward their ICT sector, and the same approach will be applied to grow the Eastern Cape IT sector," says Naidoo.

"One of the first projects of the initiative is the appointment of a steering committee which will address six key areas, such as increasing the number of SMEs in the industry, increasing the number of start-ups, increasing the competitiveness of the sector, increasing BEE, and promoting further understanding of the sector through research," says Naidoo.

"Other interventions include a development plan for the incubator as the next stage of the project, further workshops in Port Elizabeth and East London, allocation of funding by the ECDC for the workshops, and the development of two IT networks in the Nelson Mandela Metropole and Border Kei region.

"The region offers the IT industry skilled IT personnel together with an unusually high concentration of outstanding education institutions," says Abdulatief. "Some of these institutions specialise in the ICT field and are prepared to extend their research with sufficient business support."

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