Blue IQ is a multibillion-rand initiative of the Gauteng Provincial Government to invest in economic infrastructure development in identified mega projects in tourism, smart industries and high value-added manufacturing to create a truly "smart" province.
The programme encourages public private partnerships and creates business opportunities for black, small and medium businesses that will bring investment flows to key sectors of the provincial economy. There are 11 projects in total.
Of the R2.99 billion allocated to special projects in the Gauteng Budget 2003/4, Blue IQ's share is R1.47 billion, or 49%.
The largest Blue IQ project is the Gautrain, a rapid rail link that will run between Johannesburg and Pretoria with a loop to Johannesburg International Airport. Expected to cost about R7 billion over the next four years, Blue IQ's contribution will be R5 billion of which R659 million has been set aside for this financial year.
SuperModeller will control the budget allocations of the 11 projects and ensure that an even flow of funds is distributed to the many contractors in accordance with their individual expenditure.
Blue IQ runs 11 projects with a total value of around R10 billion using about 120 spreadsheets and graphs. These spreadsheets are interconnected and consolidate into a Blue IQ report. Blue IQ allocates funds to the projects and must account to the Treasury Department of the Gauteng Provincial Government. As these projects are designed to promote small businesses, funds are allocated three months in advance as these businesses have problems raising finances. The system is designed to help track these prepayments, match them with actuals from the projects and ensure the province gets value for money. Budgeting and forecasting is employed and funds are received from various other agencies and private organisations. The financial managers are concerned that spreadsheets are not a reliable method for tracking these systems and have adopted SuperModeller.
Phase one of the conversion will be to take the existing spreadsheets and convert them to SuperModeller structures. Extra functionality will be added where applicable such as a drilldown facility from the Blue IQ consolidation into each project and its components. Management can then effectively work off one screen, drilldown to the area of concern and do changes, what-ifs, etc. Presentation of reports is important and logos and colour are used extensively.
Phase two will be interfaces to the province's accounting systems to match actual transactions with the Blue IQ systems. Also being considered is the deployment of SuperModeller to the project level.
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