Born with a mission to address the issues of affirmative action and black empowerment within the information technology (IT) arena, Choice Technologies has, over the past four years, risen to become one of South Africa`s leading black networking solutions providers and a major Supplier of IT services to government companies.
Choice Technologies is a 51% black-owned company, formed in 1994 in a joint venture with the DNS Group, a subsidiary of JSE-listed Dimension Data Holdings.
Under the leadership of MD Semela Tseka, the company followed a plan of forming strategic alliances with key companies - including its parent organisation, the DNS Group - to pool resources and skills in a bid to more adequately address government IT business needs.
"Continuity and sustainability are the cornerstones on which businesses are built and technical and managerial skills transfer from successful companies through effective training and mentoring schemes are our major priority," says Tseka.
He believes that this is as true for Choice as it is for his customers, many of whom face the same skills shortages and black empowerment challenges.
"The process of creating the environment for learning and teaching, as well as stimulating innovation in terms of business systems, can be made possible with a well formulated method of technology delivery," he says.
"For example, Internet access, computer-based learning and information delivery systems may be used for effective teaching. But within the corporate environment they may also be employed as tools for performance monitoring, quality enhancement and the delivery of important management information.
"The effects of IT used in this manner are having significant spin-off benefits in many of our commercial applications and at government sites," he says.
Within government, Tseka has identified key sectors where the application of `dual purpose` IT solutions could be put to good use - including Health and tele-medicine, agriculture, housing, the environment and employment generation - all of which are vital to South Africa`s entry into the global economy.
He says that the concept of globalisation, as applied to South African business endeavours, has to involve all levels of society - including the education departments and government, working in partnership with the information, communications and technology sectors.
"There are many opportunities for key players to assist in moving the country from high levels of illiteracy to computer literacy - thereby enabling our society to meet the objectives of a strengthened economy."
An example, says Tseka, is using a national information delivery infrastructure to empower people and promote economic development. "Deregulation and a hotting up of competition within a liberalised telecommunications industry will fuel massive investments that will have many benefits down the line.
"These investments will bring the advantages of modern telecommunications to rural and previously disadvantaged communities and - at the same time - herald the beginning of a five to ten year boom cycle for black empowerment IT companies."
Commenting on a forecast by a leading IT research company, that many high profile black IT companies will fail because of a lack of technology skills, Tseka supports the view that a shake-out is imminent.
"In the past four years more than 80 black IT companies have been established. While many of them will address inequalities of the past through the employment of previously disadvantaged individuals, few will have adequate and on-going access to the technical skills found only in larger companies.
"At Choice Technologies it is our aim to actively participate in the process of nation-building through technology and skills transfer," he says.
"By working with our partners and parent company - the DNS Group - we hope to contribute to the formation of an IT-centred society and in so doing assist all South Africans to gain access to information."
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