Verizon Business SA, formerly UUNET, has cut down its sponsorship of the Bandwidth Barn, leaving the Cape-based IT incubator searching for a new industry partner to fund its projects.
The reduction in the sponsorship from about R1 million to R300 000 annually will have some impact on projects and events in the short-term, but Ravin Naidoo, chairman of the Bandwidth Barn, expects these will resume once another anchor sponsor is found.
"We understand it is a business decision on their part and they have been with us from the beginning. UUNET will still help fund the bandwidth requirements of the Barn`s tenants," he says.
New leadership
Verizon Business SA staff says the merger between its former parent MCI, with US telecommunications giant Verizon, has meant it has had to re-look at some of its activities. A formal press statement is expected later today.
In terms of the sponsorship reduction, the UUNET logos at the Bandwidth Barn will be taken down. "Should we get another sponsor, then it will have the naming rights."
Meanwhile, the Bandwidth Barn is about to advertise for a new executive director, following the departure of Masedi Molosiwa earlier this month to take up a position with the SA Post Office.
"We are about to start advertising in the national papers. The position needs someone who is good at relationship building rather than a person who is a technologist," Naidoo says.
Naidoo attributes the Bandwidth Barn`s success to the 50/50 partnership between industry and government. "Most of the other incubators are either entirely funded or entirely run by government. The Bandwidth Barn, because of the high industry involvement, is not a bureaucracy."
The Bandwidth Barn has about 65 companies with an average of between three to four employees each.
Share
