STAFF WRITER
Big corporates must the lead in supporting technology start-ups while government should then provide the right policy environment for startups growth, technology entrepreneur said.
Simbarashe Mukorera who is former computer science student at University of Zimbabwe and founder of a digital marketing platform called AdSpace said government needs to create the right environment through provision of an ecosystem of mentorship for youths and funding for most technology startups for them to reach maturity as the continent of Africa longs for birth of more technology moguls.
Today, the continent is experiencing unprecedented levels of technological innovation with African youths building their own startups. Technology entrepreneurship is taking root and despite the numerous challenges that still affects the African tech scene the African seed of innovation is germinating.
One key factor that makes Africa the new land of opportunity for innovations and tech startups is the continent’s highly young population, the highest in the world.
Mukorera told Business Times in an interview that while the talk is around nurturing technology startups, the corporates should not be left out of the picture.
“My thinking is that in as much as is government trying s to promote entrepreneurship, we should not leave corporate out of the picture. In as much as their structures and policies inhibit entrepreneurs then all the efforts by government will be in vain.
“Take for instance the procurement process .All large corporates have some form of procurement process which prevents them from acquiring products or services from new players, especially the smaller once or the not so known ones. Big corporates need to up their game in creating an entrepreneur friendly economy,” said Mukorera.
He noted that organisations bureaucracy within most big corporates has played a big role in stunting the growth of most startups especially in the technology front.
On the marketing platform, Mukorera said corporates, SMEs, organisations and individuals spend more than $600 billion in advertisement annually so as to explore new opportunities to advertise their product or service offerings.
He said the industry has potential to tap into via both the digital and conventional methods of conducting business therein with the traditional advertisement occupying a fair share of the statistics.
“Looking at the whole process of looking for advertisement service providers through to launching a campaign, various media houses have a daunting process that can be obscure, lengthy and complicated for novices who are seeking to access these services to expand their business.”
Mukorera said AdSpace which can be found on www.adspaces.co.zw is a digital solution that transforms the way conventional advertisement is done through democratizing the relevant information and easing reach between service providers and prospective clients.
It is a web based platform that facilitates the process of discovering advertisement service providers and their respective product offerings under various marketing categories through to the creation and running of advertising campaigns.
The whole process that can take hours to days using the conventional methods will be compacted to a couple of minutes through this efficiency leveling platform. Currently the advertising industry has no ubiquitous and scalable automated solution that integrates the whole ad discovery and campaign launch process.
