By Allan Olingo
In Summary
JUAN IGNACIO PONELLI
- Background: In 2002, Juan Ignacio Ponelli graduated with a Bachelor of Commerce at International Merchant Marine University.
- Education: In 2005, Mr Ponelli joined University of Buenos Aires, School of Law and Social Sciences for a law degree. In 2010, he did his Masters' degree at Northwestern University School of Law in Chicago, US.
- Experience: In 2011, he Joined BGH to serve as general counsel.
Current: Took over as the chief executive of Positivo BGH in Rwanda.
South American technology firm Positivo BGH made its
entry into the region two years ago with the building of ‘made in
Rwanda’ laptops. Allan Olingo spoke with the firm’s president for Africa
Juan Ignacio Ponelli on its plan to increase access to technology in
schools.
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How have your entry and operations in Rwanda and Kenya gone?
It has been easy, mostly because we had both governments’ support.
We started discussions with the Kigali government over the
education project in early 2014 and by the year end, we had concluded
them, signed an agreement and formed the Positivo BGH, which is a joint
venture between technology companies Positivo Informática from Brazil
and BGH from Argentina.
Our agreement was to sell them 150,000 devices each year. We
have already assembled more than 150,000 units for that market, most of
which have been distributed across schools.
In Kenya, we have partnered with a university to deliver laptops
under the primary education Digital Literacy Programme (DLP). We will
be delivering second half of the “Taifa” laptop project of 600,000 units
mid this year. To us, this will be an achievement as we are planning to
actualise this within the eight months of operations in the country,
having completed the factory in October last year.
Have there been any challenges with regards to the assembly plant in Nairobi?
We have had several challenges with the project — key among them
being the currency fluctuations. We are doing an import-oriented
operation from the components to the basic factory set up. The currency
movements affects us as we have to take hits on this, while we are not
able to vary the contract price terms. Outside that we have used
economies of scale to try to limit the hits we are taking.
So what will happen with the Kenyan plant once you have delivered the governments’ tender requirements?
We plan to commercialise the remaining element and push for
delivery of laptops mostly for private schools. When you look at the
standard one laptop projects it remains silent on the private schools
yet the contents will have a significant impact on learners.
For all of them to remain on the same level, the private schools
will have no choice but to adopt the same curriculum and to us, this is
the next market. After that we will do the secondary schools before
rolling out to the public the “Made in Kenya” laptops, which will retail
at affordable prices.
How is the arrangement with Jomo Kenyatta University of
Agriculture and Technology (JKUAT) working? How do they benefit from the
collaboration?
We are carrying the business element of the deal, while JKUAT
does the academic bit. Basically, the students at the electrical and
software engineering department of JKUAT are the biggest beneficiary.
We are one of the biggest five global technology firms in the
education sector, hence this project has seen them participate in
technical training through internships and do the daily operations in
assembly of these units.
This gives a perfect base for knowledge transfer, while the
content development, especially on the merging of the content with the
software development, is also being handled by our professionals working
in partnership with these students. This is the future of manufacturing
collaborations on the continent.
JKUAT is also engaged in the support and training of teachers and students all over selected Kenyan public schools.
So where will you source the parts that will then be assembled at the JKUAT premises in Kenya?
We have been able to build the laptops factory in collaboration
with JKUAT as promised. It is true that we aren’t manufacturing but
doing assembly of the laptop parts here in Nairobi.
That’s why we will call them “Made in Nairobi” laptops. We are,
however, sourcing the parts from all over the world with China being a
key supplier. Other markets that will be supplying the components
include Japan, Europe and parts of South America. However, we are also
trying to see whether we can get some components locally.
You are working in a market that is price sensitive; how
do you plan to address this as you branch out from government-sponsored
initiative into your own commercial venture?
We are operating in a market that has good regional policies on
shipped knocked-down kits. With that in mind, we plan to take advantage
of this to put up brands that will be cheaper compared with imported
finished devices.
We are also banking on volumes and economies of scale effect to
push down the prices. We are in a region that is proud of its
achievements and products and we believe that having a “Made in East
Africa” electronic product will resonate with the market.
What has been the impact of your activities, especially
the technology products, education in Rwanda, where you have been doing
business since 2015?
We have managed to do three laptops customised for that market. We have the mini notebook; 2in1 and the Nestbook.
Are there any investments outside of education within the region?
We are currently at the concept stages to introduce assembly
plants for other electronics and software development. It will be our
goal to have a lot of “made in Africa” software so that the huge import
bill for these items that is currently benefiting Asian nations can be
reduced.
We are renowned for producing security software systems for
militaries and this is an area we are looking at especially in the
region. We already have partnerships in software development with IBM
and Motorola in the region and we hope these will yield in products
designed for this market.
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