July 2, 2001

Rebecca Enonchong, co-founder of the Africa Technology Forum

Africa 1.0

By KATHLEEN MELYMUKA
(July 02, 2001) Rebecca Enonchong, daughter of a village chief in Cameroon and educated in the U.S., co-founded the Washington-based Africa Technology Forum (www.africatechforum.com) to promote technology in Africa and to foster the networking and growth of African technology professionals.

Enonchong, 33, who is also president of AppsTech., a Bethesda, Md.-based global application service provider, recently spoke with Computerworld reporter Kathleen Melymuka about the many challenges and opportunities of doing business in Africa.

Why should U.S. companies want to do business in Africa? Look at what's happening in the U.S. economy: The market is shrinking. Africa has new, untapped markets. A lot of formerly government-owned enterprises are being privatized. Economies in Africa are growing at a rate much more rapid than in the West. They have a greater [technology] gap and greater need [for high technology] than in the West. There are great opportunities for any company offering goods and services.

Is there a digital divide within Africa? There is. Countries in southern Africa like South Africa, Botswana [and] Zimbabwe are more advanced. Then you have the northern African countries that are also more advanced. In the middle—what would be considered black Africa—you've got this huge gap, and that's the area of greatest opportunity, because it's neglected in general by American companies.

What kind of infrastructure challenges are there? What about electricity? It's not everywhere. Even larger cities with millions of people may have entire neighborhoods without electricity. When you have it, it's really expensive, and, frequently, electricity will just go off for a couple days. So you always have to think about what kind of power generator you have and do you really want to use it for computers or do you need it for [other things].

Those are the kinds of challenges Africans face daily. It becomes part of your psyche, so it's a challenge but not an obstacle that can't be overcome. When we think about doing projects in Africa, we have to think about that and how we're going to deal with it and then just deal with it.

Talk about some of the challenges of deploying technology in Africa. Lack of land lines is very tough to deal with. Getting a phone line in some countries takes over a year, so dial-up [service] isn't necessarily an option. Most [companies] use VSAT technology, and in some countries, that's illegal, and in others, they could make it illegal any day, so even if you have VSAT, you don't want anyone to know.

Some companies will put [a satellite dish] on the back side of the building so the government officials won't see it. And that's very scary. Some companies have built their business around this technology and they don't know if it's going to last till next year. How do you get investors in a company that the government could shut down tomorrow?

What are some of the political challenges? On paper, some countries seem to be encouraging the growth of technology. For instance, Nigeria has a whole ministry for science and technology that's brand new. But our [chief operating officer] is from Nigeria, and he laughs and says it looks good on paper but the reality is that it's still filtering through and it will take some time. But it's a move in the right direction.

Then there are other countries I won't name. In one, the main land-line phone company was being privatized, and a South African company wanted to purchase the formerly government-owned [telecommunications firm], but the holdup was that one of the government ministers wanted $100 million for himself. That stopped the deal for a long time. Finally, it went through, but those are the types of things that happen.

About six years ago, when the Internet was becoming big, the minister of communications of one country said that over his dead body would his country have the Internet. He's still alive and he's still a minister in that country and the Internet exists. It comes from the population and you can't stop a revolution.

Setting up Shop

OK, I want to set up an operation in Africa. What do I have to do? The first thing is to make the long-term commitment to Africa. You can't look at quarter-to-quarter earnings. It shouldn't be the kind of commitment where you come to make a quick buck and leave. There are cultural differences, infrastructure differences, and if you do the one-off, you don't absorb it and you can't learn for the next one. And you can't take advantage of the opportunities if you're not there.

So it's a full commitment: a full office, staff, training, imparting your corporate culture in that staff, supporting the community, being a part of the community.

Then look here [in the U.S.] for somebody who is from the country or has worked in the country where you want to work and hire him. He will be able to guild you.

Then try to identify a local partner [in Africa]. Somebody that's already there, that's done business there, that knows how business is done, that understands the culture and has the right connections.

But you've got to do your due diligence: Are you compatible? Do they share your corporate culture, your desire to do things the proper way even though it will take longer? Are they above board? If they are involved in corrupt activities, are you willing to look the other way or not?

So corruption is an issue? It's prevalent in Africa because there's a lot of poverty and government civil servants are paid meager wages and supplement their salaries by taking kickbacks. Although you need to understand the system, you don't want to become enslaved to it. It's a reality and you have to know going in that it will take longer to get things done properly.

If we have any suspicion that the people we're working with a have any involvement in any corrupt activity, we'll walk away from the deal, but that's something that you have to decide for yourself.

And don't go in with rose-colored glasses. Don't go in pretending. I see this so often, particularly with African-American businesspeople. They have a very romantic notion of Africa. It's true, it's a beautiful continent and the people are wonderful, but it's real life. You have to go in mindful of the realities, the history, the facts without becoming enmeshed in it.

Sounds like you have to walk a fine line. There's a word in French: incontournable. It means you can't go around it; you can't do it without.

For a company to be successful in Africa, it has to be incontournable. It means if people want to get their project done properly, they have to work with you. It means having that kind of reputation that will permit you to say "no," because they don't have a choice if they want it done right. But there has to be no other choice because they won't do it out of the goodness of their hearts.

What else would someone need to do right away to launch an IT or business operation in Africa? Learn what the laws are. Contact the embassy because there may be tax benefits and other useful things that you aren't aware of. You may also want to contact the [U.S.] State Department or the Commerce Department to see what they can do to facilitate your entry into that area. If you need financing there are multilateral organizations that could facilitate financing.

How about the language issue? You want a multilingual staff as much as possible—not just the local language but English and French, the languages of business.

About half of our staff is African: Central African Republic, Nigeria, Cote d'Ivoire, Cameroon, Congo, Senegal, Mali, Sudan—you name it. And that makes such a difference, because it's not just the language, it's the fact that you understand that in another place, business may be done another way and not necessarily the American way. You need that open-mindedness, so an international team is important.

What about skills? It's hard enough to find good IT people in the U.S.; it must be even more difficult in Africa. You would be surprised. Maybe we don't have the breadth of skills and maybe we don't have the availability of skills but those people who are skilled have a depth of skill that I haven't seen anywhere else.

What is it they say? "Necessity is the mother of invention?" Well, it's also the mother of ingenuity. It's unbelievable how creative people become when they don't have things. The number of people who can build a computer in Africa—you would be amazed.

You want cheap labor? You've got it. You want talented labor? You've got it. It's incredible, the ingenuity and skill and talent of the people there. And we have people who are very strong in math, very well educated, who speak English and French better than in most countries. Countries like Cameroon are bilingual, so you have fully bilingual staff to start with. They're talented; all they need is opportunity. Just give them a little training and they're good to go.

How do they get their technology skills?You've got people that have master's degrees in computer science that didn't have computers to work off. They've had to write programs from scratch, by hand, and they get on a computer maybe twice a semester to see it work. So they understand the theory and the concepts so well that when you put them in front of a tool, it's like child's play. If you're willing to do a little bit of training—and I mean a little bit—to get them to understand the software that you want them to use—then you're way ahead.

OK, the business is set up. What should my mind set be? Try to understand. Don't try to reproduce what you're doing here. It's a different market; it's a different opportunity. Don't limit yourself. Just go in with a completely open mind. You may find opportunities that you never thought of before.

Be ready to innovate, because only when you're there will you get a feel that there's this need and I can build something faster and cheaper and fill that need. The opportunities are amazing.

Is there prejudice in the African business community against outside companies coming in? If I were a white American going into Africa, I'd have a much easier time than as an African. Africans think whites created the technology so they have to know it better. A company we do business with was concerned because I sent Africans to do training in Africa. They said, "For this kind of money, we thought you would send white people."

There is definitely a problem of self-esteem. One of the founding members of the Africa Technology Forum bid on a contract in Gabon and lost to a French company that bid three times the amount. The French company later subcontracted the work to them.

I think Africans don't trust Africans yet. It's a demon we have to deal with internally.

American companies coming into Africa are at a great advantage. There's an American sentiment in Africa. My brothers and sisters listen to American music, they wear Nikes, they drink Coca Cola. Michael Jordan is a star there. They don't want anything French or British, they want American. America is it. American should take advantage of that. It's not going to last forever.