Nigeria’s ICT Market: Things to Cheer, Worry About- Okere

Austin Okere, founder and vice chairman, Computer Warehouse Group (CWG) has presented a score card of the Nigeria’s IT sector highlighting both cheering and worrying situations in the third largest sector of the economy.

The keynote speaker at the inaugural ICT Success Summit held in Lagos on Saturday, urged African IT entrepreneurs to think outside the box and broaden their horizon towards solving challenges peculiar to the emerging markets.

Okere who founded CWG, one of the Africa’s most successful IT companies with annual revenue of over $130m and staff strength above 650, said that the extension of GSM connected lines from 106m to 222million is worthy of celebration, even as the teledensity 91% to 107% in less than two decades of GSM introduction.

Today, CWG has direct operations in four African countries and indirect operations in 17 others, while Okere remains the entrepreneur in residence, CBS New York; WEF GAC on Innovation & Intrapreneurship; Advisory Board, GBSN; Advisory Council, ATCON and Governing Council, IoD Nigeria.

He also highlighted that Nigeria’s ICT sector should be celebrated as the first to connect REN in West Africa (NgREN), presently contributing 12.68% to GDP in 2Q2016 and has become the third largest sector after agric (22.55%) and trade (17.57%).

According to him, Nigeria has one of the most robust ICT Policy and Broadband plan on the Continent following the strong voice at ministerial level through the creation of Ministry of Communication Technology (now Ministry of Communications) in 2011.

He also said that the President Buhari’s administration resolve to set up technology hubs in all Geographical Zones is a welcome development and will stir innovation among the youths.

Okere who also presented a currency Matrix to describe the imbalances between matching revenue with cost in the present system where dollar tends to be the legal tender does not augur well for the economy, especially, as the market is skewed against the indigenous players.

“There are other things to worry about in the system. For instance, GDP growth in ICT has slowed from 4.07% to 1.35% in Q2; NgREN is now idle because of subscription fees whereas billions were spent to set it up; it this ever non-promotion of local software and services.

“The industry needs regulatory support, especially for NOTAP to enforce of 60/40 rule in ATS and why should there be dollar payments to VADs in a naira economy; also, we will discover that the indigenous player is meant to shoulder tax burden of OEMs and VADs. Simply put, the local companies are in a race to the bottom. No matter who wins a rat race, he is still a rat. Therefore, current structure of the industry kills the local players”, he decried.

The Keynote speaker however assured ICT entrepreneurs that all hope is not lost, stressing that they must focus on the larger results ahead them.

“The trade-offs I made: Exchanging Affirmation for Accomplishment – I stopped being a people pleaser; Exchanging security for significance – I changed my attitude towards uncertainty; Trading Immediate Victory for Long Term Sustainability – I stopped measuring my performance solely in terms of immediate results”, he said.