Kenya: Safaricom, Seven Seas Technologies in joint bid for county ICT tenders

Safaricom has partnered with Kenyan based ICT multinational Seven Seas Technology in an initiative aimed at harnessing the use of technology to offer integrated communications solutions to Safaricom enterprise and mobile consumer segments.

In Summary

  • Under the partnership signed Tuesday, the two firms will market education, health and agriculture IT management solutions to the counties.
  • The Safaricom and Seven Seas partnership comes at a time when most county governments are adopting automated systems to get rid of ghost workers and streamline their financial platforms to seal revenue leakages through corruption.
  • Safaricom CEO Bob Collymore said the two companies will share the revenue based on the solutions launched and the contribution of each partner.

Safaricom and technology firm Seven Seas Technologies plan to make joint bids for county government IT tenders after signing a partnership deal.

Under the partnership signed Tuesday, the two firms will market education, health and agriculture IT management solutions to the counties.

Safaricom will provide capital and telecommunication infrastructure while Seven Seas will provide expertise to deliver the projects.

The partnership is also likely to hand Seven Seas a piece of the lucrative Sh14.9 billion police communication system tender that Safaricom is expected to rollout across the country, among other projects like CCTV cameras in Nairobi and Mombasa.

The Safaricom and Seven Seas partnership comes at a time when most county governments are adopting automated systems such the Enterprise Resource Planning solutions (ERPs) to get rid of ghost workers and streamline their financial platforms to seal revenue leakages through corruption.

Safaricom’s enterprise business unit in the year to March contributed Sh10.23 billion to the company’s revenue, representing a growth of 35 per cent.

Safaricom CEO Bob Collymore said the two companies will share the revenue based on the solutions launched and the contribution of each partner.

“The partnership will enable Safaricom leverage on Seven Seas’ human talent to roll out IT solutions to county governments, while we will provide the telecommunication infrastructure,” said Mr Collymore.

The parties Tuesday said they will concentrate on health and education solutions in the first phase of the project and expect to unveil the first solution by mid-December.

While Safaricom has been successful  in the voice, mobile money transfer and mobile data business its penetration in market areas that require more specialised technological expertise, such as integrating IT solutions, has been slow and thus the partnership.

“Seven Seas Technologies has the necessary skills to deliver the transformative IT solutions in health and education sectors that the two parties want to roll out,” said Mike Macharia, the Seven Seas CEO during Tuesday’s media briefing. Adapted from BDAfrica

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