Translations

Education for all: SILULO ULUTHO TECHNOLOGIES and internet cafés.

7. Community involvement

Skills and technology transfer

Sector Telecommunication, Medias, ITC

Year 2017

Country South Africa

Transmitter

Context

Silulo Ulutho was founded in 2004 by RANI Luvoyo, ex university professor, and his brother. The first objective of this South African company was to provide refurbished computers to schools. Then, he realised that people needed to be trained and opened an internet café. Now, the company still sell refurbished computers and laptops to everyone, but also provide computers accesses, teach courses and share knowledge and services into the café: Scan / Copy, Creation of resume, internet surfing, website development,…

Objectives

Brindging the digital divide
Bring ICT skills into the rural areas and townships
Develop entrepreneurs
Empower communities

APPROACH

To start teaching courses to people in rural areas, Luvoyo RANI needed to create a place where middle aged people would come and find its services (Courses, knowledge, IT services,…). After 2 years spent thinking about the business model and a story telling, he decided to open an internet café where he would be able to provide its services and put the accent on high value services instead of personal profit. Thanks to his teacher background, he knows how to educate people and he realized the success of his business model. So he has developed franchise opportunities, to extend the concept to the whole Africa. They are now a network of 19 franchises and Luvoyo RANI is always seeking for new franchises. Finally, the expected impact from the company is to make sure that people can belong to the same world in changing their way of mind in rural areas and teach them how to connect.

Relive the conference from the WFRE17 : Young innovative entrepreneurs working towards Africa's development

CONTRIBUTION TO COMPANY PERFORMANCE

33M ZAR -> 2.4M USD
From 1 café in 2006 to 19 in 2017
Number of direct beneficiaries : 3000
Annual Budget : 1.8 M USD

Benefits

Reduce unemployment by teaching people how to use a computer (Out of the 31,000 people trained, 50% have managed to find employment thanks to the Silulo courses)
Connect communities by facilitating access to the internet
Develop entrepreneurship by providing franchise opportunities