PAVLO’S PERSPECTIVE: FibreCo is a technology solution that delivers
by Pavlo Phitidis,
2015-03-31 06:24:47.0
WHAT’s in a promise? Is it expediency to simply get the business of your office done? Something you make to customers, staff, suppliers, government or others? Or is it an inextricable link to a value system that you, as a leader, deliver in word and action?
Globally, leaders with liquid tongues make promises that evaporate once we give them our backing through votes, signed contracts of service or payment for a product.
Promises and trust are inextricably linked. Behind every promise is a value proposition. "What’s in it for me" needs to be answered before a vote or a rand is parted with.
The promise of a technology solution to the woes of everyday life is ever apparent. Leaders in big business use it to increase agility in tough, uncertain times. Leaders in small business rely on it to increase their businesses’ capabilities. Governments with foresight envisage it as an equalising force. Citizens are demanding affordable technology access as a means to manage and build their own lives.
But can we trust the promise of technology? Once adopted and inculcated into the habits of everyday existence, our dependency on it grows disproportionally. When its promise fails us, the despair, anger and frustration drives mistrust, which makes everything impossible.
This left Oliver Fortuin, MD of BT Global, with a dilemma. His managed services and tech solutions rely on clients adopting them as critical business tools. Yet, his services are part of an ecosystem of undersea cables, long-haul fibre between cities, short-haul fibre and last-mile connections to devices.
Fortuin needed to deepen his scope of control over the ecosystem and needed suppliers that could back his promises to clients. He needed to source and select suppliers that understood what his promise to his customers meant, and contract their capabilities through a service level agreement (SLA).
In deepening his span of control over the ecosystem, Fortuin struck an accord with Arif Hussain, CEO of FibreCo, a long-distance fibre provider offering its own fibre connection between Johannesburg and Cape Town with unlimited bandwidth capacity.
Through FibreCo, Fortuin broadened his control over the connectivity ecosystem and confidently signed up additional clients with additional services.
FibreCo is a bold move made by a private sector open-access player. Fibre can only be sold on a stringent service-level agreement. Guaranteed, uncapped connectivity cannot be suspended.
FibreCo puts muscle into its service-level agreements, building infrastructure and ensuring it can detect, locate and repair within two hours after notification across its 2,400km investment around the country. It can do this 365 days a year to fulfil a promise made.
Certain businesses need to invest before a promise to a client can be made. They are nervously referred to as "build it and they will come" businesses. These businesses are market makers, the creators of value where none existed before.
The risks are high and they are the domain of entrepreneurial leaders who, through vision and action, believe that new offerings can be created to lift and raise standards for customers to unprecedented levels.
• Phitidis is CEO of Aurik Business Incubator, director of Aurik Enterprise Development, entrepreneurship commentator on Talk Radio 702 & 567 Cape Talk and presenter of The Growth Engines.
Pavlo Phitidis. Picture: SUPPLIED
WHAT’s in a promise? Is it expediency to simply get the business of your office done? Something you make to customers, staff, suppliers, government or others? Or is it an inextricable link to a value system that you, as a leader, deliver in word and action?
Globally, leaders with liquid tongues make promises that evaporate once we give them our backing through votes, signed contracts of service or payment for a product.
Promises and trust are inextricably linked. Behind every promise is a value proposition. "What’s in it for me" needs to be answered before a vote or a rand is parted with.
The promise of a technology solution to the woes of everyday life is ever apparent. Leaders in big business use it to increase agility in tough, uncertain times. Leaders in small business rely on it to increase their businesses’ capabilities. Governments with foresight envisage it as an equalising force. Citizens are demanding affordable technology access as a means to manage and build their own lives.
But can we trust the promise of technology? Once adopted and inculcated into the habits of everyday existence, our dependency on it grows disproportionally. When its promise fails us, the despair, anger and frustration drives mistrust, which makes everything impossible.
This left Oliver Fortuin, MD of BT Global, with a dilemma. His managed services and tech solutions rely on clients adopting them as critical business tools. Yet, his services are part of an ecosystem of undersea cables, long-haul fibre between cities, short-haul fibre and last-mile connections to devices.
Fortuin needed to deepen his scope of control over the ecosystem and needed suppliers that could back his promises to clients. He needed to source and select suppliers that understood what his promise to his customers meant, and contract their capabilities through a service level agreement (SLA).
In deepening his span of control over the ecosystem, Fortuin struck an accord with Arif Hussain, CEO of FibreCo, a long-distance fibre provider offering its own fibre connection between Johannesburg and Cape Town with unlimited bandwidth capacity.
Through FibreCo, Fortuin broadened his control over the connectivity ecosystem and confidently signed up additional clients with additional services.
FibreCo is a bold move made by a private sector open-access player. Fibre can only be sold on a stringent service-level agreement. Guaranteed, uncapped connectivity cannot be suspended.
FibreCo puts muscle into its service-level agreements, building infrastructure and ensuring it can detect, locate and repair within two hours after notification across its 2,400km investment around the country. It can do this 365 days a year to fulfil a promise made.
Certain businesses need to invest before a promise to a client can be made. They are nervously referred to as "build it and they will come" businesses. These businesses are market makers, the creators of value where none existed before.
The risks are high and they are the domain of entrepreneurial leaders who, through vision and action, believe that new offerings can be created to lift and raise standards for customers to unprecedented levels.
• Phitidis is CEO of Aurik Business Incubator, director of Aurik Enterprise Development, entrepreneurship commentator on Talk Radio 702 & 567 Cape Talk and presenter of The Growth Engines.
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