Tag: Company News

Large amounts of personal data generated in the country are stored across servers, networks, and several filing systems in different locations (electronically & manually), locally and abroad. The information systems used in the collection and storage of such personal data can pose considerable challenges to one’s right to privacy. As this trend continues to grow rapidly with increasingly sophisticated technology with extensive abilities to hold large amounts of data, it is necessary to address privacy concerns with data protection laws.

Personal data include all data on a given or identifiable individual that is disclosed to us or that is generated or collected by us, e.g. the inquiries from a call center, subscribing to and utilizing any of our services, and the contact data respectively provided by you in these cases i.e. particularly your name and your e-mail address.

SMSGH is pleased to announce that it has secured the Data Protection Certificate to support Mobile Money Integration with Telecommunication Service Providers in Ghana such as MTN, Airtel, Tigo etc. SMSGH values the importance of protecting your privacy when handling personal data. Personal data shall only be collected and utilized by us if this is permitted by a statutory provision or if we have received your prior consent.

The Data Protection certificate is awarded by the Data Protection Commission to registered organizations that process personal data.

About the Data Protection Commission

The Data Protection Commission (DPC) is an independent statutory body established under the Data Protection Act, 2012 (Act 843) to protect the privacy of individuals and personal data by regulating the processing of personal information. The Commission provides for the process to obtain, hold, use, or disclose personal information and for other related issues bordering on the protection of personal data.

The acknowledgment of the right to privacy with respect to the processing of personal data or information led to the passage of the Act.

SMSGH organized fun games for staff at the Lizzy Sports Complex on Friday 15^th July, 2016. The essence of the games was to provide a midyear corporate hangout – a short break from work to unwind, interact in a less formal way with colleagues, and foster team spirit. There was a football match between the technical and operations teams and other fun games.

It was all fun, healthy banter, and an extensive display of team spirit.

No more street hails or waiting outside to find a ride. Uber has launched in Accra, the 11th city in Sub-Saharan Africa and the 467th globally, in a move that marks its growing presence in Africa.

The service is set to provide unrivaled intra-city movement for the over 4 million people using the streets in the Greater Accra Metropolitan Area (GAMA). Uber’s service has already gained massive brand recognition around the world because of its ease of use and the convenience it provides in an increasingly mobile world.

Uber selected to use SMSGH USSD-based mPOS service to enable a mobile money payment that was seamless and easy to use for riders and driver-partners.  According to a recent Bank of Ghana report, mobile money transactions in Ghana have now reached GHs35 billion per quarter.

With the launch of the SMSGH mPOS, Uber riders can now conveniently pay for rides via mobile money. Drivers will simply dial a USSD code containing the driver’s four-digit business identification number (BIN) and the rider’s mobile number (e.g.*713*1234*0244000000#), select the mobile wallet provider and enter the amount to pay. A bill prompt is then issued to the rider to confirm the transaction and complete payment with a wallet PIN. Both driver-partner and rider will then receive an SMS text as confirmation of payment.

In an interview on the solution, a Senior Product Manager at SMSGH, Bubune Peter Adih commented that “….the simplicity of the mPOS application resonates with Uber’s approach to doing business. Being everyone’s private driver Uber strives to breakdown complex interactions into very simple processes and so SMSGH sought to ensure that this payment service works just as well and simple as Uber.“

Free Weekend

Uber is celebrating its launch in Accra by providing free rides. This means that from launch date (Thursday, June 9) until Sunday (June 12, at midnight), guests will be able to request an Uber ride at no charge. In order to activate this discount, a user will need to enter the promo code MoveGHANA on their Uber iOS/Android/Windows application. This will offer users 6 free rides within Accra, each up to GHS 20.

About Uber

UBER is a technology company that connects riders and drivers at the touch of a button.
Available in 467 cities across 72 countries, the UBER platform is evolving the way the world moves. UBER’s mission is to change the way citizens of the world move, work and live. It aspires to transform the way people connect with their communities and to bring reliability, convenience and opportunity to transport systems.

On Thursday May 12, 2016, as SMSGH celebrated its 11th anniversary, Chief Executive Officer Alex Adjei Bram adviced the company’s employees to utilize the years ahead saying, “Whatever our reasons for coming to work every day – let us ensure it is bigger than us. That a good reason – and there are many – is simply not great enough.”

In an email to the company’s team, Alex Bram reiterated his commitment to the vision the founders laid out over a decade ago that technology could empower the world, and asked staff never to forget what it can do to change lives.

Here’s the full anniversary letter to employees:

Dear All,

Just over a decade ago Twitter was a bird sound, WWW was a stuck keyboard, a Cloud was only in the sky, 4G was a ticketing booth at the trade fair, Google was a baby’s burp, Skype and WhatsApp were typos and SMS was simply the Super Morning Show.

Our world is changing so fast and information technology has become so important that it is technology itself. And who can lay a better claim — by 2050 the world will be home to more than 10 billion people, and technology will play a key role in the way we organise and get people to engage.

But before you even think we are well on our way, think yet of how far behind Africa is. Here in Ghana among the many problems of the land, we still battle with availability of the most basic ingredient of the information technology age – electricity.

I remember one of our very first founders meetings to start a company… and after laying out our first set of working policies, Leslie says to us, ‘Gentlemen, let us go challenge the accepted wisdom’. That statement remains true today. It resonates of innovation to re-invent a better way of doing things, of creating useful things and of responsibility in doing so.

Today as we celebrate our 11th anniversary, it is important to remind ourselves why we do what we do.

We do it for a better tomorrow – for our society, our country, for our continent.

Sometimes it takes us years to figure out even the very product of our intended change, sometimes we spend years convincing people and organisations of that change, and other times we are not even as proud of the outcome of our efforts, but throughout all of the past 11 years we always march on — in the single belief that technology applied right will someday contribute to speedy development of Africa.

I believe a company is simply a conspiracy to change the world. And with all the tools, skills, talent and market opportunities we have at our disposal, there exists a real chance for us here to make a real contribution towards a better society.

As I said at the beginning of the year, we are pioneers at this. We don’t want to just build a good company. We want to be a part of the history of a great company. What we do today should it be successful must impact generations to come.

On our trip to Silicon Valley we learned of how a single company started by 2 university roommates, Hewlett and Packard along with the hardwork of many others (just like you), impacted a small community, then a city, then the state and country, and today Sillicon Valley represents the 4th largest GDP and provides employment and opportunity for hundreds of thousands of people and has been a source of great pride for many men and women who help start it.

Whatever our reasons for coming to work every day – let us ensure it is bigger than us. That a good reason – and there are many – is simply not great enough. That the 11th anniversary motto is ‘In Pursuit of a Great Company’.

Thank you all.

Happy Anniversary.

MYtxtBOX offers you more reason to use Email messaging to interact with your customers and audience.

For as low as GHS0.008 per message, you can send emails to your customers, making MYtxtBOX Email the preferred messaging choice for businesses.

Enjoy the freedom that you deserve with MYtxtBOX Email’s pay-as-you-go service. Top up anytime, at your convenience because MYtxtBOX was created with the budgets of small businesses in mind.

We’re excited to announce that SMS Global Holdings (SMSGH) was one of a number of global business giants selected by the Stanford University in Silicon Valley, in the southern San Francisco Bay Area, for its annual Stanford African Business Forum.

Co-founders of the company, Mr Alexander Adjei Bram and Mr Ernest Appenteng, along with Chief Technology Officer, Mr Kwadwo Seinti and Board Chairman took a trip out to Silicon Valley to present our work to leading entrepreneurs and change pioneers from Africa and the world on April 23, 2016.

The annual Stanford African Business Forum (SABF) is the premier networking opportunity for African business interests for the Stanford and larger Bay Area community. This year, SABF celebrated thought leaders and changemakers on the African continent with the overarching theme of reimagining development through creating local value. The theme “Creating Local Value” captured the rise of African consumers, companies and innovations, and the growth of African economies. The forum showcased how enterprising individuals and organizations across Africa are meeting the growing needs of Africans.

CEO of SMSGH, Alexander Adjei Bram, explained before his trip to Silicon Valley: “Africa is emerging as a hub of start-ups in a wide range of areas and we aspire to take this further. We want the world to see our innovation capabilities in the startup sector. At this event, a group of African businesses will showcase their innovations and forge partnerships with the vibrant American business industry.”

“Personally I think this is one of the best times to be in Africa. There’s a lot of growth. I think in the last few years there has been a lot of capital infusion into the continent, which is providing part of the much-needed seed capital to grow. It’s pretty awesome to see how the African business is developing its own mark on the world and to be a part of that,” he added.

The Stanford African Business Forum had in attendance a number of Ghanaian speakers including Patrick Awuah (Founder & President, Ashesi University College) and Eric M.K. Osiakwan (Managing Partner, Chanzo Capital).

Others from Africa and beyond include Hans Nilsson (Board Chairman, SMS Global Holdings), Paul Mfonfu (Tools and Client Engineering Team head, PayPal), Teju Ajani (Youtube, Content partnerships lead, SSA) and Jessica Vernon (Co-founder & Director, Miti Health), who spoke on topics ranging from the Future of Content Creation and Distribution in Africa, Business Models in Financial Services to Investing in Africa.

As a keynote speaker at the event itself, Alexander Adjei Bram addressed participants on the theme “Driving Business Productivity Through Technology – Enabled Platforms,” expanding on how technology can unlock value for African businesses to better serve customers, run more efficiently, make communication simpler and more affordable, and create employment opportunities.

He shared the SMSGH success story with the Stanford community and results of the technology company’s participation in the Stanford Seed Transformation Program that began in 2014.

Silicon Valley and SMSGH are both leaders in innovation. Silicon Valley, home to major technology companies, start-ups and prestigious universities, is the world’s top innovative hub. Cooperation with Valley-based companies and institutions offers exciting prospects for SMSGH, while expanding business networks for better future collaboration.

MTN Business is hosting its maiden edition of its immensely popular business Fair in Takoradi. MTN Business is the business unit of MTN Ghana responsible for providing innovative and cutting edge communication services to small-large businesses and institutions in an effort to enable and inspire growth.

This year’s event slated for the 23^rd and 24^th March at the Akroma Plaza and Takoradi Market Circle, will expose small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to smart solutions that address challenges they face in running their businesses.

One of MTN’S leading partners, SMSGH Solutions Limited, who has over the years contributed to the growth of businesses, is one of the major exhibiters at the fair. SMSGH has innovative tools and solutions for SMEs to help boost productivity, enhance customer experience and promote business growth.

If you are interested in finding out more about our business solutions, meet us at the MTN Business Fair on the 23^rd and 24^th March 2016 at the Akroma Plaza and Market Circle respectively, or go through our website. You can also send an email at [email protected]

Don’t forget to add it to your schedule.

SMSGH has launched Email Messaging on MYtxtBOX in addition to its SMS and Voice messaging. The primary aim is to give users multiple channels to engage with their audience.

MYtxtBOX is a communication tool useful for businesses and individuals to reach a large number of people through bulk messaging. The addition of email messaging is in response to the demands of customers for messaging content that promotes visual advertising.

Research shows that more than 85% of internet users use email and users have a one-stop communication tool that improves customer satisfaction, saves costs, and inevitably increases revenue.

Features

• Create your own marketing campaigns using Email messaging on MYtxtBOX
• Professionally designed email templates for different email campaigns.
• Preview to check how your emails will look like.
• About 60% cheaper than most email messaging providers
• Pay-as-you-go service

MYtxtBOX remains the most effective communication tool useful for reaching a large number of people with personalized information at the lowest costs.

Send an email on www.MYtxtBOX.com

MPower is saying welcome to its new customers in a special way this holiday season. by giving away GHS5.00 free for the first wallet top-up. This means any customer who opens an account on MPower will receive GHS5.00 upon topping up their account for the first time.

MPower is an online payments service in Ghana offering a complete end-to-end web and mobile payment transactions solution to enable consumers and businesses send, spend and receive money. The aim is to redefine payments and transactions in Ghana by empowering businesses and consumers to do more with their money conveniently.

MPower has integrated with major local ecommerce merchants to enable users buy and pay for goods online from the comfort of their homes and offices.

To cash in on this offer, users only need to create an account and top up their wallet with mobile money, bank deposit or debit card.

Creating an account on MPower takes 4 simple steps:
1. Go to www.mpower.com.gh.
2. Click Create an account to sign up.
3. Complete the form and submit
4. Activate the account with the activation code sent to your phone.

With many ways to spend money on MPower one can shop from their favorite online shop, buy airtime and pay bills from the MPower CornerShop. Fees and charges that apply per the various transactions performed are listed on the MPower Service Fees page.

The offer started on 10th December and the first 2000 users to sign up and top up will be receiving the GHS5.00 in their accounts to spend.

Visit MPower today at www.mpower.com.gh or simply dial *714*44#.
MPower is saying ‘Be MPower’ed’ this festive season!

The MTN Career Fair is an initiative by MTN Ghana to bridge the career guidance and counseling gap for graduates and final-year students and also assist them in their search for employment. Since its inception in 2013, the fair has been held annually and this year’s event took place at the National Theatre on the 9th December, 2015, from 9am to 4pm.

The event was patronized by thousands of students and unemployed graduates as well as companies from various industries in search of the best talents to occupy available positions in these firms.

The fair opened with a welcome address from the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) of MTN, Noel Ganson, who said it was a platform for students and young graduates to acquire the knowledge and the necessary empowerment needed to start a professional career and to meet the challenges of a dynamic corporate world.

A key highlight of the event was a presentation on career planning by Ama Benneh, Human Resource Director of MTN; registered participants received guidance on how to write compelling CVs and prepare for job interviews.

Other notable speakers present at the fair included the host of Accra-based Citi FM, Bernard Avle, seasoned speaker, Emmanuel Dei-Tumi, respected author, Comfort Ocran, and the Head of Research and Engineering at DreamOval, Henry Sampson.

Attendees also had the opportunity to meet recruitment agencies and prospective employers for job interviews during the fair.

SMSGH was present at this year’s event to interact with job seekers and to find the relevant talent to join the team.

SMSGH sought various skilled individuals to fill positions in its Technology, Sales, Marketing, and Operations departments. These roles specifically include software development, customer support, copywriting, visual designing, and event management.

Details on open positions at SMSGH can be found on the careers page on the website. Interested candidates who qualify for these roles may apply directly on the page or submit their CVs to [email protected].

MYtxtBOX has just introduced a new way to top up credits via USSD. This additional top-up option offers users an effective means of purchasing MYtxtBOX credits with mobile money specifically through MTN and Airtel mobile wallets.

MYtxtBOX offers various mobile communication options for brands, businesses, and consumers to engage with their customers and contacts via text, multimedia, and recently voice messaging options.

MYtxtBOX provides a host of options for users to top up credits on their accounts. Before now customers could top-up via 5 main options:

• Direct bank deposit
• Direct mobile money deposit
• Purchasing top-up credits vouchers
• Credit/debit cards
• Payment via MPower

With this new top-up option, users can now perform 2 key functions on the go:

1. Check their existing balance
2. Top up an amount via Airtel Money or MTN Mobile Money

The top-up process can be completed in 5 simple steps:

1. Dial *714*22#.
2. Follow the USSD prompts.
3. You will receive a payment bill prompt on your phone.
4. Enter your mobile money pin.
5. Follow the prompt to accept the payment request.

Logging in to MYtxtBOX after this process indicates the new credit balance at the top right corner of the page.

The key benefit here is the ease of the process. It can take place on nearly every phone and does not require internet connectivity. This allows for convenience and a great deal of time, money, and effort is saved. Businesses and consumers can now enjoy the comfort of directly topping up their messaging credits with their mobile devices regardless of location and timing.

“Startups are the seed corn of the future economy,” our partner Steve Case, co-founder of AOL and chairman of Case Foundation, often says.

Today, Silicon Valley is envy of the entrepreneurial world, but 50 years ago, Silicon Valley was apple orchards. Detroit, then the wealthiest city in the US in terms of median income because it was the center of the half-century’s greatest innovation (the car) has now slipped to becoming the poorest major city in the US, because it stopped innovating.

As we’ve traveled from Kenya to Ghana, we’ve seen how planting seeds in an entrepreneurial ecosystem can really mature.

The first thing to know about the Ghanaian startup ecosystem is that the Ghanaian economy is itself a startup. The country only adopted capitalism in 1992, so only one generation has lived in a free-market society.

But the new next generation is fully embracing startups and the country is on the move.

We visited SMSGH, a ten-year-old startup employing dozens of people and powering mobile transactions across East Africa; DTRT, a manufacturing factory employing hundreds of people in great working conditions; nine exciting companies pitch in the ImpactHub Accra; followed by a very fun happy hour that felt more like a beach party than a networking session.

Nairobi vs Accra

If you simply compared first impressions from Nairobi and Accra, you might have thought the startup ecosystem was really rough around the edges here in Ghana. But to me, the Kenya to Ghana transition was encouraging.

Ghana today, seems not too far away from Kenya five years ago. Back then, Erik Hersman and his team were solidifying the iHub. About 20 investment groups that are now active in Kenya were not active then, and the entrepreneurial ecosystem was fragmented.

Based on the evidence of promise we saw in Ghana today, Accra can get there.

1. Local investment is impressive

We spent several days with local investors: the Oasis Fund, the African Angels Network, and Eric Osiakwan, who has a Steve Case-like reputation in Ghana as the startup champion in the country.

One of the more difficult conversations I had to have over the years in Kenya — where the ecosystem is thriving — is with local Kenyan investors. In Kenya, successful businesspeople do not invest in startups very often. It is difficult sometimes for me to justify why we invest internationally in Kenya when successful local entrepreneurs won’t do it.

Now, that is changing. And Julian Kyula of MODE, who partnered with us on the Pitch for Impact competition in Kenya is a great example — but in Ghana, successful business people have been investing in startups for quite a while.

As a few examples: the Oasis Fund has 40% of its limited partner base in-country; the Ghanaian angels’ network has over 25 locals who have done a deal in the last two years, and Eric Osiakwan walked us around SMSGH — one of his portfolio companies — as a bigger cheerleader than the CEO.

One Ghanaian said that local self-reliance, as a relatively closed economy, was an important trait for a very long time. And in Africa, when it comes to locals investing in the next generation, Ghana may well be leading the way.

2. Culture and policy both pose challenges and opportunities.

At the same time, Ghana still has a long way to go. Unlike Kenya, where entrepreneurship is encouraged, stepping out and starting your own company isn’t in Ghana.

Whether it’s cultural or whether it’s a vestige of a socialist system that didn’t reward the free market, one entrepreneur said: “In Ghana, everyone is afraid of getting too big.”

Policy and economic conditions are difficult too. Kwami, whose company, Moringa Connect, is a great agribusiness that mentioned how difficult startup investment was to raise for one major reason—bank interest rates are 28%, and it’s difficult even for an exceptional startup to outperform that.

Yet despite these challenges, Ghana has several local conditions that make it globally competitive. The factory we visited, DTRT, can employ hundreds of people in quality working conditions and sell to major US retailers because Ghana’s port is a free trade zone (a vestige of Ghana’s exports of coffee and other cash crops), and also has an agreement with the US to not impose tariffs on imports of the 48 poorest countries in Africa.

Ghana has the ability to create 1 million manufacturing jobs, estimated our leader at DTRT—thanks to policy that supports small manufacturing businesses.

Finally, while Ghanaian culture could be a challenge, its creativity and vibrancy also have major advantages. We had a breakfast with creatives from across Ghana, which is becoming a burgeoning fashion and entertainment industry. The talk was about An African City (Ghana’s Sex in the City equivalent), where the producer joined artists, fashion designers, and more to show off Ghana’s edge in cultural leadership.

3. Great assets can make Ghana globally relevant

Despite the challenges, at a spirited dinner, businesspeople and investors were bullish on Ghana’s prospects. In discussing the entrepreneurial potential of Africa, they settled on the KINGS (Kenya, Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Ghana, and South Africa) as the top five highest-potential entrepreneurial ecosystems, and Ghana ended up third.

How come? Ghana had strong assets that were exportable across Africa and the world: the most educated population in Sub-Saharan Africa, an English language background, relatively good infrastructure, a good and functioning port, and more.

In the Pitch for Accra competition, we saw these assets on display. Farmerline, which delivers information to farmers over mobile — helping them to increase their income through better understanding of crop prices and more—is off to a great start in Ghana and importing to East Africa.

Flippy Campus, a mobile solution that helps schools manage information (replacing paper noticeboards), is building on Ghana’s asset of having the best educational system in Sub-Saharan Africa.

And amazingly, Bitsoko, a blockchain-powered financial services solution, that has an early customer in a food market in Detroit — helping power the entrepreneurial revolution that is rebuilding a once-great American city.

African solutions are not just solving problems in Africa, but helping around the world.

4. Africa keeps going

The winner of Pitch for Accra was Yago Baatuolku, a wonderful leader whose company, Wanjo, produces juice sourced from 250 women farmers in Ghana. Ghana is one of the leading juice consumers worldwide, and if Ghanaians only drank juice produced in Ghana, they would send US$ 250 million a year to farmers. Currently, it’s only US$ 10 million.

Yago has a wonderful business but never felt like she was ready to pitch. When Sheila Herrling of the Case Foundation encouraged her to be “fearless” and pitch, though, she brought down the house, treated the happy hour to Wanjo juice, and took home a US$25, 000 investment.

“I’m so glad I decided to show up,” she said. In a culture that doesn’t always encourage entrepreneurs, showing up is critical.

We asked the CEO of SMSGH what advice he would give — 10 years in — to a Ghanaian entrepreneur starting out. He said, “Just keep going.” He said that there would be a lot of social, cultural, and maybe even political pressure to slow down, not get too big, not get too visible, and a lot of unexpected bumps along the way. The only reason he was able to build a company was that he kept on going.

If Ghana just keeps going, and Africa just keeps going, we’ll see a transformed ecosystem and Ghana can move light years in the next five years. Who knows what we can see in the next 50 years.

Source: Ventureburn