Kennedy Chinganya ; the current Managing Director for MTN Business in Kenya joined MTN Business in April 2015 as the General Manager Finance for Group Enterprise Business Unit. Tasked to improve governance in the enterprise business across all the company’s operations, his prowess propelled the system and saw him being whisked off to Kenya to head MTN Business Kenya within nine months of service.
Kennedy; a South African Citizen of Zambian decent who consider himself a global citizen has worked his entire life in the tech industry for the last 20 years.
Coming from a working background with IBM for 14 years before joining Microsoft Africa for another 5 years, Kennedy who is a certified accountant and a member of The Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA UK) and South African Institute of Professional Accountants (SAIPA) brought on board expertise in technological connectivity that is the epitome of MTN Business.
“I have found myself spending more time in the business than actually practicing as an accountant,” he remarks.
Asked why this is so, he says he had little control over it but fell in love with running and understanding business analytics over time. “Everything just felt in place. Multinationals I have worked for; the accounting function is mostly outsourced.
So I found myself more concerned about the functionalities of a business than actually the accounting option,” he reveals.
Mobile Telephone Network (MTN) Group is a renowned premium portal for business connectivity solutions which operates in 24 countries in Africa and Middle East. It was formed in 1994 in South Africa dominantly to offer mobile telephone services specializing in voice.
Converged communications
Mr. Kennedy says that ICT is a very dynamic industry that has evolved very fast. We used to make calls using Phones with SIM Card but we don’t need SIM Card and phones anymore to make calls. Tech disruptors like Vibe, WhatsApp and Skype among others have made that possible.
“MTN Business is also futuristic. We project future disruptions and aligning our strategies accordingly to help businesses optimize their potential. We have close to 450 Kilometres of fiber connectivity in Nairobi, Kisumu, Mombasa and Eldoret.”
Connectivity is becoming an enabler for any business operation. As such we have connectivity solutions that helps businesses connect better and efficiently with their networks.
Brand Products
MTN Business introduced a communication solution, Voice over Internet Protocol –VoIP that allows business-small or big- to take advantage of fully converge products with competitive pricing structures. With its mobile mobility and Wi-Fi connectivity it signifies a fundamental shift in the way business operates and delivers service.
He explains, “If your network already carries your email, business tools and data, why shouldn’t it also carry your telecommunications? Especially when it can save you up to 35 per cent on call cost.
Our VoIP solutions enable thousands of concurrent superior-quality voice calls to be managed over a single network and routed to multiple branches.”
VoIP solutions are highly scalable and can be tailored to suit the changing needs of your organization.
Cloud computing
“Information is the lifeblood of an organization. So what happens if you lose data? It can be injurious to your business. We offer businesses a continuity plan or disaster recovery services to businesses.That informed our recent investment of USD 13 million which included newly launched tier three Data Center in Nairobi recently,” he avers.
Businesses no longer need to store their own data as it can be very tedious and risky.
The center will allow cloud computing, virtualization and convergence and its features include data security, lower operational cost for companies in the country and immediate access of data.
“I am a tech savvy individual and I have backed all my information on a cloud system. It gives me easy access to my documents from anywhere on the go. I don’t have to worry about misplacing my laptop, surface or phone device.”
The key thing is using ICT to help improve efficiency.
Strategic partnerships
Strategic partnerships and alliances are important component of non-organic growth. MTN Business has among other partnerships, partnered with Microsoft to resell some of their business enterprise solutions. Working in partnerships brings together players with unique competencies to deliver something revolutionary, he explains.
The Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) Partnership with Microsoft allows us to sell Microsoft Office 365, express route as a bundled solution to our customers, we also have the local Microsoft Azure instance in-country meaning our customer can now have their services of a Data Centre capitalizing on Microsoft Azure platform in country without worrying of their data and/or critical information being stored outside the country. This is a pure Opex model where our customers do not have to invest heavily in IT infrastructure including resources.
“We have the capacity and resources to compete regional and we aim to be the Pan African ICT solution provider of choice. There is so much that we can do in this industry. As ICT evolves we shall continue to be more innovative,” concludes Kennedy.
