The Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT) has announced 16 winning small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to implement 15 digital transformation projects in government bodies with a value of more than 43.5 million Egyptian pounds; this is part of ‘Our Opportunity is Digital’ Initiative, which was launched last May by MCIT through the Information Technology Industry Development Agency (ITIDA) in the presence of several chairmen of local and global companies.
The ICT Minister Amr Talaat stated that the announcement reflects MCIT’s keenness to stimulate innovation among IT SMEs and provide them with opportunities to take part in implementing digital transformation projects in light of the implementation of Digital Egypt Building Strategy; Talaat also pointed out that the coming period will witness the launch of another group of projects and opportunities for SMEs.
Talaat added that SMEs play an important role in economic growth and create plenty of job opportunities for youth; Talaat also pointed out that such initiatives open broad horizons for SMEs to gain experience, have government business record, and enhance their portfolio which promote their competitiveness in both the local and global markets.
The winning SMEs will conduct digital business projects in four different categories: Quality Management and Testing; GG Web Services; Content Digitization and Analysis, Design and Project Engineering.
Four SMEs were selected to conduct projects in the Quality Management and Testing category: ‘UTrust’ for asset management system; ‘Pmaestro’ for heritage of Egypt system; ‘Digital Blocks’ for comprehensive health insurance system and ‘TestPRO’ for notary system. Two SMEs were selected to conduct projects in the GG Web Services category: ‘BlueCloud’ and ‘3S Software’. Three SMEs were selected to conduct projects in Content Digitalization category for the Egyptian Culture Digital Portal: ‘IT-Blocks’, ‘Smacrs’ and ‘Namaa InfoLogistics’.
Seven SMEs were selected to conduct 9 business projects in the Analysis, Design and Project Engineering category: ‘Ark Development’ to develop traffic applications; ‘Simple Way’ to develop commercial registry applications; ‘E-Archtech’ to conduct three business projects in digital transformation services and applications for the Ministry of Social Solidarity and the Ministry of Supply as well as applications for notary system; ‘Business Borderlines’ to develop applications for real estate registry; ‘Gulf United Consulting’ to develop applications for family courts; ‘700apps’ to develop applications for courts of first instance and ‘Sumerge Software Solutions’ to develop applications for real estate financing.
It is worth noting that ‘Our Opportunity is Digital’ Initiative aims to promote the contribution of SMEs, registered in ITIDA’s database, to implement digital transformation projects in government bodies; the initiative provides business opportunities through three ways: implementing projects through direct contracting with government bodies, implementing projects through contracting with companies contracting with government bodies, or participating in skills competitions that include training opportunities for SMEs’ employees to enhance their skills in data science and artificial intelligence, ending with having opportunities to conduct business projects in these areas.
Since its launch, the initiative has provided through its platform 31 opportunities in digital transformation projects with an estimated value of 80 million Egyptian pounds of business volume for SMEs.
