The acting CEO of South Africa’s State-owned defence industrial group Denel, Zwelakhe Ntshepe, is “delighted” at his company’s role in helping prepare young South Africans to participate in the Fourth Industrial Revolution. He was speaking at the group’s annual Young Achievers Awards ceremony in Pretoria on Friday.

He defined the First Industrial Revolution as the invention of machines and the ending of humanity’s dependence on animal power, the Second as being the invention of mass production and the third as being the development of digital technology. The Fourth Industrial Revolution will see the fusion of the physical, biological and digital worlds.

“Over the past decades we’ve transformed our company into a high-tech enterprise - a leader in innovation,” he highlighted. “In the process we have broadened both the scope and range of our activities [now including cyber technologies]. We are now also getting involved in the nanoworld.”

“New technologies are designed, developed and made by people and used by people,” he pointed out. “Our human resources remain our [Denel’s] biggest asset. A large focus lies in attracting the country’s best and brightest. That’s why we place endless value on programmes like our schools outreach, our engineering academy and bursaries. We recognised the importance of science, technology, engineering and mathematics education for the country’s growth. Denel takes great pride in all those who graduated from these programmes.” Ntshepe praised Denel staff who helped educate and train students during weekends and on public holidays.

“Companies like Denel do not sit and wait for students to come. They do not sit and wait for talent to come,” commented Deputy Public Enterprises Minister Bulelani Magwanishe at the same event. “Denel is going out to rural areas, to townships, to everywhere, to make certain people are aware of their [education and training] programmes.”

The beneficiaries and graduates of the company’s various programmes “were unearthed by Denel, supported by Denel”, he added. “Unlike other companies, who rely on newspaper ads, Denel, supported by the Department of Public Enterprises, goes out [to all provinces]. So we’d like to call upon all companies to go out to rural communities, to townships. If we don’t do that, [this] information will be confined to Gauteng.”

Denel runs maths and science enrichment programmes in schools in Gauteng, Mpumalanga and North West provinces, provides bursaries to university students and operates its own tertiary-level Denel Technical Academy, which helps train the group’s apprentices. The 230 matriculants who participated in Denel’s maths and science enrichment programmes last year achieved a 100% pass rate, gained 117 distinctions and more than 60% qualified for university. The 83 university students who received bursaries from the group also enjoyed a 100% pass rate last year. The Denel Technical Academy trained 345 students in 2015.

South Africans are not the only ones benefiting from Denel training; 60 of the students who attended the Denel Technical Academy last year came from Cameroon. They studied a number of aviation-related trades. One of the guests at the awards ceremony was the Deputy Chief of Staff of the Cameroon Air Force, along with other Cameroonian officials.

“Denel and Cameroon go back a very long way,” highlighted Ntshepe. “We’ve had relations for over 15 years.” It started when Denel delivered “some aircraft” to Cameroon, which are still operational today. (These were probably Atlas Impalas, of which Cameroon is reported, by Flight International World Air Forces 2016, to operate five.) “That made Cameroon to trust our capabilities.”

“Denel is becoming a true African company,” affirmed Magwanishe. “We are very happy to work with Cameroon and train their students.”