South Africa’s digital future is in a healthy space as tertiary students across South Africa continue to impress with their creativity and innovation. To this end, MTN SA as proud supporter of the Enactus national competition for seven years, has rewarded 12 digital innovators in a special ICT Challenge addition to the 2020 Enactus National Competition.

After an extremely competitive 2020 Enactus virtual national competition (which concluded at the end of last week) where ideas and products were thoroughly tested in front of a panel of acclaimed experts, the grand winner was the University of KwaZulu-Natal, with last year’s victor, the Durban University of Technology the runner up. This means UKZN will represent South Africa at the Enactus Virtual World Cup 2020 from September 8-12.

In an exciting addition to the overall national awards, the MTN Special ICT Enactus Challenge rewarded 12 digital innovators in 2020 – which is 6 up from 2019. The identified university teams have won R70,000 each towards support for the app development of their winning concepts, business registration (CIPC) and towards marketing-related costs for their businesses.

“This competition continues to shape future generations of entrepreneurial leaders. Digital innovation and education were definitely the outright winners at this year’s event,” says Kusile Mtunzi-Hairwadzi, General Manager: MTN SA Foundation.

“For us, the overall objective is to unlock opportunities for innovative solutions, unconventional careers and create new industries and ecosystems. We aim to continue giving tertiary education students additional support to develop digital solutions to address socio-economic challenges across the agriculture, education and health sectors,” says Mtunzi-Hairwadzi.

The 12 MTN ICT Special Challenge winners were: Central University of Tshwane, University of Venda, Durban University of Technology, Nelson Mandela University, University of Western Cape, Walter Sisulu University, University of Free State, University of Johannesburg, University of Pretoria, Vaal University of Technology, Rhodes, and Mangosuthu University of Technology.

“The various apps on display by these 12 institutions were practical, fun, innovative and targeted at real needs, like getting correct health information to medical professionals in time or supporting the agriculture value chain and providing mentorship programmes for education and jobs upliftment. We were extremely encouraged by these entries and want to help get these to market and help make them profitable,” says Mtunzi-Hairwadzi.

Another highlight of the 2020 Enactus SA National Competition, was a panel discussion that Rob Shuter, MTN Group CEO participated in, titled, “Leading Change at the Edge of Chaos”, where it was highlighted that the NextGen Leaders of Enactus are, and will be, on the front line of economic recovery around the world. 

“The next generation of leaders will define how we revive and thrive in the emerging ‘new normal’. This is extremely well-aligned with MTN’s ongoing commitment to work together with like-minded partners to enable our youth to innovate, and become our future job creators,” says Mtunzi-Hairwadzi.

“Furthermore, as MTN we continue to leverage this dynamic, youthful thinking and energy to work towards solving a range of socio-economic challenges. MTN will continue to harness its own network to enable youth entrepreneurship to help solve SA's youth unemployment challenge and make a meaningful impact in the lives of SA's people.”

Krishna Chetty, MTN SA’s General Manager for Network Deployment also participated in the Action Leader Panel discussion, highlighting how the 5G network has become a necessity in today’s world. 

“This is mostly because of an increase in device automation, which relies on wireless networks. For example, home automation requires a fast network that works seamlessly and without buffers. Currently, most companies are using 4G. However, there is always room for improvement  and that is where 5G enters the picture,” says Mtunzi-Hairwadzi. MTN this month launched its 5G network to more than 100 sites to further support the growth of the digital economy.

“We have been blown away by the Enactus programme as it ties in so well with our own ethos to inculcate skills broadly and grow the ICT eco-system so that more people can truly benefit from the digital world,” says Mtunzi-Hairwadzi.

The MTN SA Foundation’s strategy, together with the MTN Group’s broader community-development target is education for all in a ‘bold new digital world’. 

“The MTN SA Foundation continues to harness innovative technologies to help foster change and create solutions to real-life problems. Giving SA’s youth the opportunity to create commercially viable businesses that will create jobs and have a positive impact on the SA economy is something we love doing. We thank all participants for their amazing contributions and wish UKZN the very best as they showcase SA’s digital talent on the world stage in September,” concludes Mtunzi-Hairwadzi.