Four Rwandan youth are seeking to provide solutions in different sectors using software through their company IDA (Information Data Analysis) Technology Ltd. The founders Télesphore Tuganimana, 25, Emmanuel Nzabaregerimana, Pathos Nshimiyimana and Djuma Kubwimana all aged 26, are graduates of Business Technology and IT from University of Rwanda, Huye Campus. They created the company in 2016 to design and various innovative solutions and platforms. So far the company has developed five solutions. Their debut software business was ‘Rwanda housemaids’, a web based application that links housemaids and their employers. “While at University we were encouraged to be innovative and make use of technology. Our first idea was inspired by an incident in 2015 where a house maid in Nyamirambo murdered her employer’s child. We thought of improving the relationship that house maids have with their employers. We set up a software that can track the movement of housemaids, link them with their employers and keep past records of housemaids so that criminals can easily be tracked,” one of the founders, Nshimiyimana shares. The application currently has 200 maids registered in the database. They plan to develop a mobile application and USSD application, as well, where the house maids will be able to register themselves while employers can use the application to hire house maids. Their second project ‘Girls in code’ was created in 2017 and seeks to help girls in the field of information technology. They train girls from primary school to university level how to use different technologies. This, they hope, will reduce the gap between boys and girls in ICT. The group developed another software; School Management System (SMS) that is customized according to the different schools’ program. It was designed to give academic reports to students, send notifications to their parents, to keep track of their children performance and behavior in school, register students and employees, and manage the school’s procurement and accounts. It also manages the Human Resource of school and makes it easy for the school management to grant students permission to leave school and employees’ leave. So far, the system has already applied in one secondary school and five primary schools. Through their Courier Transfer System, both the sender and receiver receive SMS and reference numbers which enables courier transfer agencies to keep record of courier. The receiver is also able to get details of the courier and the time that courier reaches their destination. Additionally, one of the members Kubwimana is a talented visual artist and is, through their Art and Digital Marketing project, using his talent to empower talented youth to market themselves using technology. The project is also aimed at teaching young people painting, ceramics and sculpting every Saturday at their office, located in Remera. They hope to extend this to different youth centers around Kigali. Future plans IDA Technology Ltd is currently also developing a new software, MIS (Management Information Systems),that will help churches keep database of their church members, as well as manage human resource and accounting of the church. According to Nshimiyimana, several clients including the Presbyterian Church (EPR Rwanda), have already approached them for their services. Nzabaregerimana says their dream is to be the leading company in development services in the next five years. Their biggest challenge however, is that Rwandans don’t trust local software services. “They prefer to buy from other countries like South Africa and India but we are determined to prove that our services are worthwhile,” he says. editorial@newtimes.co.rw
