PC maker calls for gov't support of local IT industry

Nigerian PC manufacturer Omatek Ventures has called on the country's government to institute policies that support local computer manufacturing.

State and local governments should join together to boost the usage of Nigerian-made PCs, said Florence Seriki, Omatek group managing director, at the unveiling of the company's 8- and 10-inch Smartbooks in Lagos State on Thursday.

During Olusegun Obasanjo's presidency from 1999 to 2007, the federal government issued a directive to all of its ministries, departments and agencies to consider purchasing PCs from four local assembly plants, namely Beta, Brain, Omatek and Zinox. However, the current administration lacks a cohesive policy in this regard.

Africans should cultivate the habit of patronizing local businesses, Seriki said, while banks should come on board by cultivating more small and medium enterprises to finance consumer products.

Through the patronage of local computer manufacturers, “Technology will be passed down with the resource centers being established in various schools of higher institutions in the country, and the issue of after-sales support will be taken care of,” Seriki noted.

Omatek is offering its Smartbooks through the eXpress initiative, which allows for payments to be made in installments over 12 to 24 months. The notebooks run Microsoft XP Pro educational platform and are bundled with Encanta software and external combo or DVD-RW drives.

The 8-inch version is particularly geared towards students, Seriki said, with strong Wi-Fi capabilities, alloy casing, Web cam facilities, 512M bytes of RAM and a 60G-byte hard drive. The 10-inch Smartbook comes with 1G byte of RAM and an 80G-byte hard drive.