WE SELL TESTED AND PROVEN PRINT TECHNOLOGY – AKIN ODUWOLE

Tell us more about Technology Global?

Technology Global Services Limited was created out of a need to resolve technical problems in the printing sector, the company over the years has been at a cutting edge because of the heavy investment in factory trained Nigeria engineers ensuring that every customer’s investment is protected by making sure the equipment runs always. The promise of a near zero downtime has helped increase patronage as we believe that a customer’s job is to ensure they put printing jobs on the machine while we ensure that those machines keep running.  We love to sell tested and proven print technology so we represent topline equipment manufacturer, we also love to see businesses grow, thanks to our ever-evolving non- traditional approach; from helping customer to conceptualize, to procurement, deployment, installation, operator training, commissioning and then super after sales support. We can say we are a dependable partner to our ever-growing list of happy customers as we ensure being always flexible and easy to collaborate with and constantly improving and transferring knowledge. Recently we brought home all we have learnt globally and started to manufacture made in Nigeria printing machines, our long-standing dream is now empowering some young people, we hope to keep getting better so that we can start exporting made in Nigeria printing equipment

As an IT firm do you think that your eCommerce site is sustainable?

We are not really an IT firm but sure we use technology to solve printing problems, and we have encouraged especially our textile printing customers to embrace eCommerce, some of them are selling their quality prints to their own customers abroad, the ecommerce site is helping them earn forex so in my opinion there is no other way to define sustainability.

Do you think that Nigerian market is ripe for full eCommerce because of logistic challenges?

One of the positives that COVID 19 pandemic brought was an embracing of eCommerce, supply chain disruption, restriction of movement made people see that we had to use other methods to get our goods to us, recall that there was a ban on bike transportation popularly called “okada” and a host of this operators embraced dispatch riding, this also prompted easier logistics, like any other sector that people see a need for, we will continue to  experience growth and evolution of ecommerce and the logistics that will come with it

What are the sales support system that you have in place?

Sales support refers to variety of functions that helps sales executives focus on selling and closing deals. Recall that our industry is capital intensive so a proper knowledge of what we sell and its application is our first focus, we ensure sales people are well grounded and can display a flavor of their knowledge about the subject matter. In house training, cases studies during brain storming sessions are for us a way of life, there is a level of knowledge that is required before you even step out to engage a client. Then we arm them with series of sales tools like Videos, return on investment calculators, cost per print analysis, presentations that compare apples with apples etc

Fake parts are things that are rampant in the market, how are you dealing with this?

We are the dealer for known suppliers in Nigeria, we represent Agfa for computer to plate systems, Xeikon for industrial digital label and document presses, and when we talk entry level label printers, we represent Afinia, screen printers are covered as we represent M&R, for textile printers we have products from Polyprint (for DTG and DTF), and Dgen (for roll to roll direct to textile), the flexible packaging world we are handy with Esko products and AVT for their inspection systems. As a company we stock major spare parts for this equipment, so it will be safe to say we are actually solving the problem of substandard spare parts.

What are the challenges that you face in the business?

Challenges are part of business; we constantly evolve the business with extreme focus and creativity. Like every business we also face challenges of founder dependence, burnout and fatigue, money management, selling the vision to staff and stakeholders, staff retention, managing diversification and so on.

What are Nigerians to expect from you this last quarter?

We did position for this quarter, when the pandemic came, it did come with so much uncertainty and confusion but luckily we were part of the first to snap out, we had an online general meeting first with the management team then all staff and we decided that we will bring all we have learnt globally home and apply them locally, we agreed that we will use engineering to solve difficult problems, we took on electricity problem and locally produced solar power for our office, so today we can provide alternative power supply for small printing equipment, then we produced VESA coined out of Vitalis Ebiziem and Sulemon Aniyera, our top super engineers whose conceptualized and designed the exposure unit for screen printers that expose using sunlight today, with the small equipment they can buy an affordable equipment powered using their “I better pass my neighbor” generator any time of the day even when it’s raining or when the sunshine has disappeared at night.

While we were still at it, a client, another screen printer asked if we could manufacture a mesh stretching unit and a month after, we had it fully fabricated and delivered, this then motivated us to produce a one platen multicolor screen-printing equipment. We are also working on a solution that will help resolve one major problem that printers are currently battling with, we won’t like to let the cat off this leather bag yet. But all we can say is as we start this last quarter there are many solutions awaiting the printing community, our plea is for them to start buying made in Nigeria printing equipment as this is the only way we can get better at what we do.

How did you cope with Covid 19 pandemic and what do you have in place that is making you to adapt to the current realities?

As I said earlier, we snapped out of the shock and faced our reality, in our thought we saw the good, the bad and the ugly that the pandemic came with and decided to refocus based on the good, like, the change in trend and lifestyle and then started massive education for all our customers to refocus, for instance supply chain problem caused a scarcity and then hike in prices of our chemistry plates, we advised customer to switch to thermal plates. Our believe is that difficult times won’t be forever but we all need to show empathy and stay reasonable with each other till the difficult

What advise do you have for startups?

I have a video posted by Print TV on YouTube titled 10 mistakes people make when starting a printing business, I will just like to reiterate the points I made there as it applies really to any business startup;1.      Having a clearly defined mission2.      Having the adequate budget3.      Choosing the right equipment/ tools4.      Do you have support?5.      Specialize, don’t try to do everything6.      Invest on trained man power7.      Build a strong network8.      Put the right process in place9.      Build your staying power as you go through the learning curve 10.    Have a proper exit plan

Challenges are part of business; we constantly evolve the business with extreme focus and creativity. Like every business we also face challenges of founder dependence, burnout and fatigue, money management, selling the vision to staff and stakeholders, staff retention, managing diversification and so on.