The CD-ROM covers the following:
What does it mean to be an entrepreneur
Successful African ICT entrepreneurs talk about what it means to start up a
company, what kind of personal qualities you need and the type of mistakes
they made that you can easily avoid.
Starting with a good idea
The CD-ROM looks at the kind of ICT ideas that have fuelled the growth of
ICT sector across the continent and highlights a number of recent examples
to give you a flavour of what you might come up with.
Planning a business idea
It provides a list of questions that need to be answered for most new ICT
business ideas and offers some templates for the structure of your business
plan. Whether you're a first-timer or are already running your own business,
these questions provide useful ways of thinking about new ideas or planned
expansion.
What skills do I need to make it work?
Every ICT business needs a particular combination of people and skills to be
successful. This section looks at what skills you need to bring together in
your team.
How do I get finance and at what stage do I need it?
It offers the distilled wisdom of a range of individuals from different
African finance institutions who explain what they look for in a fledgling
business. It also explains when you might need finance, how equity
shareholders can help develop your business and what it means to have an
exit strategy.
Strategic alliances and partnerships
Few African ICT start-ups have the resources to do everything they want to
achieve. To overcome this, this section describes how you might approach
making strategic alliances with other companies that will help your company
grow.
Sources of information
An information archive that provides everything from where to find ICT
information relevant to Africa to local and international sources of
finance. It also includes an archive of past issues of Balancing Act's News
Update up to issue 114 with a search engine to help you find what you want.
As a bonus, it also has the following free software: ACDSee, Adobe Acrobat,
Eudora, GetRight, Netscape Navigator 3.04 - 4.5, Paintshop Pro, Shockwave
and Flash and Winzip. Most are available in either Windows or Mac versions.
Order a copy
If you would like to order a copy, you need to do two things:
Account Name: Southwood Consultants Ltd
Bank:
Nat West
145 Clapham High Street
London SW4 7SN
UK
Account No: 08732663
Bank sort code: 60-05-34
When the US$50 payment has been credited to this account, we will send your
copy of the CD-ROM to the address you've sent us.
Last update: October-24, 2002