Intelligent CIO Africa Issue 36 | Page 9

NEWS Jeff App to open first hubs in South Africa customers to choose the exact location, time and day they want their laundry or dry-cleaning picked up. A driver visits the user’s house, collects the garments and delivers them back, cleaned and ironed. This service can be accessed via on-demand or monthly subscription options. Mr Jeff is set to open its first hubs in South Africa The first South African hubs will be in Cape Town (Newlands, City Bowl, Rondebosch and Woodstock) and Johannesburg (Fourways, Midrand and Sandton). Eloi Gómez, the CEO of Mr Jeff, believes the service will take off rapidly in South Africa. According to research, 78% of people say that laundry is their least favourite household chore, but they’ve never had a choice. The laundry-on-demand model is creating a new market, with an estimated 60% of Mr Jeff customers never having used a laundry service before. P rofessional laundry service app Mr Jeff, which launched in South Africa in October, is set to open its first 10 hubs in Cape Town and Johannesburg in the New Year after an enthusiastic response from local entrepreneurs and consumers. The latest in a growing number of apps that cater for the modern on-demand lifestyle, Mr Jeff allows “On-demand services are one of the biggest lifestyle trends of recent years,” said Gómez. “South African consumers are used to being able to order food, or get a taxi, using an app. Now this business model is expanding to areas like cleaning and laundry, which allows people convenience and choice. It’s also a major business opportunity for local entrepreneurs.” ///////////////// Egypt’s Ministry of Communications and Information Technology launches contact centre for people with disabilities E gypt’s Ministry of Communications and Information Technology has launched WASEL, a first-of-its-kind contact centre service in the region that provides enhanced access to services for people with disabilities. Launched in accordance with the presidential initiative establishing a National Council for People with Disabilities, WASEL is a contact centre that is technically equipped to provide people with hearing and speech impairments access to emergency, ambulance, rescue and firefighting services through video calls. Accessible to citizens via the new WASEL mobile application, the solution is built on Avaya IX Workplace and provides multi-party video conferencing between citizens, call centre agents and sign language experts. “We are proud to launch the Contact Centre for the Services of People with Disabilities, www.intelligentcio.com which, through the application of WASEL, provides accessibility to key services in specialised agencies,” said Dr Abeer Shakweer, Advisor to the Minister of Communications and Information Technology at the Egyptian Ministry of Communications and Information Technology. contribute to equality of experience for all members of society,” he said. WASEL enables citizens to video-call into a government call centre and then have their call quickly passed onto live sign language experts, enabling faster responses to emergency calls placed by people with hearing and speech impairments. Ahmed Fayed, Country Manager – Egypt and Libya, Avaya added: “Avaya is looking forward to further collaboration with Egyptian government agencies to provide innovative technology solutions that From left: Ahmed Fayed, Country Manager – Egypt and Libya, Avaya and Dr Abeer Shakweer, Advisor to the Minister of Communications and Information Technology INTELLIGENTCIO 9