Technology vital for local business survival


- Ashigbey

THE Managing Director of Graphic Communications Group Limited (GCGL), Mr Kenneth Ashigbey, has called on local businesses to adopt to new technologies to enable them to compete with their peers in the global market place.

He said, “Without new technology, there is no way businesses will be able to compete. For us at Graphic, one of the things that has transformed our operations is the new technology we have adopted,” Mr Ashigbey said, urging other business executives to patronise technology, given the tremendous advantages and impact it would have on their operations.

Mr Ashigbey made the call when organisers of the leading industrial fair in West Africa, GEREU 2012 by the Ghanaian-German Economic Association (GGEA), paid a courtesy call on him and the editorial team of Daily Graphic.

He said Graphic had invested several millions of Euros to acquire a new printing press, making Ghana’s largest and most celebrated media house the fourth company in Africa, after South Africa and Kenya, to own such an ultra-modern facility.

He said local businesses needed to leverage on Ghana’s image in the global arena as a beacon of peace and stability and a haven for investment in Africa, adding that “we need a paradigm shift in our technology.”

He said the company was committed to its mandate of empowering the people with all the information that would educate and entertain them.

The Editor of the Daily Graphic, Mr Ransford Tetteh, said the paper would contribute its quota to the growth of the private sector since their survival would be beneficial to both parties.

He, therefore, urged the business world to avail itself of the opportunities and the platforms that the Graphic Group provided for a win-win outcome, saying the two could partner to do special supplements for members of the association on agreed terms.

The President of the Ghanaian-German Economic Association (GGEA), Mr Stephen Antwi, said the inability of businesses to embrace new technology in Ghana was the puzzle GEREU was seeking to solve.

“If we want our country to move forward, we need to employ new technology in our businesses. That is why we are here to seek partnership with Graphic and we hope that by hosting GEREU, it will gradually open the eyes of Ghanaian manufacturers about the need to line up with the rest of the world,” he said.

Mr Antwi, a legal consultant, said the country could not continue to import everything but must begin to produce certain essential items for itself.

He pledged that members of GGEA, many businesses with interest in German and European products, would support the Graphic Group and its brands, such as the Graphic Business, to enable it to provide relevant and timely information for businesses and decision makers.

GEREU 12, the fifth in a series, would showcase a range of companies and products from Europe for various solutions in automotive, plant installation, oil and gas, mining machinery, and information and communications technology (ICT).

Other areas are logistics, building materials, construction, printing, telecommunications and chemical industry.

Mr Antwi said the entry-free fair had grown over the years from an exhibition of 14 companies into a must-attend flagship industrial fair for the whole of West Africa.

The three-day event comes off from September 25 to 27, 2012 at the Accra International Conference and would have two special stands: the Technology Corridor and an Auto Care Centre.