Polish IT firm to select Ethiopian companies

The largest IT company in central and Eastern Europe has shortlisted four Ethiopian companies in its search for an East African partner.

Asseco Group has been evaluating 10 companies in Ethiopia and says it wants to play a big part in developing the country’s IT sector.

“Our plan is to help Ethiopia build its own software in the future. We want to share our experience and training with the people who will be maintaining our solutions,” Adam Goral, Asseco group president, told Ethiopian journalists at the company’s Warsaw branch.

Asseco officials have visited Ethiopia three times this year to select local companies with which to set up a partnership.

Dariusz Brzeski, a member of Asseco’s supervisory board and part of the delegation that visited Ethiopia, said the company will make a decision in July on the best local company for future projects.

The company’s president said its aim is to make Ethiopia its base for continent-wide projects and it will engage in projects in Ethiopia before the Ethiopian new year on September 11th.

Asseco joined the IT industry in 1991 and plans to work with the Ethiopian financial sector, public utilities and other industries that would benefit from its solutions.

“Asseco has a company in South Africa, which was formed by Asseco Israel, but the branch in Ethiopia will be the biggest on the continent,” said a company spokesman.

They said the names of the four Ethiopian companies on their shortlist “will remain confidential until we select the best one.”

Asseco employs 16,000 people in 26 countries and in 2011 it recorded revenues of 1.2 billion Euros.

The group is a federation of companies engaged in information technology and is quoted on the Warsaw Stock Exchange and other international stock exchanges.

It operates in most European countries as well as in Israel, the USA, Japan and Canada and offers comprehensive, proprietary IT solutions for all sectors of the Polish economy.

Asseco develops and implements centralized and comprehensive IT systems for the banking sector.

In addition, the company portfolio also includes advanced solutions for insurance institutions that have been implemented by major companies in the sector, as well as IT systems dedicated to public administration.

The Asseco Group is also successful in the provision of its products and services to the utilities sector, telecommunication and healthcare, local administration, agriculture, uniformed services, as well as for international organizations and institutions such as NATO or the EU.