BOTH nomenclatures are inseparable: you cannot talk of one without mentioning the other. Chief Leonard Stanley Nnamdi Ekeh (OFR) is the chairman/CEO of Zinox Technologies Limited and the adventurous success face of the soar-away brand. If you have not heard of this economic ambassador and his info-tech solution institutions, I am afraid your essence here is about to crash due to self-inflicted cerebral hemorrhage! As far back as 2002, former president, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, had declared this national info-tech pride the Icon of Hope. Subsequent manifestations keep attesting to the reality of this presidential recognition.
Recently, this medium reported that the Board of Zinox Group, Africa’s most integrated ICT firm, had become the first company to introduce paternity leave of between two and three days for its employees here and abroad. These off-duty days will not be deducted from the yearly vacation. This could be an entry in the Guinness Book of Records. I am not sure whether any other employer in the world offers its workers free days for post-natal bliss. According to Zinox, this will gallop family bonding.
The significant thing here is not the marginal number of days involved, but the enthronement of family values. For most global organizations, a worker’s home front is much more critical to them than the staff. Once there are overwhelming domestic challenges, an employee is most likely not to be at their peak in terms of productivity in the workplace. Industrial relations experts will tell you that an employee’s lack of concentration arising from family issues oftentimes persists throughout the day’s working hours and diminishes output.
This kind of considerate policy has the potentialities of acting as a catalytic incentive to staff to be at their optimality and pursue the advancement of their company to summit frontiers and leave competition perpetually on their trail. It makes the employ realize that they are not just human capital statistics and establishes a sense of belonging. When a worker feels appreciated by his employer, he is ready to throw in everything even outside office hours like a corporate ambassador-plenipotentiary.
The report under reference also pointed out that in the 2010/2011 academic year, the Zinox Group awarded scholarships to children of people in its establishments such that a junior worker could have three of his children benefiting from the scheme that covers post-primary to tertiary level. An advocate of a knowledge-driven economy and polity, Chief Ekeh has further demonstrated this by ensuring that the children of his staff toe this path that will equip them to be in the forefront of the country’s technological transformation alongside other external beneficiaries.
Zinox, which was unveiled in 2001 by a crack team of IT-savvy technocrats and egg-heads with a cumulative experience of almost 130 years, has Chief Ekeh as the principal strategist and driver. With an exponential network that extends to Ghana, Liberia and Europe, the company prospects in ICT research and development, world-class IT solutions, manufacturing, distribution and software development among other cerebral-hinged businesses.
The instructive aspect of Chief Ekeh and his companies’ massive inroads in the area of ICT revolution in the country is the passion with which they go about without drawing unnecessary attention to their contributions to national technological development. Attempts by competition to discredit them via a horrendous de-marketing strategy sometime ago failed like a pack of cards because Zinox from the outset embraced the future!
If it were elsewhere, this entrepreneurial pioneer would have been celebrated far much more for his silent contributions to the economy and development of human capital through the platform of his companies and e-learning advocacy.
What is it that drives this prime benefactor who has been indisputably described as the ‘Bill Gates of Africa and Nigeria’s Steve Jobs’—excluding our patriot’s differential erudite scholarship? And who is he? What are in his purview in the years ahead? Can he possibly computerize at least 25 percent of schools in the country? Does he have the human and material resources to accomplish this quest? You are welcome to the racy world of the genteel chief and vast Zinox.
A first-rate Indian-trained economist and risk manager who was born on February 22, 1956, in Ubomiri, Mbaitoli, Imo State, Chief Ekeh spearheaded the launch of the first locally-manufactured computers in Nigeria on October 9, 2001. This info-tech wizard had years back also caused market penetration for giants like Compaq, IBM, DELL, APC, Hewlett Packard and Microsoft. Today, the Zinox brand equity, which is a partnership between Stan Technologies of Nigeria, Mustek South Africa and Alhena Ventures of France, hallmarks Nigeria’s info-tech identity-cum-visibility.
The progressivity of Zinox is such that it has an agreement with the federal government to train staff of federal ministries and supply info-tech equipment to ministries, departments and agencies in facilitation of computer literacy and awareness in Nigerian schools and among civil servants. In pursuit of this lofty ideal, it is interesting to note that Zinox Technologies Limited has the structural capacity and human capital competencies to produce 350 personal computers daily with the operational mandate of Microsoft and Intel.
And as a socially responsible corporate citizen, Zinox has evolved the Computerize Nigeria Project—an initiative that will sensitize Nigerians to the transformative nature of computers in efficient and effective economic management through the deployment of ultra-modern information and communication technology equipment. Indeed, for SMEs, it is a digital launch-pad for financial breakthrough and borderless freedom.
One of the offshoots in the Zinox Group, Technology Distributions Limited, pioneered IT distribution in West Africa, just as Chief Ekeh’s evolutionary platform, Task Systems Limited, led the way in desktop publishing and computer graphics in Nigeria. This same outfit computerized 95 percent of print media, publishing houses and advertising agencies in the country, too.
It is no longer news that Zinox is the first computer manufacturer in the sub-region to attain the WHQL and the ISO 9001:2000 certification. In consolidation of these achievements, Chief Ekeh crashed the prices of his computers to make them very affordable by one and all through the instrumentality of a synergy between his company and the federal government which culminated in the Computer for All Nigerians (CANi) project. This novelty is intended to create massive accessibility to computers at below-the-market rates.
A globally-recognized brand, Zinox played key roles in CHOGM 2003, All-Africa Games (Abuja 2003), FASU-Bauchi 2004, 17th African Union Summit (Banjul-Gambia 2006) and INEC rescue mission in December 2006. It is on record that Zinox was the only indigenous company contracted by the federal government to supply direct data capture (DDC) machines to INEC, which subsequently gave it an award for partnership excellence.
As our Icon of Hope continues to build a truly indigenous company in this part of the world, it behoves government to grant tax rebates to knowledge-driven organizations like Zinox. The creation of an enabling environment (excuse the cliché!) for supranational investors should not be a lip-service. Taxation should be investment-friendly to encourage local entrepreneurship.
A devout Christian who had his foundational education at Holy Ghost College, Owerri, before proceeding to India for a degree in Economics from Punjab University and a postgraduate degree in Risk Management from Nottingham University in England, Chief Ekeh is married, has children and cherishes family values despite the antithesis of civilization and his billionaire status. Unlike this whiz-kid, most moneybags who swim in opulence have eroded family traditions!
This background must have underpinned his authorization of the aforementioned unprecedented non-leave deductible paternity leave in his group of companies.
My intuition tells me that this gentleman and business titan is the kind of person the country needs in political leadership having performed quintessentially as a trailblazer in business with multifarious awards, fellowships and honours as testimonies to a sterling life that continually exudes distinction in all spheres of humanity. A long time ago it was rumoured that ‘Mr. Zinox’ had interest in the governorship of his state. I am sure he will, based on the profundity of his inimitable pedigree, make mincemeat of current jokers in government houses when, ultimately, he decides to give it a shot.
Chief Ekeh, may you never relent in your charity. Your philanthropic, entrepreneurial and scholastic contributions to human development will remain indelible in mind maps. With the introduction of paternity leave in your transnational empire, I would have been zestful prospecting for Zinox employment if my delectable wife was still birthing! Do we resume procreation?