Foto: Wikimedia Commons
By Dennis Kateregga
The number of Television and Radio Stations available in Uganda has grown tremendously. As of July 7, 2010 Uganda had licensed 244 radio stations with 188 operational and 32 off air stations and 50 TV stations, 35 on air and 15 off air. Uganda‘s electronic media has since attracted several investors following the liberalization of the sector in the early 1990s. The world is going digital and Uganda has too.
December 31, 2012 was the deadline set for East African Community (EAC) countries to have switched to digital broadcasting. As the deadline drew closer for this migration, business owners had to realize that the future is for digitally capable electronics that can survive in a digital broadcasting period. Ugandas Minister for Information and Communications Technology (ICT), Hon. Ruhakana Rugunda on July 18, 2012 while appearing before the committee of parliament on Information, announced that by the end of this year 2012, not all Ugandans will have started utilizing digital signals rather than analogue waveforms. He said that the country will however meet the world target of 2015. He said that by the end of this year, districts like Kampala, Jinja, Mukono, Masaka and some few others will have digitalized and by 2015 all districts will have responded. This opens up the business to more players who thought would not beat the deadline.
East Africa is moving to a period that runs on satellites and broadband communication. Digital Television provides better picture and soundquality as opposed to analogue. With advantages like multiple programming also referred to as multi casting and interactive capabilities. Multi-casting means that any existing channel can provide many more channels like Sports and Movies all as dedicated channels. This ensures a guaranteed growth in the media industry for all East African countries.
The switch from analogue to digital broadcasting will create more room for new ICT innovations. This will start up an era for more technologies like 3G and the 4G, which deliver better internet services. This gives a chance to third world to close the digital gap as they slowly and efficiently embrace ICT. This will provide greater chances for employment but also a chance for a business that is willing to innovate and take advantage of this architecture, growth in the media industry as well as in ICT capabilities. Digital migration will create a bridge for business ready to take advantage of the new technology.Keeping up with the digital world will become vital to retain customers, conduct business efficiently and remain competitive. Why not start small with print to digital migration?
Starting small with the conversion from paper to digital records can increase the efficiency your business. Converting paper documents to digital format inevitably does have an impact on how one runs their business. A business can’t function if is under a paper mountain. Being digital means transforming your business, thus enabling you to deliver better services more efficiently with effective processes. Information technologies that help you have access to information in ways that are far more productive than past methods of search and capability; businesses need to shift from color filling systems, systems where you put receipts together. This is no longer sufficient. Business need to shift to information technologies that create opportunities for data mining.
Process used by companies to turn raw data into useful information. By using software to look for patterns in large batches of data, businesses can learn more about their customers and develop more effective marketing strategies as well as increase sales and decrease costs. An advantage of data mining could be in marketing campaigns to build models based on historical data to predict who will respond to new marketing campaign. Businesses need to build a framework that is centered on digitalization. Digitalization is here to stay and the success of businesses will be determined by whether or not they choose to go with the change and embrace it; become digital or stick with the past that is being phased out; remain analogue.
