Throughout the month of June 2018, master students of the VUA Amsterdam are developing innovative ICT services in Borneo, Malaysia. The first two weeks are used to find promising ICT4D (ICT for development countries) cases in the Malaysian kampung named Pinggan Jaya as well as in the banana industry. They use the approach of TVE to develop ICT services, amongst other exploratory workshops to find new and interesting ideas, prioritization of these ideas in terms of impact and ease of implementation, and business network value modelling to understand the value propositions between enterprises and end-users, as well as payments for these.

Exploratory workshops

In order to explore the possibilities for innovative ICT services, several workshops are held in the kampung with different kinds of users, such as children, teenagers, housewives and Gula Apong producers. Gula Apong is a kind of luxury sugar that for example is used to produce ice creams, cookies, and tasteful cakes.

A Gula Apong producer obtaining his raw materials in the jungle of Borneo

Idea prioritization

The cases explored in the first two weeks are subject to a rigorous prioritization. We score the ideas along two dimensions: Impact and Ease-of-Implementation. Actually, we are looking for ideas that can be easily deployed while at the same time having a high impact.

The idea prioritization workshop

High impact ideas that are easy to implement

This year, two cases stood out. First, the aggregation of multiple Gula Apong producers such that they can negotiate higher prices with sellers. Second, the supply chain optimization of farmers who cultivate bananas for the banana chip factory.

Chips produced by the local banana factory

Additionally, Internet access is still an issue, for example in the kampung, which is a third use case. Finally, a fourth case is centered around e-learning services.

 

More about the students’ progress in upcoming posts.