Deploying Science & Technology for Competitive Advantage

Creative Strategies for Achieving Nigeria’s Golden Dream

Definitions

Like to begin by consulting the dictionary. DEPLOY: Place troops or weapons in battle

formation, To distribute systematically or strategically, Bring in to use; make use of▪ The word “deploy” is a military term: Anything military

suggests urgency, importance Battles, human lives and freedoms can be lost with improper deployment.

SCIENCE: Research into questions posed by scientific theories and hypotheses▪ Dictionary was not as helpful here. Hence a better

authority …

Scientific Method

Scientific method refers to a body of techniques for investigating phenomena, acquiring new knowledge, or correcting and integrating previous knowledge. To be termed scientific, a method of inquiry must be based on gathering observable, empirical and measurable evidence subject to specific principles of reasoning. A scientific method consists of the collection of data through observation and experimentation, and the formulation and testing of hypotheses

Technology

Technologies are the ways human control and adapt to their natural environments.

Use of technology began with the conversion of natural resources into simple tools

Higher technology is perhaps one distinguishing feature of the human species.

We use technology to dominate our space Technology is therefore much older than the

systematization of knowledge which science represents

Science, engineering and technology

The distinction between science, engineering and technology is not always clear.

Technologies are not always exclusively products of science, because they have to satisfy requirements such as utility, usability, safety and affordability.

Engineering

Relies largely on the scientific method to create technology, products and services

Ages & Metaphors

Humans classify the history of the world into different epochs:

Ice Age, Stone Age, Bronze & Iron Age.

Industrial Revolution (1760-1957) Space Age (1957- 1980) Technologies Age (Television,

Internet, NanoTechnology, Globalization, etc)

What’s in a Name?

These were so named largely because of the chief raw materials for the production of the implements.

These implements are used by men to: For Survival Imposing their will on others (War

Making) Gaining Trade Superiority in Peace times Doing better in Sports

Winners & Losers

Each Age creates Winners and Losers. The winners are those who

▪ Understand the metaphor▪ Apply it to advantage ▪ Reap great benefits

No surprise that the Europeans ruled the world in the 18th to 20th Centuries

No surprise that Africans were (are?) their slaves. ▪ Our forebears were the losers in the Industrial Revolution. ▪ When they could not coax us with “gifts” such as gin or

looking glass to sell our brothers▪ They coerced us with their gunpowder to give up

sovereignty over our land, then went on looting binges . . .

Goal of this presentation

What Governments can do How Legislatures can make laws to

encourage the deployment of Science and Technology

That Companies that do not adopt a technological attitude will die

That Individuals, Communities and even Family Units can make the difference.

Competition, Advantage

In a globalized world, there is no place to hide.

People will choose whatever is the best product or service available to them.

To gain competitive advantage, we must put ourselves in a position to create products and services that are better and provide better return on investment.

In What Environment?

We often encounter words in the public space that govern discourse. For example: Conditionalities of the IMF Dividends of democracy Barrels of crude oil Turn-around maintenance of refineries Megawatts, etc.

Local Inventors/Hoaxes?

News media may sometimes report someone has invented a helicopter! How did he do it? Got beetle engine, some rotors and

made some noise Invented a motorbike, etc

A nation searching for heroes in a dry and thirsty land.

Similarities & Differences with Western Countries

Only a small percentage of the people in the developed countries are practitioners in scientific or technology disciplines

Those societies, by reason of a history of survival together in various conquests and defeats, famines, etc, have learned what works

They have learned to select the right people and institutions that can make the difference in National challenges.

Not so with us!

When we talk about megawatts, everybody’s opinion weighs the same!

The economist and the layman talk about conditionalities equally.

There is little feedback on the track records and promises that people have failed to deliver

Everything gets muddle up in the suffocating discourse around ethnicity, religion, etc in the midst of greater problems we could have attacked with our best minds!

Engineering & Economics

Technologies, to succeed, have to satisfy requirements such as utility, usability, safety and affordability.

A product engineered for distribution must be sufficiently convincing for people to freely exchange their money for it. The optimal use of scarce resources is also a major component. Economics.

Engineering as Economics

If there were to be sufficient resources, there would be no need to optimize in design.

There would be no need to persuade people to buy anything.

There will be no engineers, no marketers, no competitive advantage to gain!

Winners and Losers

Each age has its own paradigm The people who understand the

paradigm of the age and deploy its technology appropriately become winners

Those who don’t become losers. Western Europe with the industrial

revolution and advances in War and Ocean Transportation were Masters in the 18th and 19th Centuries

Examples of this phenomenon will illustrate:

Adapt or die:Smith Corona Typewriters

Beginning in 1886, they practically invented the typewriter and made huge profits selling these, rifles and small arms

Then came the hand held calculator Later the word processor And then the PC and various word

processing software

Result:

By 1985, personal computers were being widely used for word processing,…,the company announced in 1995 it was cutting 750 jobs as a result of continuing sales declines, and shortly thereafter, declared bankruptcy.

Adapt or Die: GPS & Surveyors

With Satellites in space and pocket sized receivers, you can quickly obtain not only your coordinates but also a survey of an area in a quick way that would have required much patience and effort in just a few years back.

If a professional surveyor does not adopt such technologies to enhance his trade, of course he will not be competitive within a very short time.

Adapt or Die: GSM & VOIP

If your connection is sufficiently fast, you are seeing whom you are talking to in real time. You may in fact be doing this for “free” or so cheaply that your GSM company cannot compete!

The battle for survival of GSM companies started right after the day of birth literarily. The battle rages on. Who will survive? Too early to predict. It may not be the proverbial “fittest” but those who understand the paradigm of the times and adjust accordingly.

The Technology of Pounded Yam

A group of engineers thought they could improve on this situation. They devised a way where the same set of processes could be carried out and produce the pounded yam, cook, pound and mix mechanically and avoid the debilitating labor.

There are new products in the market which, with strategy that may be counter-intuitive: ▪ Study the end product▪ Study the inputs▪ Examine the biochemical processes that can be carried

out to get the input into a penultimate state where it can be easily converted to the final product.

Deployment of Technology as a National Policy

Three examples to illustrate this may give a better understanding

1. Japan Motor Industry (in detail)2. China unstoppable advance into a

technology driven society3. The Indian Progress in the past 30

years

Japanese Motor Industry Timeline

1914, Mitsubishi Zosen manufactured 22 Mitsubishi Model As, the first mass production cars in Japan.

1918, the Military Vehicle Subsidy Law was established. Under this law, the military granted subsidies to automobile manufacturers to produce vehicles (mostly trucks) to be used by civilians during peaceful times and converted to military use in times of war. This was in effect Japan's first automobile industry policy.

1927: Earthquake Disaster Japan: A lucrative Market Ford established Ford Motors Japan in

Yokohama in February 1925 and began local assembly and sales (from June that year) of Model Ts.

GM followed suit, establishing GM Japan in Osaka in January 1927 and commencing local assembly and sales (from April) of Chevrolets

1930s Protection of Local manufacturers

Following the Japanese military occupation of Manchuria in 1931, the basis for war grew steadily stronger, and in 1936 the Ministry of Commerce and Industry and the Ministry of War jointly supported the establishment of the Automobile Manufacturing Industries Act.

The aim of this legislation was ostensibly to stifle the monopolization of the automobile market by American manufacturers by fostering domestic mass production of motor vehicles to meet the needs of the public,

Additional goal was to ensure an uninterrupted supply of vehicles for the military.

1930-1939 Japan – Lucrative Market for US Cars

Between 1925 and 1935, the Big Three produced a cumulative total of 208,967 units. In contrast, domestic production for the same period totaled 12,127 units, just 5.8% that of American manufacturers.

After 20 years of effort, the Japanese could only get 5.8% of their own market due to overbearing foreign competition: Cars, bikes, etc.

1939: US Pull-out

Sino Japanese war of 1937 – pressure on Japan domestic non-war spending

Foreign exchange revised Import prices skyrocketed with the

decline in the yen exchange rate. Feeling the mounting pressure, the Big

Three finally discontinued production in 1939 and withdrew from Japan.

WW2 Effort:

The Automobile Manufacturing Industries Act of 1936 positioned the automobile industry in a key role in the war effort

Ministry of War classified motor vehicle manufacturing as a munitions industry.

As of 1938, automobile manufacturers had no choice but to focus on the production of trucks, rather than cars, and some were eventually required to produce other kinds of munitions as well

War Making – A Technology Issue

Policies taken to create an Independent Japanese Auto Industry made it possible to fight a war.

The outcome of most wars is closely related to technology

The British, vastly outnumbered by African Warriors had the advantage of gunpowder fighting men with bows and arrows

After the War: Automobile Manufacturing as a Model for Industrial Development

Ministry of Commerce and Industry followed Ministry of War in viewing automobile manufacturing as a "comprehensive" industry, because of its interdependence with a whole range of related industries in the provision of parts.

Premise that the development of the automobile industry could serve as a model for industrial expansion in other sectors as well

Government granted the automobile industry a key position in the development of Japan's industrial infrastructure.

Advances in Production Technology

Large-scale investments in plants and equipment, not only to cope with the increase in demand accompanying the steady growth of the Japanese economy, but also to prepare for imminent trade liberalization.

Investments in equipment were focused on the introduction of special-purpose automatic transfer machines. Beginning in 1955, manufacturers concentrated on introducing these machines to certain critical processes and applied them especially in the machining of engine parts, such as cylinder blocks and cylinder heads.

These various measures helped bring about the rapid automation of Japan's automobile production system.

New Impetus for Passenger Cars War restricted production to trucks and

utility vehicles War over, new impetus for the

development of passenger vehicles Accordingly, construction of Toyota's

Motomachi Plant started in 1958, and Nissan's Oppama Plant in 1961; Isuzu also built its Fujisawa Plant at this time.

Leapfrogged the industrialized manufacturers of Europe and America

Robotics and other New Production Technologies

With steady growth in the domestic and export markets, the implementation of new technologies to increase productivity became a top priority for manufacturers beginning in 1965.

High-speed automation was introduced when the use of special-purpose transfer machines was extended to each stage of production. To optimize the integration of automation within the production process, new factories were built between 1965 and 1974 to accommodate the new technologies.

These developments laid the groundwork for the subsequent introduction of robot technology and also boosted the ability of workers to perform multiple tasks.

Digital Technologies

From about 1970, the use of digital technology for specific tasks was expanded when all these operations went on line, leading in a short while to computerization of the entire manufacturing process

From the earliest stage of product development through final production, on-line management of the supply of parts and materials.

Also during the 1970s, the steady introduction of new robot technologies gradually eliminated the need for humans to perform dangerous work in manufacturing operations.

Environmental Requirements Japanese cars had to meet stringent

conditions worldwide. In a country with little natural resources, there were stringent constraints.

In 1975, for example, the cost of exhaust emissions research amounted to 36% of that year's total R&D investment by the automobile industry

Gasoline Efficiency also took a high toll on the R&D funds

Result

Japan dominated the Automobile Industry

It created the National Industrial Development which, as the designers expected led to success in other areas such as Electronics, Robotics, IT, Rail, Civil Infrastructures etc.

Other Asian Countries such as Korea, China, etc are waking up to just that same experience in our time!

Brief survey of China and India

What did Napoleon actually say?“China is a sleeping giant that only a madman will awake”, “Let her sleep, when she wakes, the world will tremble”, etc

The Giant is up, and the world is doing exactly as Napoleon was alleged to have said 200 yrs earlier!

Still a Creative Deployment of Technology

1. Know ThyselfChina was scavenging the disused technology of the West in the 1980s. I personally observed a whole factory that was to be decommissioned. The Chinese paid not only for everything in the factory but also for the technicians to pack the whole thing and reassemble in China.

Yesterdays Scavengers

Huge investments and development of Energy and Civil Infrastructure

Large Scale investment into the Productive Capacity of its Population Centers

Today Industry leaders

Infrastructure of Magnetic Levitation High Speed Train – China leads even the West!

Germans have the Mag-Lev Technology

China develops the high precision tracks with its own civil engineering technology

No Turn-Key project!

Home Going:Nigerian-Indian

25 – 30 years ago, Nigeria was in a boom.

What a typical Nigerian did with that money

An Indian perspective Discouragement of imported Luxury

Vehicles till home based industries could produce

Availability of basic Libraries and Commonwealth

Areas of Opportunity

I hate to say we must diversify from an oil based economy

Two Reasons1. It has become a cliché as the

Government has been talking this for more than 35 years!

2. There is no Oil economy in the first instance!

Learn the history of Technological Development of the Emerging Nations. They may have more to teach us.

Where is the Technology?

For a commander on the battle field to deploy troops, he must first have them!

Where is the technology to Deploy? Do we own them? Are we acquiring

them? Oil companies have operated for

nearly 70 years in Nigeria. How close are we to acquiring the technology?

IT Technology

Nigerian Banks are leaders in IT Deployment The ease with which money can be

moved, accounts checked and even transactions paid for are quite commendable

GSM Companies are Technology Driven

Why are we not demanding similar efficiencies in Government transactions?

Funding

The Road Safety, Immigrations Services, etc have sufficient means to be as technology driven as the banks are.

Policy Issues

Japan, China and India had policies that empowered the local Industry to acquire Technology and produce in line with national goals.

What are the National Goals in the area of Infrastructural Development?

Human Development

Infrastructural

What is the level of technology acquisition of in the Road and Transportation Industry?

Our rail lines were developed to serve the 19th Century British Interests. What is the long-term strategy to acquire technology to develop our transportation infrastructure to meet our present and future needs?

Is it merely a matter of pronouncing large sums of financial allocation, followed by stories?

Oil

The Oil Industry has helped in greatly under developing Nigeria

We have “Learned” that all we need do is to collect “Royalties” while others think

This attitude does not allow us to deploy technology to our advantage

To deploy technology, we must bring in our own strengths – no matter what it is. We MUST contribute something.

The Shell Component

When collecting seashell specimens in the Caspian Sea area in 1892, the younger Samuel realized there was potential in exporting lamp oil from the region and commissioned the world's first purpose-built oil tanker

Globacom, for example, shows that Nigeria Companies could have been producing Oil all along.

Cannot Go to TechnologyEmpty-Handed!

Turn-Key attitude with no value addition make it impossible for us to acquire technology in the first instance.

Just like Oil, Same technology companies service the Industry.

There is no reason for foreign concerns to be in complete charge of resources for one century! *Arabs wising up**

Tar Sands

The Tar sands deposits we have here will not yield to the same method we used for Oil and gas

Technology Investment etc. will require much planning on a National scale.

Success will depend on readiness to invest in Technology acquisition and deployment in a gradual way till it becomes our own technology

Opportunities

The filth in our cities are a great opportunity for us to participate in the waste conversion technologies.

The inability of various Governments over the years to deliver Electricity is also an opportunity.

Who should react and lead?

Who Should React?

Governments Legislatures Corporations SMEs Individuals, Families etc

Governments

Formulate Policies and Create a framework that rewards contributions to National Development▪ Japanese Government had policies that aided the war

effort▪ Decided that even though they were underdeveloped in

the area of car production, saw development in this area as key to industrial progress.

▪ Drove Public Policy in that direction Framework for Punishing acts that retard the

nation. Discourage Monopoly Rent Collection (Pat

Utomi)

Legislatures

Legislation is NOT about being the highest paid person in the land

Legislation can actually be made to drive National Development in the way of Strategic Deployment of Technology

▪ The Japan Legislation did not allow Japanese Car makers to make luxury cars. Trucks were needed first. ▪ Rewards were given for the production of needed

products

The Deployment Process can be orchestrated by Legislation

Corporations

Smith Coroner example shows how slowness in the deployment of current technology bankrupts a giant corporation

IBM, Siemens and several other giants that saw the technology problems and adjusted before it was too late are examples of successful corporations surviving in the midst of paradigm shifts in technology

Individual Decisions

What did a Nigerian do with 50,000 in 1984?

What did an Indian do with the same amount of money?

Governments, Legislatures or Corporations are made up of people from the same society.

Our Governments are populated by our brothers and sisters. We have the same values!

Changes of direction can come from us also!