Aumentum Implementation Partner Q&A: Teqbridge, Ltd.

In a Q&A, Chiemeka Ngwu, President and owner of Teqbridge Ltd. talks about teaming with Thomson Reuters to transform services and technology to support states in Nigeria as they modernize their land information systems. He explains how the partnership strategy has revolved around improving capacity and skills not only for government customers, but also for his own staff. Teqbridge recently became a Thomson Reuters certified Aumentum Implementer Program (AIP) partner.

Teqbridge and Thomson Reuters have been delivering land registry and cadastre solutions for state governments in Nigeria for some time. How has this partnership benefited state-governments in Nigeria?

The states in which we have implemented the Aumentum land registry and cadastral software solution have experienced a very noticeable process, tracking and transparency improvement. The duration of time to process registrations have drastically been reduced from months to now a matter of days depending on the type of transaction. Titles and documents issued by land agencies are now bankable, and these governments’ revenues have more than doubled and are still growing. Most importantly, through efficient customer service centers, citizens are receiving much improved services.

Cross River State, Nigeria

It’s all a virtuous circle: Improve the land registry process through known and transparent services, and more people participate in the formal land sector, which in-turn leads to increased transaction volumes and in-turn increased revenue for the land agency to maintain their operations. The land agencies we have worked with have moved from an era of confusion to an era of sanity. It’s been very rewarding, for me personally, to be a part of this transformation.

From your perspective as the President of an IT service provider, how has working with a global information technology provider benefited your business?

Since coming on stream with Thomson Reuters, we have seen the positive effects of a firm with global reach moving into our region. The partnership has increased the visibility of Teqbridge and this helps in our marketing efforts, be it through leveraging Thomson Reuters promotion investment in FIG conferences in Nigeria or Kuala Lumpur or at the Annual World Bank Land & Poverty conference in Washington, D.C.. We have also benefited from the improved product lines, a more focused implementation strategy and a concentration on keeping to delivery timelines. This all helps keep our customers’ happy.

You recently became a certified Aumentum Implementation Program (AIP) partner. How is this program benefiting your capacity and internal human resource skill to deliver land administration projects?

The certified AIP is our key to survival and continuity. We have more than enough internal capacity to implement and support our region and hope to keep improving on our skills development. This program is providing us a clear path to follow. Our customers now know we are breath away from them and this gives them the confidence that their projects and issues will be handled more professionally with a faster turnaround. It also means we are able to help them grow their own capacity.

How do you expect that this program will improve upon Teqbridge’s ability to deliver services for even more government customers?

The AIP program is meant to enhance our product knowledge of the Aumentum technology platform. The training we received, conducted in Thomson Reuters development center in Bangkok, Thailand, is cutting-edge and provides us the knowledge to better implement the products, but also importantly to provide long-term local support for our customers. Right now we have five certified professionals – all Nigerians, who are already engaged in our Plateau State Geographic Information, and who are expected to soon to be deployed on other upcoming projects in Nigeria.