In the wake of Science and Technology Minister Naledi Pandor's call to the private sector to help elevate the recognition of home-grown technology to service the country's markets and address local needs, Altech Multimedia believes it has the proven local technology, resources and skills to address these requirements.

Minister Pandor made the call at the Top Technology 100 (TT100) awards ceremony in Johannesburg earlier this week. The TT100 programme is an initiative of the Department of Science and Technology to foster technological innovation and excellence.

Having received the Award for Excellence in the Management of Innovation and the Award for Excellence in the Management of Systems at the event, Altech Multimedia is poised to lead the country's digital migration programme, which is in danger of not meeting the International Telecommunications Union deadline of 15 June 2015 to switch off analogue broadcasts.

As a leading provider of products, professional services and competitive solutions to the digital broadcast and broadband industries, Altech Multimedia is the premier manufacturer of set-top boxes in Africa and has the home-grown technological solutions required by Minister Pandor to propel the local analogue-to-digital transition programme forward.

According to Danie du Toit, Managing Director at Altech Multimedia, the company's success at the awards were an affirmation of Altech Multimedia's position as one of the most innovative developers of technology and systems in the world today.

"We are particularly proud of these achievements as ours is such a highly competitive and focussed sector. Innovation is the cornerstone of any ambitious technology and solutions-orientated business, and maintaining a competitive advantage is critical," Du Toit said.

"We continue to focus on ensuring that our systems and performance are world-class, and winning these very prestigious awards reaffirms our industry leadership position on the African continent," he added.

According to Du Toit, Altech Multimedia surpassed the "23 million set-top box manufactured" milestone in 2014 and has produced more than five million set-top boxes in the 2014 financial year alone.

"Government has again called for the finalisation of the digital migration process to support broadband infrastructure roll-out as ICT has the potential to propel the economy to higher levels of growth, open new opportunities for new industries and modernise the delivery of social and economic services. Altech Multimedia is ideally positioned, with our B-BBEE partners and our continued investment in our people and processes, to support the South African Digital Terrestrial Television rollout programme and we will continue to work with Government to meet its DTT commitments," he concluded. 

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