By MATTHEW VARI
A GROUP of ICT (Information and Communication Technology) startup business owners have called on NDB not to mislead the public on its loan products and conditions through the media in recent months.
Since the government’s push to stimulate the SME (Small to Medium Enterprise) sector to lift the numbers of local owned businesses- with K240 million injected into the National Development Bank to provide loans to local businesses and startups.
The group raised their concerns that more could be done to cover all business form apart from the more traditional business of retailing to more service oriented and professional small startup.
“It is really exciting, everyday is not the same- there are challenges, there are highs and lows, but I think the government of the day can do more than what they are doing at the moment,” said Kenny, a System Integration startup owner.
“Our biggest problems are sourcing capital to startup, our mode of business is mainly based around the internet, and rates are very high- office rentals is a big killer for us.”
“There has been a lot of media coverage about the SME initiatives that the government is doing but I one haven’t really seen it in effect, I guess that the way the government is looking at it is probably is by looking only at the sole trader kind of coverage, they are not looking at cutting edge high impact industries, like ICT and all that,” they all pointed out.
They said that businesses like trade stores, retail outlets were better off in sourcing funds from the state bank.
Another startup owner agreed that the awareness programs undertaken were centered around a particular arm of the SME sector.
“I think the policy makers aren’t really going out to cover the whole length of the SME arm, so all they are looking at is a certain part of it,” another said.
“Some of us have gone to NDB and have sat down with officers, but I think as part of their offers you have got to have 100 percent collateral, if I want to take out K100,000 you need the same equivalent equity, which goes against the publicized 30 percent equity they keep talking about.”
They called on NDB should start broadening and defining properly what they wanted to finance so that the average startup owners can be covered under the SME loans.
“Last week we were at the Tanim Graun show and some of the things the managing director for NDB and Youth Commission talked about involving all parties like NGOs, small businesses, and other stakeholder in the consultation process- but the policy that comes out if you look at the quality doesn’t cover everyone.”
“You cannot expect to grow the economy by people having a lot of trade stores, taxis and PMVs, there has to be investment in profession based businesses like technological companies.”
When contacted by the Sunday Chronicle on the issues raised, NDB Managing Director Moses Liu stated that the bank would respond to the queries this week.
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