What is planned for release/rollout over the next month (Jan)?
General Updates on Key Projects
Blockers (Issues getting in the way or slowing things down)
Initiative
What was released last month?
What is planned for release/rollout over the next month (Jan)?
General Updates on Key Projects
Blockers (Issues getting in the way or slowing things down)
bP3-12/Taal Phase 2
@Peter Kossakowski (Unlicensed)
Taal: Status update
5 suppliers shortlisted and samples to be received by end January in Rwanda and China
Feb: narrowing down to final supplier and working on final samples
bP3:
lantern with phone charging
Non-IoT, Non-PAYG, cash sales
bP12:
2-3 lights for 4 hrs + phone charging
Non-IoT, PAYG enabled through token system
bP20-10 / Taal Phase 1
@Peter Kossakowski (Unlicensed)
bP20 Kenya:
First order & Grid Chargers arrive in DCs after delay at Port and Customs.
bP20 Rwanda:
Commercially launched 22nd Dec.
bP20 Kenya:
Commercial Launch across the NGU, now that stock can be activated and distributed.
bP20 DRC:
First order of 600 expected 26th Jan (currently in Dar Es Salaam). Grid Chargers to arrive same time by AF
Staff Training and Production of Marketing Materials taking place throughout Jan
50 units to be tested with friendly users
bP20 Rwanda:
Continued sales ramp up across NGU
bP20 Kenya:
77 sales as of 11th Dec
bP20 DRC:
N/A
bP20 Rwanda
+700 installations as of 11th Dec
bP10 Development
Devices Team designed a bPower10 based on bPower20 - 6.6Ah battery with 10W panel, IoT enabled
Trial order assembly planned for after CNY
Commercially available end Q2 (to be confirmed)
Dimmable light
100 samples of new dimmable produced in China, to be shipped to Rwanda for piloting
After pilot, confirm for mass production in February
Phone Charger
new version of USB phone charger is being planned
requirements are confirmed, sourcing team is reviewing supplier offers
bP20 Kenya:
Delays at port and customs with Stock and Grid Chargers caused distribution plan to be pushed back, meaning sales started later than planned (aroud 1st Jan)
bPower50 and Redesigned bPower100 (Teide)
@Juma Stephen (Unlicensed)
bPower50 - N/A
Teide - N/A
bPower50 - N/A
Teide - N/A
bPower50 DCM - For Lead Acid
Firmware and software development is work on going. The development and testing will be completed on schedule at end Q1 2021. This will be implemented in 2 phases
New units - All units produced in China after the implementation of DCM will have DCM
Existing units with customers will be gradually converted to DCM after all the risk analysis has been done.
bPower50 Lithium (13.2Ah)
Trial production is on going
Trial production to be be ready by end of January
Lithium battery
Anti tamper stickers
Anti tamper screws
50 products to be airfreighted to the pilot market for pilot from end of Feb 2021
Product Specs:
13.2Ah @12.8V
90% DOD = 152Wh usable energy
bPower50 Lithium (9.9Ah)
Development has been approved for a smaller LFP product
Product Specs:
9.9Ah @12.8V
90% DOD = 114Wh usable energy
bPower50 Lead acid
Trial production of 50 CUs that have an updated casing, tamper screws and tamper stickers is on going.
Production will switch to tamper proof stickers and screws in the first production after Chinese new year.
Torch:
Updated version developed and trial production completed
Sample has been received in the office in Kigali for user testing
Radio v5 :
Updated sample has been produced and sent to Kigali for user feedback collection
32”TV :
Pilot Stage
DRC is running pilot. 21sales so far (installed: 9, Paid DP: 12).
Preparing final pilot report by end January.
Next steps: confirm product for mass production in February depending on pilot report
Orders from NGUs
Kenya order 500 TVs Shipment date of arrival to be confirmed
DRC ordered:
143 TVs: TVs left China and will be expected to arrive in DRC during Feb
Further 150 TVs shipment date to be confirmed
Sample orders
KE will receive 2 samples within January
NGU’s can order 2-3 samples for testing for free from, to be shipped in next sea freight. Contact Claudine/PeterK to confirm sample order.
Parabolic Antenna
Trial product confirmed but not yet ready for mass production, next steps depending on trial in DRC (DRC confirmed trial order of 1,000pcs)
NGU’s can order samples (contact Claudine/PeterK)
Subwoofer
Working on v2 improvements
new orders to be placed after CNY (to be confirmed, depending on v2 QA testing)
bP100 - Engineering sample
High level schematic (electronics design) is ready
Most core components have been selected
Prototype Demo scheduled for end of January
Component selection
bP100- Target cost
Estimated costs for the products and additional feature have been provided by Devices Hardware
Finance team to verify the costs
bPower50 improved Panel Mount
This was to be initially released with the bPower50 lithium but the high increase in cost of the mount has forced the panel project to be decoupled from the bPower50 project. Panel mounts are going to be looked at as an independent project for the whole product range
Cook LPG
@Paul Büttner (Unlicensed)
N/A
N/A
Appliances
Production and QC of 1.5k stoves completed
Shipping planned to start next week
Potential order of 11.5k cylinders and 3k regulators prepared for DRC
Kenya
Cook Upgrade launched, 5 customers so far based on cold calls
Blockers: low buy-in of sales team
Cook PAYC license waiver granted, Technology is all setup (MoMo integration, pricing, etc.)
10 PAYC alpha users
Blockers: customer contract still being reviewed
DRC
Ordered 5k cylinders and 500 regulators on top of 1k stoves from Bboxx Group
200+ Cook Upgrade customer
10 PAYC alpha users with PAYGO Energy smart meters set up
BAU
Workshop with Trafigura prepared and completed
CCA article on synergies between OGS and clean cooking published
Next Generation Pulse
@Andrew Kent (Unlicensed)
n/a - won’t be usable releases for several months
Product Configuration
We are still in the process of designing how to configure products in the new system, and are taking significant time to do it as it’s foundational to so many things.
We welcome feedback from NGUs!
Sales Process
Completed design of how the sales process will work in the new system. We will share it with NGUs and get feedback on the final design.
Managing Field Staff
@Jacques Kagabo (Unlicensed)
@Ruairi McLoughlin (Unlicensed)
Sending SMS to the customer through Pulse:
What it is: It is a new feature that will allow the Pulse user especially Call Centre to send SMSs to the customers through the customer page.
Why it is important: There are info/feedbacks that cannot be communicated through the call, but instead with an SMS, Call Center was using ERP to do this but Pulse users who don’t use ERP were not able to do that, with this feature it will be done in Pulse too.
Automatic Shop Selection based on the selected installation address (in Pulse)
What it is: This is the ability for Pulse to automatically suggest the shop that will do the technical actions based on the selected installation address during the lead creation.
Why it is important: This feature was existing in ERP but not in Pulse.
this will guide NGUs on deciding which shop that will do the technical actions.
it will indirectly reduce the installation cost (because the customers will be installed by shops that covers their addresses as per defined demarcation).
Changing the installation address in the customer details page (Pulse)
What it is: it’s the ability of editing the installation address of the customer in Pulse.
Why it is important: This is mostly needed when:
The initial recorded installation address is wrong or
The customer has relocated to a new address.
Building Agent App with New format: The developer is currently working on the lead creation form (the progress can be found in this epic: https://bboxxltd.atlassian.net/browse/PA-1021 )
Call Centre to Pulse:
This week the design should be done after the final review. Then we start creating additional user stories.
We are rebuilding some call actions in Pulse that are currently done in ERP, to allow Call Centre to move completely to Pulse. These have started being developed (they can be found in this epic: https://bboxxltd.atlassian.net/browse/PA-479 )
Territory Planning Tool: ready for the final review. This is the tool that we have created to help the NGUs to plan for their market. It shows how good is a territory in terms of Households that can be targeted and agent assignment status (in the map view) depending on the electrification data in the country. We started with Rwanda NGU as a prototype.
User Management: We have created the role called “Entity Admin”, this entity admin will be able to create and manage users. But this is still hidden from the NGUs as the migration is not yet 100% completed. The recent released story is https://bboxxltd.atlassian.net/browse/PA-33
https://bboxxltd.atlassian.net/browse/PO-1101. This is blocked because Peter wanted to make sure that there are no other NGUs that want a different sales flow than the one discussed in the story.
Technician Scheduling Tool Improvements: delayed due to lack of resources and higher priority work on product configuration, free stock assignment and barcode tracking.
Fighting Fraud & Enforcing Payment
@Anthony Mabonga
Collection Rate in Finance dashboards:
Collection Rate (currently known as % recurring cash) will no longer include defaulters. The new metric will provide a better way of assessing NGU performance on cash collections that aligns with the financial model, since defaulters are already excluded from collections rate in the model.
The Collection Rate metric has been released in all NGUs but is currently being displayed alongside the old % recurring cash collections for NGUs to get used to the change before we make a full transition. In case of any feedback, please feel free to reach out to Sean De Souza or Anthony Mabonga
We have analyzed the causes of customers getting stuck in pending enable/disable and made a list of potential improvements including:
Dashboards in Power BI to improve visibility on customers stuck in pending status
Refined pending enable and disable alerts to make it easier for NGUs to follow up and assist customers stuck in pending via SMS/call/visit depending on severity
Custom lists in Power BI: Soon, NGUs will be able to create custom lists (based on fields that they can add/remove from an existing list) and export the list outside PBI in csv/Excel. This will enable NGUs to get more information on customers they would like to follow up with so they can take necessary actions (e.g. following up with DP only Defaulters) to improve their portfolio quality.
Credit check for upgrades, Phase 2: the initial version, in the agent app, will be released in October. The next step will be to include the credit score in the Pulse Web App. Once this happens, you will be able to turn off the “contract performance” credit score in the ERP back-end.
Collection Rate and Utilization Rate improvements in Portfolio and Finance dashboards:
Collection Rate (currently known as % recurring cash) and Utilization Rate will no longer include defaulters to align with Financial models used for NGU budgets. The potential impact on CR and UR numbers to be communicated to NGUs and other stakeholders ahead of the release
We will start reporting on Total Utilization Rate broken down to its component parts (payment, bonus, manual, enable time) to enable NGUs better explain short-falls in cash collections
Free Stock Assignment:
What it is: This project will allow you to assign stock to a technician without linking it to a customer, to enable “same day installations.”
Development has started, so progress is ongoing. The first story is in UAT. Next will be to develop inventory updates and track stock losses for stock with technicians
Discussions with Software Delivery team have led to a slightly reduced scope for Pulse 1.0 as proposed design required overhaul and redevelopment of scheduling tool. In addition there are numerous dependencies between free stock assignment, inventory locations, barcode tracking and technician scheduling that need attention.
Back-end development in ERP is complete but not yet live. This makes it possible to assign Free Stock to Technicians in addition to the usual assignment of stock to planned installations.
Front-end forms for the assignment of free stock to technicians have been selected for development and will enable shop managers to assign and return stock items from technicians from the quick actions menu. These forms will be separate and parallel to the existing stock assignment for planned installations process.
ESF Compatible PULSE
@Gilbert Ishimwe (Unlicensed)
A Finance person with permission can see amount to write-off and when the customer joined ESF before opting the customer out
What it is: It is a field that allows a Finance person to see amount to write-off and when a customer joined ESF to better take a decision to opt-out a customer
Why it is important: Give more information the opt-out approver before he opts-out a customer
What it is: currently services (i.e. Canal+ subscription) can only be sold as upgrades. This allows it to be sold at sign up
Why it’s important: Will allow proper configuration of Canal+
Note: this is related to the canal+ integration but have been worked on under ESF initiative
Manual Downgrades
What it is: a process for downgrading a customer by recording a repossession, re-installing the non-downgraded products through Linked Account, recording a fake payment for the DP and previous payments made, and manually removing the ontime.
Why it’s important: allows Canal+ and other services/products to be sold, without the risk of customers being trapped into pay plans they can’t afford.
Note: This solution has been tested in DRC and worked fine.
Manual Upgrades Between Solar Systems
What it is: a process for upgrading a bPower20 customer to bPower50 by recording a repossession, re-installing the non-repossessed products and new products through linked accout, recording a fake payment for the DP and previous payments made, and manually removing the ontime.
Why it’s important: allows to sell bPower20 to customers with an option to upgrade once they meet the upgrade between SHS eligibility criteria
Manual Upgrade between SHS is not to be pushed by Agents, but can inform customer that if he/she meets eligibility criteria that NGUs are setting up can.
Note: The upgrade between SHS is available for pilot, planned to start in Kenya!
What it is: A page which allows NGU portfolio managers to follow cohort per cohort the UR of ESF-only customers, and the difference before / after joining ESF.
Why it’s important: This serves as a proxy for understanding clarity of communication to customers. As customers upgrading or opting out will leave the ‘ESF-only’ pool and this analysis, each NGU will be able to make sure that ESF-only customers are happy customers.
On-going work on opt-in options (currently customer can opt-in through linked account), but we are trying to see what could be automated in the current system Vs what will come in Pulse 2.0
ESF UR cohort analysis in portfolio dashboardhttps://bboxxltd.atlassian.net/browse/DAT-2248 is currently blocked because the DI team identified a few issues and they are looking into them.
PULSE Product Integrations
@Davis Nteziryayo (Unlicensed)
Safaricom Kenya integration (Dependent on Telco)
Bboxx will have a direct integration with Safaricom without going through an aggregator (Kopo Kopo).
Kenya NGU will launch solar payments using M-PESA paybill
Payments dashboard
What it is: have a payments page on finance dashboards
Why it’s important: Innovation can have access to payments detials i.e. payments per NGU, telco, monthly breakdown, subsidy components, etc
SunCulture - Phase 1 (Manual switch on/off)
What it is: add water pump customers to ERP and be able to switch on/off manually in the SunCulture sentinel system
Why it’s important: Togo NGU will be able to sell solar water pumps to non Bboxx customers. Also SunCulture water pumps are going to be the first non Bboxx product that will be sold and managed in pulse which make it first market place product.
Update: Development work for phase 1 will be completed this month, with only 1 story remaining to be released. The Togo team will now be able to record key actions (e.g. assign stock, record installation, record repo) in both ERP and Pulse. Additionally, the team will be able manually enable/disable SunCulture water pumps in Sentinel while tracking performance in Pulse and ERP.
What it is: build a new USSD application that allows Bboxx customers and non-Bboxx customers to have access to Bboxx products and services
Why it’s important: customers will have self service option available to them 24/7. For example:
Make payments for themselves or pay for other Bboxx customers
Customers can access Bboxx account information anytime
Signup for upgrades and other Bboxx products or services
Non-Bboxx customers can pay for Bboxx customers or see information about Bboxx products
SMS provider for TOGO, PAS Nigeria, and DRC Goma
What is it? above mentioned NGUs will start paying for their own sms messages used.
Why it’s important: Currently PAS Nigeria, DRC Goma, and Togo are not paying for their sms messages. The cost is included in the pulse fees.
Update: Account registration and configuration for Togo PAS Nigeria, and DRC Goma is complete. Training for NGUs on how to use Africa’s SMS dashboards will follow within the next two weeks.
SunCulture - Phase 2 (Integration to automate switch on/off)
What it is: Automatic switch on/off for customers with SunCulture water pumps. Follow up from phase 1 to enable Togo to scale water pump sales.
Why it’s important: Togo NGU will be able to sell solar water pumps to non Bboxx customers. Also SunCulture water pumps are going to be the first non Bboxx product that will be sold and managed in pulse which make is first market place product.
Update: A few stories are going to be releases in the next month including:
Automatically creating a customer profile in Sentinel once an installation has been recorded
Orange Ivory Coast, Guinea, and Senegal payments integrations
What it is: Orange NGUs want to start accepting payments through Bboxx payments services
Why it’s important: Orange NGUs are currently accepting solar customer payments through servers in Paris. These servers being used for solar payments will be decommissioned Orange end of January.
Vodacom DRC integration (Dependent on Telco)
What it is: add Vodacom M-PESA payments as new payment option for DRC NGU
Why it’s important: DRC NGU will be able to accept M-PESA payments from Vodacom and expand to new territories
Update: Integration code is complete and testing session is scheduled January 18th.
MTN Rwanda Payments Integration
MTN is moving their servers to a new environment and put all integrations on hold. They were supposed to have finished this in mid-Oct, but still not done
Complete Care & Repair
@Kamanzi Kenneth (Unlicensed)
Repair Centre Set up.
Repair Centre Ruiru (Kenya):Launch Ruiru repair centre by 31st December
Repair Centre Kisumu (Kenya):Complete repair centre renovation in Kisumu by 31st December
Updated IRT Appliance repair form
Why it is important:
Context: Technicians complete appliance repairs before submitting the forms. They sometimes lose track of how many forms they have submitted and end up submitting inaccurate data of spares used to repair x number of appliances
Release note: Technicians, when completing the repair forms will now be able to click and check the list of repairs completed today to verify the number of repairs and the number of parts replaced aggregated by appliance type.
Pilot Synchronisation Tool:
What it is:
DC repair technicians use IRT to report spares used. This is the data we use to generate the monthly warranty claims. However, DC logistics officers use ERP stock moves to manage inventory of spares. We often have a variance between spare stock moves done by the logistics officers and what repair technicians report in IRT
Why it is important:
The purpose of the sync tool is to synchronize IRT and ERP and trigger automatic stock moves when technician reports a part in IRT to capture accurate spare Usage.
Update: UAT the IRT/ERP synchronization tool in Rwanda repair centre on HOME 2 units.
N/A
N/A
Supply Chain Integrated Tool
@Abdulrazack Karim (Unlicensed)
@w.vangoethem
@Jackline Abagwaneza
Barcode Scanning and Tracking:
What the system is able to do now NGU (Rwanda) is able to scan 24″ TV V2(CMAC) from Asia to DC main stock Abele to scan while doing the internal moves with in the DC and in the repair center Able to generate new serial numbers and print QR codes in the repair center just in case some trackable TVs that are missing or don’t have serial numbers.
Barcode Scanning and Tracking:Phase 3
This phase was purposely to be able to scan all the stock moves that operate at the shop level. This stage was put on hold because there were no frontend developers from
Barcode Scanning and Tracking:
Tracking Project was split into different phases as described below:
a) Phase 1 ( Asia):
b) Phase 2 (Asia to DC & stock moves at the DC):
c) Phase 3 (Tracking at the shop level):
Barcode Scanning and Tracking: Currently progress blocked as low front end developer resource.
B2B Systems Migration (From ERP 7 to SAP) - Bonsai Project
@Duarte Ferreira (Unlicensed)
4 Workshops:
Organizational Management
Data Migration
Finance
Supply Chain
Weekly project meetings begun to review all task
Asia customer & supplier data prepared for upload
Asia materials & products categories prepared for upload
Begun to create our future GLOBAL chart of accounts
SAP Test environment ready
Walkthrough SAP system functionalities with the vendor (Orchard House)
DATA CLEANSING in progress
We will be transferring master data from our current ERP into SAP ByDesign.
During this process we will also complete a data cleansing exercise. This means we fix any data that is incorrect, inaccurate, incomplete, incorrectly formatted, duplicated and remove irrelevant data.
Examples:
From 546 current customers only 24 will be uploaded into SAP
From 35 Bill of Materials only 5 will be uploaded into SAP
Great cooperation between Finance and Supply Chain teams
Project deadlines on track
Orange (CAPEX Free)
@Robin Scanlon (Unlicensed)
N/A
Will begin negotiations with Orange DRC to setup CFM with Rawbank
N/A
N/A
Nigeria Market Re-Entry
@Thomas James Newell (Unlicensed)
N.A
N/A
Ernest now in Nigeria to build business on the ground and confirm business plan assumptions
Ernest to lead project/implementation plan
Pulse setup/configurations
Shops idenfitication and preparation
Logistics partner identification and negotiation.
etc.
Trafigura investment closed--ongoing discussions with BEAM to secure and finalize investment into Nigeria entity
Stock being prepared to ship (exp. arrival mid-March 2021)
Contracts confirmed for Bboxx internal transfer to Nigeria
