SIMI Technologies, Uganda’s phone assembly plant today released the first batch of mobile phones manufactured in the country.
The consignment en-route to Morocco, was flagged off by the State Minister for Finance in charge of Investment and Privatization Hon. Evelyn Anite at the firm’s assembly plant in Namanve Industrial Park, Mukono District on Saturday.
Owned by a Chinese Electronics firm ENGO Holdings Limited and commissioned in November 2019, the assembly plant started off after the government of Uganda signed an agreement with SIMI technologies to promote electronics manufacturing in the country.
The factory runs three production lines, each with daily output of 2,000 feature phones, 1,500 Smartphones, 800 mini slim laptops.
According to Hon. Evelyn Anite, the plant has also started manufacturing protective eyewear and affordable digital temperature guns which will go for as low as UGX 50,000shs in an effort to help fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.
Anite says SIMI Mobile Uganda currently provides employment to over 400 youths, and its success comes as a result of government prioritizing investment in industrial parks to support industrialization and create quality jobs.
SIMI series are 2G Analog Phones fitted with blue tooth, Camera and a Low Emission Diode bulbs or torch and branded Made in Uganda.
The phone models with dual SIM slots and a Memory card will collectively be known as S300 powered 1,400mAh capacity battery. They are enabled with JAVA for playing MP3/MP4 Audio-Visual files.
The phones receive telecommunications signal using 2GSM and GPRS operating on two bandwidths in the range of 850 -1900.
During its commissioning, Ares Chow Yu Qing, the Executive Director of ENGO Holdings Limited said the factory will in the future produce 2,000 chargers, 4,000 USB cables and 4,000 ear phones in the third phase of the development of the factory in October 2021.
The Company said it was investing USD 15 million (55.6 Billion Shillings) in phases over a period of five years to achieve optimal output from the initial one million electronic gadgets a year.
Most of the parts currently being assembled were imported from China including mainboards, the 2.4 Inch screen, touch panel