The woman marshalling the ICT behind the Lotto

SOUTH AFRICA marks August as Women’s Month, paying tribute to the more than 20 000 who marched to the Union Buildings on August 9, 1956, in protest against the apartheid extension of pass laws to women.

Women’s Month is also a national acknowledgement of the millions of pioneering and innovative women, grappling daily with the burden of disease, inequality and unemployment.

For Joy Diphokwana, chief executive of Paytronix Systems – a 100% black-owned, ICT solutions partner offering of specialised ICT services, South Africa has come a long way in the emancipation of women since 1994 – but the country is not out of the woods yet, given the disparities between earnings of men and women.

“My message to fellow South African women, particularly in the corporate world, would be of perseverance. What may initially seem impossible, can be achieved with hard work and commitment,” said Diphokwana.

“We stand on the shoulders of iconic women who came before us.”

When Ithuba Holdings was in 2015 awarded the highly coveted licence to become South Africa’s third national lottery operator by the Department of Trade and Industry, it immediately needed a partner with the technical expertise and aptitude to bring the highly popular lottery to millions of homes without a glitch.

Ithuba then partnered with the women-led South African ICT solutions giant Paytronix Systems. Founded in 2002, Paytronix Systems has been mandated to provide and manage the platform which Ithuba uses to run the national lottery.

Looking back, Diphokwana said the company implemented the ICT infrastructure for Ithuba in a record time of five months.

“This is a remarkable achievement and affirmed Paytronix Systems as a global player using best practices and exceptional standards,” she explained.

“Paytronix was able to deliver the project despite the technical complexity.”

Within the first three years, Paytronix Systems managed the data operations of more than 1 636 billion transactions on Ithuba’s behalf, with a transactional value of more than R19.5 billion.

Paytronix designed and continues to manage Ithuba’s mobile e-commerce platform, enabling lottery players to enjoy the whole online player experience.

The company also designed and implemented two high-tier replicated data centres 350km apart, enabling full redundancy for the lottery system.

Diphokwana said Paytronix Systems has also ensured a stable and secure central lottery platform.

The central lottery platform has retail network connectivity to more than 9 000 retailer terminals, 80 000 handheld terminals, and more than 180 000 virtual point of sale devices.

“The lottery is highly regulated and technically complex. It needs to comply with stringent requirements by the National Lotteries Commission, World Lottery Association Standards and the Department of Trade, Industry and Competition. The successful operation of such an organisation has been entrusted to Paytronix.”

Paytronix Systems has previously provided a turnkey solution to Empilweni Payout Services, including its in-house development and operating software that served as the backbone for the social grant distribution system.