The Rectron Summit 2024, themed “Future Forward With AI”, saw a big jump in attendance from previous years, as the South African technology sector flocked to learned about the complex, emerging challenges and opportunities in the fast-growing artificial intelligence (AI) landscape.
The annual event focused on AI, it’s integration into businesses and the momentum it could lend to all sectors, for households and businesses alike.
“The Rectron Summit, which we first hosted in 2022, has always received great engagement from our network of suppliers and downstream channel partners,” says Rectron CEO, Spencer Chen . “However, the rapid launch of various artificial intelligence platforms into the mass consumer environment in the past year (mainly large language models like Microsoft Copilot and ChatGPT) has triggered a mass awareness of AI processes and their benefits.
“This, in turn, has led to technology suppliers needing to urgently come to grips with the various technical and ethical considerations of AI-human collaboration across key growth sectors,” Chen says.
This year, Rectron Summit saw almost 1000 attendees in setting a new standard for ITC events in South Africa, including:
- 377 dealers, 33 vendors dealers, and 101 retail and industry attendees attended Rectron Summit 2024, with 25 of those being small business owners.
- A total of 97 C-suite executives, plus 60 senior leaders (including category heads, sales managers, branch managers, IT managers and finance managers), 51 middle management product managers, marketing managers, branch and country managers attended the Summit, as well as media and other interested parties.
- 884 app user out-clicks to the dealer portal.
This proved to be a significant jump from last year’s Summit, which welcomed 750 delegates, 30 featured vendors, and over 1680 sales leads and engagements of the Summit mobile app – already higher than previous years.
Bringing together vendors, channel partners and key brands, under a multi-faceted programme based on the three themes of Harnessing AI, Accessibility and Security, attendees from across various sectors within the ICT space were able to access a rich consolidation of the latest technology, key insights and best practices when adopting AI at work and at home.
“Like any new tool, we need to understand what opportunities it offers and how we can best use it safely, correctly and to our advantage,” concludes Chen. “As AI systems continue to expand and evolve in often unpredictable ways, we also need to empower businesses, whether larger or small, with advanced security options that will prevent business data from being compromised, providing a secure environment.”
The AI market continues to mature rapidly and as a result, full-scale deployment is increasing across all sectors of technology for business and household. Businesses who recognise the value of investing in AI can reap significant rewards.
Digital futurist Craig Wing, who opened the conference, urged AI users to see the technology as more than just a data tool, but an extension of human imagination that can lead to innovative connections of ideas that can solve even the most perplexing problems faced by business and humanity.
Human-centred AI advocate Johan Steyn echoed this sentiment, offering a set of principles for getting the most out of AI through smart prompting, while also detailing the main considerations for responsible AI development.
IOCO principal AI consultant Callan Abrahams was joined on stage in a by Synology’s Chi-His Hu and Asus Technical Public Relations Officer Alex Gous to discuss the opportunities available for AI in Africa going into the future.
“We are seeing more opportunities to do good and make more money in South Africa, because there is still a lot to do here to build people up,” Abrahams said.
“AI in Africa will take over tedious jobs, which are everywhere, not exclusively here in Africa. This will free people to do more their work in the same fields with more creativity, work that needs intuitive intellect, which only humans are able to do,” Hu noted.
Gous agreed that there is a lot of opportunity on the continent but cautioned that it is about how the technology is applied.
“We typically have a lot of manufacturing taking place, so when people think AI, they typically think automation in manufacturing,” he said. “But for us, industries like agriculture and mining already have huge capabilities. With the latest AI servers and devices on the market, AI plays a huge role in making these processes more efficient and profitable, but also exploiting new opportunities, especially in Africa where economic development has been stagnant for a long time.
“These opportunities are now coming to light and new AI-enabled innovations are making previously unfeasible ventures possible and lucrative as well,” he said.
The Summit culminated in the annual Rectron reseller award ceremony, with the following categories and winners:
| Category Award | Partner Awarded | |
| 1 | POS Business Partner 2024 | Buena Vista Trading 15 (Pty) Ltd |
| 2 | Consumer Electronic Business Partner 2024 | Africa Drone Kings (Pty) Ltd |
| 3 | Components Business Partner 2024 | First Technology IT Suppliers (Pty) Ltd |
| 4 | Mobilty Business Partner 2024 | Wootware Computers (Pty) Ltd |
| 5 | Software Business Partner 2024 | Computronics Systems (Pty) Ltd |
| 6 | Power Solutions Business Partner 2024 | Solar Trust (Pty) Ltd |
| 7 | Infrastructure Business Partner 2024 | Storgate Zimbabwe (Pvt) Ltd |