- July 1, 2026
- Posted by: root
- Category: Uncategorized
Botswana Institute for Technology Research and Innovation (BITRI) Chief Executive Officer Dr Sebusang Sebusang held a town hall meeting with employees at the company’s headquarters, Maranyane House, on the 30th of June 2026.
At the event, Dr Sebusang underscored greater emphasis on consistency in producing positive impact with the solutions that the organisation generates, agility and efficiency in execution of work, and greater accountability for individuals, teams, and the entire organisation.
In his hour-long address, Dr Sebusang gave an appraisal of the overview of institutional performance, organisational strategic direction and priorities, financial performance, research and development (R&D) projects and innovation highlights/divisional highlights, people and culture, risk and compliance, challenges and opportunities, and concluded with a future outlook that covered upcoming initiatives and expectations.
Dr Sebusang shared that BITRI’s R&D portfolio continues to show robust technical vitality. The CEO cited, amongst others, the Electronics & Communications division having successfully upgraded and deployed its Seding solar lighting products across the Okavango, Mabutsane, and Etsha regions, alongside advancements in forensic signal processing and water quality monitoring, and the Building Materials Science laboratory successfully developing an innovative Limestone Calcined Clay Cement (LC3) and geopolymer mix designs, achieving impressive laboratory compressive strengths of 35MPa and 50MPa, which meets industry standards. He further shared that under the Nanomaterials division, advanced research continues in the Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) diagnostic test strip project, and the product will find greater relevance within the domestic market and sub-Saharan markets in which FMD is a malignant challenge to the livelihoods of communities and economies of countries. Dr Sebusang added that BITRI has had other notable achievements that include the Information Systems Technologies division’s completion of core system developments in several assignments leading to the increased demand for the institute’s solution from public sector institutions.
In lieu of the limited government project funding and a lack of development subventions, the CEO propounded a turnaround plan centred around aggressive resource mobilisation with a view to secure institutional sustainability. Twinned with the aforementioned aspect, Dr Sebusang submitted that tightening execution discipline through rigid quarterly performance management, accelerating the commercialisation of mature research outputs, and stabilising human capacity through targeted recruitment and retention interventions for scarce skills would pave a path to success.
“We have good people, strong capabilities, and an important mandate. What matters now is how consistently we deliver results. BITRI has credible technical outputs, strong applied research platforms, growing external interest in digitalisation and technical services, emerging commercialisation prospects in diagnostics and materials, and a new institutional strategy that can be used to reset focus and accountability,” Dr Sebusang emphasised.
Looking ahead to the next quarter, the CEO laid out a rigorous stabilisation and execution agenda that requires every division to distill its goals into a lean list of fully funded, time-bound priorities with clear accountability. Dr Sebusang averred that to spearhead this turnaround, management is expected to finalise and roll out the new 2026 – 2031 corporate strategy. Additionally, the institute is envisaged to enforce a leaner, quality-driven operation by fully implementing the ISO 9001 quality management system. To ensure financial sustainability, the CEO said that BITRI will leverage commissioned research, consultancies, and revenue-generating initiatives while building stronger cross-functional R&D teams and intensifying engagements with government and industry partners to unlock crucial new funding and collaboration opportunities.