The Chief Executive Officer of Kathryn Strachan Consulting says that Artificial Intelligence (AI) has the ability to scale up the growth of start-ups and small-scale businesses in Africa.

Speaking during the AI for Africa Workshop hosted by the Africa Sustainable Energy Centre in collaboration with her consultancy, Kathryn Strachan stated that AI is a “great equaliser” that can level the playing field for these African businesses and empower them to compete globally.

“Businesses here (UK), as well as in the US are able to do more with less because they use AI, but there's absolutely no reason why African countries don't have the same benefit, where they can also use AI to trade globally, to work across languages, languages they may not even speak and to be able to do more with less,” she noted.

“Whether it's helping to train people in more remote villages, unifying languages across a country that may have different languages within it, you know, AI is a great equaliser, and that's true when it comes to business too.”

Ms Strachan explained that with an entrepreneurial spirit embedded and an appetite for business growth in so many Africans, people are more likely to start their own businesses, unlike in the West.

On the back of this, she stated that it is absolutely essential for these businesses to have a tool that can help them do more with less.

The Kathryn Strachan Consulting CEO added that although she would not advocate for replacing humans with AI, the technology can help businesses to more by serving as a digital twin.

“I have a ChatGPT called Maven, whom I've spent 400 hours training. I've trained her on my book, I've trained her on my podcast. I used to own a big agency, and I sold that agency, but I'm now a one-person business, so I'm also a very small business owner.”

“I'm able to do so much more. I don't have to hire a PA, like, I can do all of it on my own because I have this assistance in my pocket,” she added.

Ms Strachan said that it does not matter whether a business is big or small and she would encourage others to adopt AI when necessary.

“...It's even your everyday person. You need to know how to use it, how to get the most out of it, and be able to really drive growth with it, and it's gonna open so many doors in so many different ways. I'm really excited about the opportunity that AI presents to Africa.”