Nirvesh Sooful has been involved in the information and communications technology (ICT) industry for over 20 years. He is currently a senior executive in EOH’s Provincial and Local Government Services division. In this capacity, he provides consulting and advisory services to the Western Cape Government on their broadband initiative.
Nirvesh is well regarded as a thought leader within the ICT industry in South Africa and internationally. He has been an expert speaker at many local and global conferences, as well as contributing to numerous papers and research initiatives. He is known as being a visionary, dynamic leader with extensive experience at executive and strategic management level. However in addition to vision and strategy, he has an excellent track record of successfully delivering large, complex projects cutting across multiple departments and operational units, ensuring that the business benefit is achieved – essentially turning vision and strategy into reality.
Prior to joining EOH, Nirvesh was the founding CIO of the City of Cape Town. In that role he was the architect and driver of the “Smart City” strategy, which was a turnaround strategy for the city aimed at information-enabling all key business processes in the city and embarking upon a modernisation programme to deliver services based on real information emanating from the ground (operations). This programme was a huge success, winning several international awards – Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Access to Learning Award (Berlin, 2003), 21st-Century Achievement Award from the Computerworld Honors Programme (Washington DC, 2004) and African ICT Achievers Award (2002, 2003) – and becoming a global best practice for public sector organisations. Former Communications Cabinet Minister Ivy Matsepe-Cassaburri called the “Smart City strategy” a “visionary transformation strategy,” which positioned Cape Town “to become one of our most technologically advanced cities” and “a frontrunner in South Africa’s National IT Strategy”.
Nirvesh has a B.Sc with majors in Computer Science and Mathematices, a B.Com (Hons) in Information Systems and an MBA. He is currently toying with the idea of pursuing a PhD relating to broadband and economic development. He lives in Cape Town with his wife and 2 children.
