The Tribune

By FELICITY DARVILLE

GREAT dreams are made of innovation and solutions to some of humanity’s biggest challenges. Creative enterprise comes from the ability to seize those great dreams and bring them to life for your own people.

Velenzo Miller has vivid dreams for his country, as well as the drive and the enterprising spirit to bring them to reality.

His startup company, Skyser, was recently recognised for this innovation when it recently received a grant from the Digi Innovative Project. It is a collaborative effort by the Digital Transformation Unit, Access Accelerator and Bahamas Development Bank, and the Ministry of Economic Affairs.

The grant was designed to improve productivity and competitiveness by promoting the use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in the public sector. A total of $900,000 was set aside for this project, and Skyser was awarded $74,000 to start the company, which is already analysing the workings of several government agencies with a view to improving their effectiveness.

Skyser is a digital information and drone technology company poised to provide tangible solutions to some of the challenges faced in The Bahamas.

Velenzo, also known as Lenny, dreamed big when he thought about how he could make his country a better place. Drones can much to improve the efficiency offer lives, he explains. There are many areas of governance that Skyser proposes that its drones can revolutionise.

In tourism, for example, they can analyse foot traffic data for tourist hot spots, and create virtual tourism platforms that can allow prospective visitors and individuals that are incapable of travelling to be immersed in the Bahamian experience.

Drones can prove very valuable in environmental work. They can monitor terrestrial and marine wild-life health, migratory patterns and potential threats in inaccessible regions of protected areas. They can monitor coastal zone integrity to detect erosion, along with coral reef and mangrove health. They can also engage in wide scale sanitation and fumigation for pest control exercises.

Skyser can make a significant impact in aviation. Velenzo points out that there is a deficit of information available to air traffic and civil aviation. Drones can satisfy an immediate need for real-time surface and upper level winds recordings at the aerodromes.

At present, the Bahamas Department of Meteorology serves as the entity that supplies the information for surface wind and temperature for about ten of 48 airports across the islands, while supplying upper level winds using only three data points that encompasses The Bahamas.

Skyser proposes to dispatch a host of aerial drones to bolster real time surface data input for additional airports for commercial flights, as well as create an equal amount of data points to formulate an effective network via the collection of information on upper level winds for accurate reporting and briefing of pilots. This will not only make pilot briefings more efficient, but will also warn against low level turbulence that creates a hazard, especially for smaller aircrafts.

In the Ministry of Works, Skyser’s drones propose to assist with constructing land survey maps for construction and town planning purposes. They can even conduct power line inspections for diagnostics purposes for a compromised power grid.

“Skyser proposes a comprehensive platform that gathers, interpolates and processes data that can be readily available to shareholders in government and private sectors in order to make well informed decisions on improvements and increase efficiency within a given sector going forward,” Velenzo said.

“The company’s goal is to implement drone usage into a multi-faceted approach that will eventually lead to the launch of ‘smart cities’ across the breadth of the Caribbean.”

Agriculture is an area where Skyser hopes to make a national impact. Velenzo says his company seeks to implement a “smart-farming” initiative (inclusive of seed and water dispersal, and soil monitoring) using drone technology and education throughout the Family Islands.

These islands could also benefit from disaster mitigation drones can provide. Drones can create flood zone maps of vulnerable locations, and impact maps to access the effects of storm surges. They can provide disaster relief through delivering of goods and medicine in impacted areas that are inaccessible during events like. hurricanes, and they can be deployed for search and rescue missions.

One of the most practical uses for these drones came to mind in the midst of what could have been strategy for Velenzo.

He was working at the Bahamas Department of Meteorology when he had a work-related accident that left him incapacitated for months on end. These life-changing incidents can make you or break you. For Velenzo, it gave him time to really figure out what direction he wanted to take in his life. He started brainstorming ideas, but he didn’t feel passionate about any of them.

“It wasn’t until I was returning to work from sick leave that the light bulb came on,” Velenzo said of his Eureka moment for Skyser.

‘I lived in the Winton area for the majority of my life and anyone who has ever lived in the east knows what morning traffic is like. I would usually take Yamacraw Hill Road and divert through Elizabeth Estates to get onto Prince Charles Drive. I was approaching the Elizabeth Estates Police Station and I realised that I had left my cellphone home. At that moment, I knew if I turned around, there was no way I would be on time for work at 9am. So I said, ‘that phone has to stay home today’. But an interesting thing happened because I didn’t have my head buried in my phone checking messages, emails, or social contents. I was able to look around and see how inefficient our country was operating. From the simple acts of people creating their own lanes and many other traffic infractions, and I said the same thing many Bahamians probably say each morning: ‘Where are the police when you need them?’ When I got to the office, I remembered asking for a legal pad from stationary and I just started writing all day. Needless to say, I didn’t get any other work done that day. On that day, the idea of Skyser was born.”

When it comes to transport and local government, Skyser proposes to use its drones to optimise traffic flow, help reduce traffic congestion and increase road safety; reconstruct traffic incidents; and generate a database using compiled footage and data for easy accessibility through mobile apps.

They can also provide real time sea measurements for boating information. These tasks are just a drop in the bucket in a myriad of solutions Velenzo shared with me.

Nation building is in Velenzo’s DNA. Not one, but two of his grandparents have parks in their respective communities named in their honour. Christopher Roberts, his mother’s father, was a stalwart on the Bullocks Harbour, Berry Islands and the park is named in his honour. His father’s mother, Menencia Miller was a veteran educator whose invaluable contributions resulted in the park in Deep Creek, South Andros being named after her.

The legacy continued with Velenzo’s parents, who were both career educators in the government system, helping to shape the lives of countless students in public schools throughout The Bahamas. When they retired from public service, they began teaching in the private sector. Both of these community giants retired as principals. Elliott Miller retired as principal at Charles W Saunders Baptist School, and his wife Enza Miller retired at principal of Faith Temple Christian Academy.

The Millers passed on the love of country and commitment to education to their three sons - Velesco, Velenzo and Wencil. Velenzo’s educational journey began at St Francis and Joseph Primary School. He went on to attend St Augustine’s College, where he graduated from high school in the Class of 1999. His tertiary education began at the College of the Bahamas for a brief time, before he transferred to Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina, well known as the first HBCU (historically Black Colleges & Universities) in the southern United States of America. He studied and earned a degree Business Management and Finance.

After coming back home to The Bahamas, he worked a few different jobs, which included teaching physical education and computer studies at both private schools where his parents taught. Later, he began working at the Department of Meteorology in the Forecast Office where he was a Meteorological Observer. This job afforded him the opportunity to travel to Barbados to attend the Caribbean Institute for Meteorology and Hydrology to attend a Class IV Meteorology Certification.

“The fall I had at work (at the Met Office) had the most profound impact of this process (the development of Skyser),” Velenzo shared.

“I suffered a dislocated knee cap and a herniated disc in my back. It was my first major injury in my life. Being a high school athlete in basketball and track and field and remaining active years later, it really had me in a state of depression - not being able to do the small things without pain and discomfort. The months of therapy, acupuncture, and pain killers just to get some relief was taking a toll one me.”

“I remembered praying one day saying if I ever get the chance to move around again without pain, I would never take another day for granted. At that point, I realised that pain is a lot more mental than physical. So, I started to push myself a little more in therapy and continued doing more exercises when I got home. Every day, I increased my workload. Being able to overcome this ordeal really gave me strength to know that if I put my mind to anything, great results will follow.”

The greatest result for Velenzo came in the form of Skyser - an idea that developed into a startup, and now a company set to make a difference in The Bahamas and the region.

“Digitalisation speeds up development, helps economic growth, brings people closer together and enables better use of resources,” he advised.

“Digital technologies have the potential to boost more inclusive and sustainable growth by spurring innovation, generating efficiencies and improving services. They are also an important tool in helping countries to confront and recover from the COVID- 19 pandemic that has disrupted economies and societies globally. “

“A ‘smart’ city is accessible and enables a high quality of life by using technology which enhances social inclusion and governance processes in line with people’s expectations. Digital innovation remains central to the smart city concept. A smart city or community is one that is an accessible city that enables all its people high quality of life by leveraging technology and the services it enables, and by enhancing social inclusion and governance processes in line with people’s expectations.

In general, a national policy framework can facilitate the adoption of smart city initiatives. This could be an explicit smart city policy, or an implicit objective immersed in a broader policy. In those countries where this is in place, the smart cities national framework (SCNF) would normally include a vision for the cities and a plan to maximize their potential through the use of technologies.”

“The framework may also incorporate a diagnostic on how the national government understands the challenges, a division of responsibilities across all levels of government to contribute to the development of cities, and opportunities of cities and how government action could promote investment and growth.

“The aim is to ensure co-ordinated action and approaches across levels of government for public investment at the National. Data is at the heart of smart city strategies National smart city policy frameworks emphasize the importance of accessing, producing, and using timely and accurate data for decision-making and public service delivery.”

To find out more about Skyser and to see their drones in action, look for Skyser242 on Instagram and Facebook. Call (242) 447- 8936 or email skyser242@ gmail.com.