FAQ AKILI Labs — OHADA ERP, AI & DevSecOps

Question 1

What is an OHADA-compliant ERP?

Accepted Answer

An OHADA-compliant ERP is an integrated management system that follows the OHADA chart of accounts, in force across 17 African countries including Côte d'Ivoire and Senegal. It automates accounting, revised SYSCOHADA financial statements, and local VAT, eliminating manual reprocessing that is often a source of errors.

Question 2

Why choose Odoo for a business in West Africa?

Accepted Answer

Odoo is the most widely adopted ERP in the UEMOA zone thanks to its modularity, competitive total cost of ownership, and ability to adapt to local specifics (OHADA, Ivorian labor law, UEMOA VAT). With over 28 million users worldwide, its ecosystem of certified local partners guarantees lasting support.

Question 3

How long does an Odoo ERP integration project take?

Accepted Answer

A first modular rollout (accounting + inventory) takes 3 to 6 months. A full scope covering HR, OHADA payroll, CRM, and purchasing requires 6 to 12 months, including training. Duration depends on source data quality, the availability of business teams, and the level of customization required.

Question 4

What is the difference between Odoo Community and Odoo Enterprise?

Accepted Answer

Odoo Community is open-source and free. Odoo Enterprise adds advanced modules (payroll, e-signature, multi-company consolidation), official support from Odoo S.A., guaranteed security updates, and native mobile apps. AKILI Labs recommends Enterprise for organizations with more than 20 users or complex HR and OHADA payroll needs.

Question 5

How does data migration from a legacy system work?

Accepted Answer

Migration follows 4 steps: audit and mapping of source data, cleansing and transformation into Odoo's format, loading into a test environment with business validation, then cutover to production. AKILI Labs favors progressive imports and cross-consistency checks to avoid data loss or duplicates.

Question 6

Where should you start your digital transformation?

Accepted Answer

Digital transformation starts with an audit of the current setup: process mapping, identification of friction points, and potential gains. AKILI Labs produces an IT Master Plan (Schéma Directeur Informatique) that prioritizes initiatives by business impact and feasibility, factoring in UEMOA budget constraints.

Question 7

What is an EDM (Electronic Document Management) system?

Accepted Answer

An EDM system digitizes, classifies, indexes, and controls access to company documents. It eliminates paper archives, speeds up document search, and secures data. In the UEMOA zone, it is especially useful for client, HR, and accounting files subject to legal retention obligations.

Question 8

How do you choose an IT partner in West Africa?

Accepted Answer

A good IT partner in West Africa must master the local context: OHADA regulations, variable connectivity, and budget constraints in XOF. Check references in your industry, post-deployment support capacity, local presence for on-site interventions, and the team's technical certifications.

Question 9

What is BPM and what is it used for?

Accepted Answer

BPM (Business Process Management) models, automates, and optimizes business processes. It maps workflows, identifies bottlenecks, and implements automated workflows: approvals, notifications, escalations. The result: faster, more traceable processes that depend less on key individuals.

Question 10

How can AI help my business in Africa?

Accepted Answer

AI creates value on concrete use cases: automated credit file analysis (−94% turnaround time observed at a UEMOA client bank), support chatbots in French and local languages, document OCR, inventory forecasting, and accounting anomaly detection. The starting point is always a measurable business problem.

Question 11

What is a private LLM and why use one?

Accepted Answer

A private LLM (Large Language Model) is an AI model deployed on your own infrastructure or a dedicated cloud, with no data shared with third parties. It guarantees the confidentiality of customer, HR, and financial data. AKILI Labs deploys solutions based on Ollama, LLaMA, or Mistral, hosted in your controlled environment.

Question 12

What is RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation)?

Accepted Answer

RAG connects an AI model to your own data: internal documents, knowledge base, ERP. The AI first searches your sources, then generates an accurate, traceable answer without hallucination. It is the recommended method for deploying a reliable document assistant or business chatbot on private data.

Question 13

Is generative AI secure for enterprise data?

Accepted Answer

Generative AI is secure when properly architected. AKILI Labs recommends models deployed on-premises or in a dedicated VPC, with per-client isolation, request logging, and granular access control. Third-party cloud APIs (ChatGPT, Gemini) are not recommended for sensitive data without a prior risk analysis.

Question 14

What is DevSecOps?

Accepted Answer

DevSecOps embeds security at every stage of the software development lifecycle: design, code, testing, deployment, production. Unlike the traditional approach where security comes in at the end of a project, DevSecOps detects vulnerabilities early, reduces remediation costs, and strengthens trust with customers and partners.

Question 15

Why containerize my applications with Docker?

Accepted Answer

Docker packages an application with all its dependencies into a portable container. The result: identical environments from development to production, reproducible deployments, service isolation, and easier scaling. Paired with Kubernetes, it lets you manage dozens of services in an automated way, with 10× less deployment time.

Question 16

What is Infrastructure as Code (IaC)?

Accepted Answer

IaC consists of describing and provisioning your infrastructure (servers, networks, databases) through version-controlled code files (Terraform, Ansible). Your environments become reproducible, auditable, and deployable in minutes. DEV, QA, and PROD stay consistently aligned, eliminating bugs caused by configuration drift.

Question 17

What is the difference between CI and CD?

Accepted Answer

CI (Continuous Integration) automates testing and builds on every code commit: errors are detected in under 10 minutes. CD (Continuous Deployment) automatically pushes validated code to target environments. Together, CI/CD reduce delivery times from weeks to hours while maintaining quality.

Question 18

Which countries does AKILI Labs operate in?

Accepted Answer

AKILI Labs operates in the 8 countries of the UEMOA zone: Côte d'Ivoire, Senegal, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, Togo, Benin, and Guinea-Bissau. Our headquarters is in Abidjan. For remote projects, we operate across the entire ECOWAS zone and also support French organizations with subsidiaries in West Africa.

Question 19

How do I start a project with AKILI Labs?

Accepted Answer

Three steps: (1) Contact us by email or online form, with a response within 24 business hours. (2) A free scoping consultation: we analyze your needs, context, and budget constraints. (3) A technical and financial proposal within 5 business days. No commitment on your part before you approve the proposal.

Question 20

Do you offer TMA (application maintenance) services?

Accepted Answer

Yes. AKILI Labs provides ongoing TMA for your systems with contractual SLAs: P1 incidents resolved within 4h, P2 within 24h. Our TMA contracts include proactive monitoring, security updates, Odoo patches, minor enhancements, and a dedicated project manager. P1 SLA compliance rate: 100% over the past 12 months.

Question 21

What is your pricing approach?

Accepted Answer

Our services are offered on a time-and-materials basis (daily rate) or as a fixed-price package. For ERP projects, we offer CAPEX (upfront investment) or OPEX (monthly subscription) plans suited to the cash-flow constraints of UEMOA organizations. The initial consultation is free and non-binding. Quotes within 5 business days.

Question 22

AKILI Labs is a young company: is that a risk?

Accepted Answer

It's a fair question — and our best answer is structural. You are not entrusting your project to a brand, but to people: at AKILI Labs, every engagement is led by a member of the founding team — a team with over 30 years of combined IT project experience across the UEMOA zone. You get the experience of an established firm, with the full commitment of a team that stakes its reputation on your success. Our contractual commitments (milestones, SLAs, reversibility) are designed to protect you, not to cover us.

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