Introduction
Centinel Systems was created to automate, simplify and make parking management more affordable.
Established in 2019 by Simon Yiga and Daniel Muwazi in Johannesburg, South Africa.
Background and Environment
Simon and Daniel have been running parking management company Afropark since 2011.
Afropark’s mission is to manage the parking facilities for property owners in order to provide safe, convenient and affordable parking to motorists and thereby enhance the experience of cities.
Afropark previously did this by deploying staff, equipment and processes to run-down parking facilities.
Based out of Johannesburg’s inner city (“the CBD”) – a gritty, chaotic environment with a reputation for crime - real life Gotham and the PERFECT place to build and grow the type of business like Afropark - that brings:
- Order
- Security and
- Healthy Financial Returns
Uncertainty Creates Opportunity
By 2019 the local inner city and broader economy was struggling - a downturn accelerated by COVID-19.
Afropark’s client’s – owners of relatively small buildings all over the city were seeing shrinking incomes and increasing vacancies. It had become too expensive for them to manage their parking by staff deployment.
Centinel Systems was born as an evolution of Afropark, the only parking management company in South Africa that specialised in inner city properties.
Centinel Parking
“Centinel Parking” is the team’s first ever all-digital product. It works using widely available Automatic License Plate Recognition (ALPR) technology.
It is designed to enable any property owner or manager, particularly of smaller properties, to manage their own parking facilities - autonomously and cheaply using ALPR and an online web-app. They no longer need to rely purely on expensive parking systems or skilled staff deployment.
Centinel Systems' goal is to continue to provide order, security and healthy financial returns to a new generation of African cities by designing systems that adapt widely available technology to solve real world problems.
