Our Services

Lumec works together with Open Data Durban on data science and analytics projects for informed decision making. The desired outcome of these projects is to improve the lives of citizens through more evidence-based interventions.

Data tools developed to date include: 

• Open data portals, where public data is made available to citizens;
• Data stories, where data is used to answer user questions in the form of a narrative;
• Dashboards, where data is used to generate an interactive platform, primed to allow users to easily access information.

Data tools are designed to respond best to the needs of users, and as such, determining target user groups and their needs is the first step to developing any data tool. Lumec understands that research is only as useful as those who access and engage with it. Data tools increase the likelihood that these target users will find and usefully engage with the information they require. It is for this reason that Lumec promotes the development of data tools, in combination with, or instead of, lengthy research reports which notoriously are not user-friendly.  

Data tools enable data to be automatically collected and updated. Traditionally, research is conducted at a single point in time and is often outdated the moment it is gathered. Furthermore, data tools empower data holders to maintain and access the data rather than having to employ external consultants to collect the same data repeatedly. All users within an organisation, or even a city, can be assured that there is one accurate information source and further research and analysis can be crowdsourced to continuously improve the accuracy and depth of the data.