Building What Comes Next

People, businesses and ideas shaping Africa's next economy

The Project Herald Review was created around a simple editorial belief: the businesses, people and ideas shaping Africa's future deserve to be examined beyond the headline.

Africa's next phase of economic development will not be defined by infrastructure and capital alone. It will also be shaped by entrepreneurs building new technologies, companies solving difficult commercial problems, institutions developing new models and individuals turning emerging opportunities into operating businesses.

Our role is to document those developments with the depth they deserve — examining not only what is being built, but who is building it, what problem it addresses, how the model works and where the opportunity may lead.

The profile looks at the business from an editorial and commercial perspective, tracing the experiences, operating history and technology proposition behind D.E.T Services. But understanding a company also requires hearing directly from the person building it.

That is why this issue goes beyond the profile to bring readers into our conversation with Ted Eni. He discusses the field experiences that changed his understanding of farming, the challenges of building a technology-driven company in Nigeria, the more than 600 farmers the company says it has reached, and the technologies and partnerships he believes could shape its next stage.

For us, that is where business journalism becomes useful. A company is not simply a name, a product or a founder's story. It is a developing proposition — one that must be understood in the context of its market, its customers, its operating environment, its capital requirements and the opportunity ahead.

We hope this issue gives you more than a profile. We hope it gives you a clearer view of the person, the business and the possibility.

From the Soil to the Data Layer

Ted Eni's journey from agricultural science to precision farming

Africa's agricultural challenge is often described in terms of land, inputs, financing and access to markets. For Ted Eni, however, another constraint sits underneath many of these problems: information. Farmers cannot efficiently manage what they cannot accurately observe.

That premise sits at the centre of Eni's entrepreneurial journey. With an academic background in Soil Science and Meteorology, Eni entered agriculture with an understanding of the physical systems that determine crop performance: soil, weather, water and environmental conditions. His later experience working directly with farming communities transformed that academic foundation into a commercial technology thesis.

Today, as founder and CEO of D.E.T Services, he is building an agritech business around precision agriculture, combining drones, sensors, artificial intelligence, farm data and targeted agricultural interventions. The company's proposition is captured in its own positioning: “Cheap, Smart and Profitable Agriculture.”

But Eni's journey into this field did not begin with drones. Before D.E.T Services, he explored other entrepreneurial ventures, including a snacks business and a youth-focused fashion venture — experiences that exposed him to the mechanics of building businesses and identifying opportunities. Agriculture eventually became the sector where his scientific background and entrepreneurial instincts converged.

Instead of treating technology as an end in itself, Eni began developing a model in which technology functions as an agricultural decision-making layer. The objective is to replace guesswork with information.

The Business Case for Precision Agriculture

From drone services to agricultural intelligence

The strongest evidence of D.E.T Services' development is found not only in its technology proposition but in its earlier operating record. A USAID/Nigeria COVID-19 Food Security Challenge Final Report identifies D.E.T Services as a youth-led agricultural business operating in Abia and Ebonyi States, focused on agricultural input supply and soil and crop management.

The report records $74,801 in funding and describes the company's model as combining precision soil-fertility maintenance, precision agrochemical application, crop-health monitoring and fertilizer distribution through a subscription service.

Those historical figures matter because they demonstrate that D.E.T Services' technology proposition has previously been connected to a functioning agricultural service model rather than remaining solely at the concept stage.

The commercial logic is straightforward. Traditional farm inspection can be labour-intensive; traditional spraying can involve treating areas that may not require the same level of intervention. Precision systems seek to make application more targeted — a means of reducing chemical waste, lowering costs, increasing coverage and improving farm productivity.

Research, Policy and the Move Toward Agricultural Intelligence

Building the intellectual foundation behind the business

Eni's work has also extended into agricultural research. At the 2nd African Conference on Precision Agriculture, he was listed as the author of a study titled “Precision Agriculture, the Key to Increased Productivity for Smallholder Farmers; A Case of South-East Nigeria.”

The study examined the impact of precision agriculture on smallholder farming operations in South-East Nigeria. Its central argument was that many smallholder farming systems still depend on traditional, time-consuming approaches and lack precision in agricultural input application, contributing to uneven productivity and input waste. This is significant because it shows that Eni's interest in precision agriculture predates the more recent AI-focused narrative around D.E.T Services — the technology is rooted in a longer-running concern with agricultural efficiency.

From Startup to Agricultural Infrastructure

What Ted Eni is really building

The most interesting part of Ted Eni's trajectory is not any individual drone, sensor or AI application. It is the possibility of building agricultural infrastructure around information.

Consider the sequence: a drone maps a farm. Sensors provide additional environmental information. Data identifies areas requiring attention. AI assists with interpretation. Precision equipment delivers the intervention. The farm is monitored again. The process creates another cycle of information.

That is fundamentally different from a one-time agricultural service. It is a farm-management system.

The Next Chapter of D.E.T Services

Scaling the idea of cheap, smart and profitable agriculture

The long-term opportunity for Ted Eni is therefore considerably larger than building a successful drone-service company. The more ambitious proposition is to help establish precision agriculture as part of the operating infrastructure of African farming — requiring farmer education, accessible pricing, reliable equipment, data, partnerships, capital, and evidence that the technology produces economic value.

D.E.T Services' historical operating results provide an early demonstration of that commercial pathway. Its documented expansion in subscribers, drone capacity and revenue during its USAID-supported period shows that precision agriculture can be packaged as a service business rather than treated solely as an innovation experiment.

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For Ted Eni, entrepreneurship did not begin with a business plan or a technology platform. It began with a habit of looking at everyday problems and asking how they could be solved.

Today, as Founder of D.E.T Services, he is applying that mindset to one of Africa’s most important economic sectors: agriculture. Through precision agriculture, drone technology, farm data analytics and climate-smart innovation, D.E.T Services is working to help farmers improve productivity, reduce waste and make better decisions about their farms.

In this conversation with The Project Herald Review, Eni reflects on the experiences that shaped his entrepreneurial journey, the realities he encountered working with farmers, the evolution of D.E.T Services and the larger ambition behind the company.

I have always seen the world through the lens of solution. I am naturally curious and constantly asking myself how things can be done better, faster or more efficiently. That mindset has shaped my journey into entrepreneurship.

My background is in Soil Science and Meteorology, and my work with farmers in rural communities exposed me to many of the practical challenges they face. Before D.E.T Services, I was involved in research, construction fieldwork, entrepreneurship and extensive engagement with farming communities.

Even before agriculture became my primary focus, I experimented with different businesses. I started a chips brand and later ventured into a trendy clothing line. Those experiences taught me that entrepreneurship is really about identifying a gap, understanding what people need and having the courage to turn an idea into something tangible.

For me, entrepreneurship is how I turn problems and market gaps into realities that can create value.

Yes. A major turning point came during my field engagements with smallholder farmers in Ebonyi State.

Initially, I assumed that the biggest challenge farmers were facing was access to affordable agricultural inputs. But as I spent more time with them and understood their realities, I discovered that the problem was much deeper.

Farmers were dealing with flooding, pests, diseases and poor precision in farm management. They could have access to inputs and still experience poor yields because they were not always able to determine precisely what their farms needed, when they needed it or how best to respond to changing conditions.

That experience completely changed my perspective. I began to understand that solving agricultural problems required more than simply making inputs available. Farmers needed better information, better monitoring and practical technologies that could help them make better decisions.

It was this deeper understanding of the problem that pushed me toward precision agriculture and eventually toward building D.E.T Services around practical, locally relevant technology.

The deeper Ted Eni went into farming communities, the clearer it became that agricultural productivity could not be solved by inputs alone. The challenge was increasingly about precision: knowing what was happening on a farm, understanding why it was happening and responding at the right time.

That realisation became central to the philosophy behind D.E.T Services. Rather than introducing technology simply because it was new, Eni wanted to understand how technology could be adapted to the realities of African farmers, particularly smallholders operating with limited resources and infrastructure.

One of the biggest challenges was limited funding and infrastructure. Precision agriculture requires equipment, research, training and extensive field testing, and these things can be expensive, especially for a young company operating in an emerging ecosystem.

There was also the challenge of skepticism. At the time, the idea of using drones, artificial intelligence and precision agriculture tools for rural African smallholder farmers was still unfamiliar to many people. There were questions about whether these technologies were necessary, affordable or even practical in those environments.

Those challenges forced us to become more resilient and adaptable. We had to continuously learn, test ideas, listen to the people we were serving and find ways to make the technology more practical.

They taught me that innovation has to begin with listening. It is easy to assume that you know what people need, especially when you are looking at a problem from outside. But once you spend time with the people experiencing that problem, you begin to see the gaps differently.

That lesson influenced how we approached D.E.T Services. We wanted to combine advanced agricultural technology with local accessibility. The objective was not to build something that looked technologically impressive but remained disconnected from the farmer. The objective was to create something practical, tailored and capable of producing measurable value.

This thinking eventually shaped our focus on drone technology, farm data analytics, AI-powered pest and disease detection and precision input application. Each technology has to answer a real agricultural question.

One of our biggest strengths is our understanding of local farming realities. We are not simply taking technology developed elsewhere and placing it in an African context. We are looking at the specific challenges faced by underserved farming communities and asking how technology can be adapted to meet those needs.

We believe technology should create measurable value. It should help farmers make better decisions, improve productivity, reduce unnecessary input use, detect problems earlier and ultimately improve their resilience and profitability.

That is why our approach is deeply connected to the communities we serve. The technology matters, but the outcome matters more.

For Eni, the lesson from those early years remains straightforward: the most useful innovations are the ones that begin with people. That principle continues to influence how D.E.T Services develops its solutions and how the company thinks about the future of agriculture in Africa.

The ambition behind D.E.T Services extends beyond individual farm interventions. For Ted Eni, the larger opportunity is to build an agricultural technology platform capable of supporting farmers at scale while contributing to a more resilient and sustainable food system across Africa.

That ambition is increasingly taking shape through a combination of precision agriculture services, artificial intelligence, drone technology, farmer education and data-driven crop management.

Our long-term vision is to become a leading climate-smart agriculture innovation company across Africa. We want to help thousands of farmers improve their productivity, resilience and profitability while contributing to food security, sustainable agriculture and rural economic growth.

We also want to develop our own advanced plant-health and crop-monitoring platform that can scale beyond individual projects and eventually serve agricultural markets globally.

The opportunity is significant because agriculture is increasingly becoming a data-driven industry. The more accurately farmers can understand what is happening on their farms, the better they can respond to risks and make decisions that improve outcomes.

I am proud of the practical impact we have been able to create. We have helped over 600 individual farmers improve farm monitoring, reduce input waste and detect pests and diseases earlier.

Beyond the direct services, I am also proud of the awareness we have created around climate-smart agriculture and modern farming practices. For me, the most important measure of success is whether what we are building makes a meaningful difference in the lives of the people we serve.

Recognition and opportunities through innovation programmes have also been encouraging. Programmes such as Orange Corners and the Pivot Challenge, alongside other innovation communities, have provided opportunities to learn, build partnerships and strengthen the business.

We are currently working on an AI-powered pest and disease detection application, alongside our precision agriculture services, which include drone-powered farm mapping and crop monitoring.

We are also preparing for the second season of the Harvest Heroes Project, which focuses on educating young people and farmers about climate-smart agriculture and modern farming practices.

Going forward, we expect to deepen our innovation work, expand farmer outreach and develop more demonstration projects. A major area of interest is intelligent crop-monitoring systems that can provide farmers with more timely information and support real-time decision-making.

AI-powered agriculture will become increasingly important, particularly in areas such as pest and disease detection, crop monitoring and decision support. Remote sensing will also continue to expand because it can provide farmers and agricultural organisations with information that would otherwise be difficult or expensive to collect.

I also see significant opportunities around carbon-smart farming and climate adaptation. As climate conditions become more unpredictable, farmers will need technologies and practices that help them understand risks and become more resilient.

We are interested in working with organisations focused on agriculture, food security, rural development and emerging technology, as well as agritech companies and impact-driven investors.

There is also strong potential for collaboration around climate adaptation programmes, government agricultural initiatives and sustainability-focused industries that depend on accurate agricultural data.

Africa's agricultural transformation will require practical, scalable and locally relevant solutions. We want to be part of building those solutions and creating partnerships that can take them further.

The direction is clear: more data, more intelligence and more locally adapted technology moving closer to the farmer. For Eni, that is where the real opportunity lies — not in technology for its own sake, but in building systems that help agriculture perform better.

Behind the technology is a founder whose approach to business is closely tied to service. For Ted Eni, building a company is not simply about creating a commercial enterprise. It is about taking responsibility for a problem, creating opportunities around it and remaining committed long enough to see a solution take shape.

I see leadership as service, responsibility and vision. It is about creating opportunities, solving meaningful problems and staying committed even when the path is uncertain.

As a founder, you have to be willing to make decisions, learn from mistakes and keep moving forward. You also have to understand that the people around you are part of the journey. Leadership is not just about directing people; it is about creating an environment where people can contribute, grow and pursue a shared vision.

I try to stay focused on purpose and progress rather than perfection. Entrepreneurship comes with uncertainty, and there will always be moments when things do not go according to plan.

Strategic thinking and adaptability are important. So is continuous learning. I try to understand what is changing around me, identify what can be controlled and make the best decision with the information available.

I also remind myself that progress does not always have to be dramatic. Sometimes the most important thing is simply continuing to move forward and learning from each stage of the journey.

Research is a major part of my routine. I spend time studying ideas, technologies and trends that could influence agriculture and the wider innovation ecosystem. I also plan, document ideas and spend time in the field.

Field engagement is particularly important because it keeps the work connected to reality. It is easy to become disconnected from the people you are building for when you spend too much time thinking about the business from a distance.

Intentional reflection is another important habit. I try to understand what worked, what did not and what needs to change. That process helps me continue learning.

Away from the work, Eni describes himself as someone who enjoys nature, creativity, deep conversations and sports. He also has an interest in curating wine-tasting events and exploring vineyards — a more relaxed side of a founder whose professional life is increasingly focused on technology, agriculture and climate resilience.

His perspective has been shaped by field experiences with farmers, travel and exposure to different communities and challenges. Those experiences continue to influence how he thinks about innovation and the kind of company he wants D.E.T Services to become.

Success, for me, is about empowering communities and leaving behind solutions that improve lives beyond my own generation.

If the work we are doing can help farmers become more productive, help communities become more resilient and contribute to a stronger agricultural future, then that is meaningful success.

That is also what continues to motivate me. Africa has enormous potential, but unlocking that potential will require people who are willing to build, experiment, learn and stay committed to solving real problems.