AMPLIO NETWORK

In 2020, Amplio passed a milestone: Amplio Talking Books have now reached over one million listeners! Our five-year program goal is that by 2024, two million people challenged by poverty, remoteness, or low literacy will have acquired the knowledge they need to address their greatest needs.

In order to reach and serve those who are the furthest behind, Amplio is committed to forming partnerships with organizations that focus on the most vulnerable and hard-to-reach populations. Our program strategy includes:

1. Grow the number of vulnerable communities served by our technology by expanding our affiliate network and community of practice.
2. Regularly evaluate sales channels (e.g. affiliate vs. self-service) and business development strategy.
3. Help partners effectively achieve their objectives.
4. Invest in technology and training resources to improve scalability and quality.

Amplio partners with local experts, government agencies, and leading international development organizations to plan, implement, monitor, and evaluate Talking Book programs and to continually update and improve our technology and services to achieve our goals. Our team brings strategic skills and experience to this work.

Arthur Tao co-founded Amplio with Cliff Schmidt in 2007. He previously was a senior program manager at Microsoft. He has extensive experience in the management of large, complex software programs and working with global teams. Arthur has a MS. in computer engineering from Cornell University.

Bill Evans, Senior Software Design Engineer, started out supporting room-sized mainframe systems for the healthcare industry in 1978. Bill was a founding member of the Microsoft team that created the .NET development environment and later worked on the Kindle reader at Amazon. Bill has programmed professionally in more than a dozen computer languages. He has a BS in electrical engineering from Mississippi State University.

Lisa Zook, Monitoring and Evaluation Specialist, has 11 years of international development experience. As a senior specialist for World Vision International, she designed and led M&E capacity building workshops in 14 countries and gained field experience in sub-Saharan Africa and Asia. She has a MPH in epidemiology and international health from University of Michigan and a BS in mathematics from Davidson College.

Lindsay Dakan, Global Partnerships Program Manager, has eight years of international development experience, including program monitoring and evaluation for NGOs in Uganda. She has an MA in sustainable international development from Brandeis University.

Bea Covington, Global Partnerships Director, is an economist and data-driven leader. Bea worked for USAID, International Finance Corporation, and private sectors clients. She has extensive experience leading and scaling public/private partnerships. Bea has a MAg in natural resource economics and an MS in adult education/communication from the University of Florida.

Gumah Tiah, Ghana Country Director, has developed and led programs for the SEND Foundation, Populations Services International, and the British and Swiss Red Cross. He has 12+ years of experience in the emergency and development sectors, including climate change, disaster management, food security, health, WASH, livelihoods, gender, and governance, in Ghana, Sierra Leone, and Sudan. Guman has an MPhil in Development Management.

Since 2007, Amplio has reached over one million people in 13 countries through our Talking Book program and partnerships. The Amplio Talking Book is recognized by UNESCO as an inclusive digital solution that low-literate people can use to gain new skills and knowledge to improve their livelihoods and lives. Our innovative, low-cost technology has proven effective as a safe and appropriate tool to help bridge the gender digital divide.

- A Ghana pilot project that used Talking Books to share messages from agriculture experts saw a 48% increase in crop production, leading to greater food security and nutrition.

- Funded by Global Affairs Canada, MEDA's Greater Rural Opportunities for Women project used Talking Books to help empower over 23,000 women farmers in northern Ghana to improve food security and nutrition by growing and selling soybeans. The women doubled their annual income. Over 53% percent achieved income stability.

- In Kenya, the USAID-funded Afya Timiza project used Talking Books to train and support community health workers to improve access to quality health information and services for semi-nomadic pastoralist families. As a result, community health posts saw a 110% increase in pregnant women attending antenatal care visits.

- The Government of Niger, in partnership with ITU and other UN agencies, has included Talking Books in the Niger Smart Villages project, which aims to reach 15,000 rural villages.

- In 2020, Amplio partnered with UNICEF and Ghana Health Service to launch a COVID-19 awareness in eight vulnerable districts in the Upper West Region. Community health nurses and volunteers used Talking Books to share consistent and accurate local language health messages more efficiently and effectively.

- Landesa is currently using Talking Book to reach and inform rural farmers in Liberia about women's land rights and to expand program delivery while maintaining social distance during the COVID-19 pandemic.

- In 2021, an external evaluation of VSO Zambia's TALK II project showed that using Talking Books to educate adolescents in Samfya District about sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHF) significantly improved 1) message reach to youth and their families, 2) quality of SRHR messaging, 3) data collection and feedback, and 4) engagement through technology.

- Talking Book programs and partnerships expanded to new regions, including South Asia (Bangladesh) and Latin America (Haiti) as well as more countries in Africa (i.e., Uganda, Ethiopia, Nigeria)

- We launched a suite of products to help partners more easily and cost-effectively launch and run their programs, created a community of practice, and designed a new system for processing Talking Book user feedback.