Moniepoint @Enugu Tech summit'23, advocates for more thriving hubs outside Lagos, Abuja

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As part of the Nigeria’s on-going efforts to give fillip to the economy and shore up its fiscal and monetary agenda even as the after-effect of global macro-economic realities continue to linger on, strident calls have been made for concerted efforts to be directed at creating more thriving technology hubs outside of Lagos and Abuja.

This is in recognition of the catalytic role as well as the potential of tech hubs in driving economic growth, promoting inclusive development, pushing the boundaries of innovation so as to address some of the country’s most pressing challenges and increasing demand for digital solutions that will make life better across different spheres of our national life.

Entrepreneurship: Facebook set to partner Nigerian hubs - ITREALMS

ITREALMS:

Facebook has advanced plans to launch a new incubation programme in partnership with satellite hubs across Nigeria to help local start-ups and upcoming entrepreneurs, reports ITREALMS.

Participating hubs in the 8-week programme, ITREALMS gathered include Colab, Roar Nigeria, nHub, Ken Saro Wiwa Innovation Hub, Ventures Platform, Di-Hub, Start Innovation Hub, and NG_Hub. 

ITREALMS also gathered that the programme slated for official launch on Monday, February 4, the programme has begun accepting applications from interested candidates, with successful applicants graduating with those from the ongoing Facebook Accelerator Programme.

Designed and run in collaboration with the satellite hubs spread across Nigeria, the programme aims to help new start-ups and entrepreneurs-to-be to take their respective solutions from ideation stage to prototype through mentorship with industry experts and practical training sessions - providing foundational skills necessary for building a successful business.

Speaking on the initiative, Facebook Developer Program Manager, Kendra Nnachi, said “Our aim for these kind of initiatives is to empower entrepreneurs. We believe that this programme will increase the quality and longevity of the Nigerian startup scene by not only providing specialist knowledge and mentoring to the participants, but also by creating a community that gives them room to share and grow.”

Commenting on the programme and the partnership with Facebook, the Partnership Director of Ventures Platform, Mimshach Obioha, commended Facebook for its commitment to the growth and development of startups across the continent, saying that this coincides with objectives of the hub.

“Ventures Platform backs Africa’s boldest entrepreneurs and helps them grow great companies around their ideas. We have always been in the business of incubating ideas and bringing them to life and we are excited that this partnership will give us an opportunity to do more. We are certain that the young people of this country will take due advantage of the opportunities the program will offer and we are willing to nudge them along,” he said.

Also speaking, CEO of Di-hub, Alhaji Idris A. Dangana, said that with the program, more young people will be given an opportunity to showcase their ideas.

“Young people, especially in Nigeria, are known to be bursting with the entrepreneurial spirit and we are only too glad to provide the needed boost with this workshop. As we have always done, we would be providing support services for the duration of the training, and we are very thrilled to see what the participants have to offer,” he said.

Chuks Egbune/DoP

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Stakeholders demand improved curriculum, technology hubs for students - ITREALMS

ITREALMS:

Some Lagos stakeholders have demanded from government at all levels to upgrade education curriculum and provide more technology hubs for students in tertiary institutions, reports ITREALMS.

According to News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the stakeholders made this call at the closing of a free four-weekend Java training programme organised by Paradigm Initiative.

About 17 undergraduates from the University of Lagos, Yaba College of Technology and Lagos State College of Health Technology attended the training.

Mr James Onyenenue, a Java Consultant, said that government should empower and encourage more institutions by providing enough computers in schools.

“Imagine a situation where the government says every student should have access to a computer or laptop, it would be a different story.

“There is the challenge of networking for young people to meet with those who can empower them in coding.

“If the government can create a platform such as Co-Creation hub where students can have access to learning or meet other experienced and professional programmers, it will change a lot of things,” he said.
 
Mr Solomon Ogunbowale, a Computer Science student at the University of Lagos, said that the four-weekend training had exposed him to programming not taught in schools.

Uj. N. Dominic/GEE

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African Tech Hubs diversifying with innovation - ITREALMS

Commentary@ITREALMS:

The innovation and entrepreneurship play an ever-increasing role in growing Africa’s emerging technology ecosystem.

According to research by the GSMA Ecosystem Accelerator, over the past two years alone, Africa has seen the number of innovation hubs double. Whilst the big 3 cities – Nairobi, Lagos, Cape Town – have been dominating the Sub-Saharan growth narrative, the next wave of incubators are arriving from new ecosystem cities in North Africa. 

And the cities driving this growth, Casablanca, Cairo, Sousse and Algiers, are serious about generating sustainable operating models in the fast evolving ICT landscape to overcome core business challenges around viability, future-proofing the business and most importantly, producing continuous success stories.

Funding in North Africa is shifting from relying on public spending

According to the Disrupt Africa Tech Start-ups Funding Report 2017 (http://disrupt-africa.com/funding-report), funding in African tech start-ups surged 51% to reach $195 million in 2017, as compared to figures of the same period in 2016. When it comes to funding, the majority of Africa’s tech hubs are grant funded by Governments and foundations, however there has been a growth of social ventures and a trend toward for profit and self-funded endeavours to fast track growth.

Rabeh Arezki, Chief Economist for Middle East and North Africa Region (MNA) at the World Bank stated, “When it comes to sustainable funding, African tech hubs tend to focus on demand-driven service models that solve problems and support the specific needs of an ecosystem. To succeed, a modern innovation hub needs to pinpoint a niche in growth areas and deliver that proposition. Key areas ripe for development are start-ups looking at improving Internet infrastructure, payment systems and education. These are the types of businesses we see succeeding.”

Eric Chan, Digital Investment Expert, Xona Partners remarked, ‘What’s important is that we are seeing the gaps in infrastructure that impact technology development, digital entrepreneurship, and innovation closing. What’s powerful is that technology hubs are facilitating the development of that infrastructure. A lot of hubs are driven by forward thinking, young entrepreneurs who are looking to improve their skillset. The hubs are filling those skill gaps which will only continue to progress the development of the local ecosystem in a positive way.’

Algiers has been claiming a highly favourable investment climate and hosting major regional events like the upcoming Global Smart Cities Technology and Investment Summit (http://bit.ly/2LONCiz) on June 27-28 2018, where 4,000 smart city leaders from around the world will discuss how smart technology and ecosystems, smart data and sustainability and the Government’s role in stimulating new technology are changing the landscape. Founder of Smart City Algiers, Fatiha Slimani said "Algiers smart city project is in a way our commitment to develop our city based on principles of durability, sustainability and innovation. We’re trying to find solution to what we call - the cascading technology trap - where technology moves way faster than policy makers' decision making."

Innovation hubs are diversifying their scope

We are also seeing the new innovation hubs adopting hybrid systems to enable sustainability. Many choose a mix of community tech space and ‘paid-for’ co-working space, though corporate partnerships are increasingly becoming more common, especially though mobile operators. Over 14% of active tech hubs in Africa now supported by mobile operators like MNT, due to the opportunity to scale quickly. Examples of this include Orange–Start on in Morocco and Djezzy’s ENP Incubator Algeria (https://goo.gl/oRcmXf). Others create their own private funds by taking equity in early stage start-ups whilst offering business support.

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Zinox digital hubs attract $25m investment, to employ 500 Nigerians

ITRealms:

Foremost Information and Communications Technology (ICT) company, Zinox Technologies, has attracted $25m counterpart funding investment to establish three digital hubs in Nigeria, which will pave way for employment of some 500 Nigerians, reports ITRealms.

Revealing these while receiving Acting Director General, National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Dr. Vincent Olatunji, on Thursday in Lagos, the Chairman, Zinox Group, Dr. Leo Stan Ekeh, said the latest investment would increase the share of contribution from the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) sector to Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

He explained that work has commenced in one of the digital hub in Port Harcourt, Rivers State capital, stressing that among other things, will create employment and empower thousands of digitally-minded Nigerian youths in search of the right platforms to develop their skills.

Ekeh also said with the one located in Abuja which is nearing completion and all things being equal will become active by early 2017.  With the current improvements raising hopes of stability in public power supply by first quarter of 2017, the company plans to install the digital plants and commence production thereafter.

Nigerian economy, he said, is in dire need of an alternative to crude oil a role which the ICT sector could effortlessly play in boosting the nation’s dwindling earnings. In the view of the Zinox boss, Nigeria has millions of young Nigerians of digital mindset with the potential to become dollar billionaires.

He cited instance with the case of Nigerian start-up and pioneer composite e-commerce outfit Yudala which received little funding from investors and within one year is a leading e-commerce brand in Nigeria employing over 400 graduates.

Ekeh equally disclosed that their strength is not cash but knowledge of the business backed with strong front and back-end technologies. Just as he affirmed that thousands of such brilliant kids exist in the country, even as he urged the government to partner with technologically-minded companies in unearthing such raw digital diamonds in the country.

“A simple app developed by a Nigerian which achieves global acceptance could usher such an individual into the league of billionaires while putting the country on the world map.

“I had a similar experience when Zinox acquired an Ibadan-based software company Xputer. The young chaps behind Xputer were so talented and had huge capacity to develop amazing content but no individual, corporate or government saw any potential in them. Some of the apps developed by these young Nigerians are being used today by e-commerce companies in Nigeria which they would have paid millions of dollars for, had it been developed by foreign companies,” he enthused, assuring that Zinox will not retrench quality Nigerian staff.

Speaking after a guided tour of the various infrastructure and facilities within the premises including the digital computer hardware manufacturing and assembly plant, telecoms e-Hub unit, Data Centre, bandwidth aggregation, digital security infrastructures and warehousing facilities as well as integrated after-sales service and support centre, among others, Dr. Olatunji affirmed the commitment of the agency in partnering with Zinox Technologies in the task of empowering the youth through the provision of requisite capacity-building programmes and initiatives.

Dr. Olatunji who expressed delight with the infrastructure and facilities on display at the Zinox headquarters during the tour of the company premises, disclosed that NITDA is keen to empower tech start-ups as a means of promoting opportunities in non-oil sectors, noting that a partnership with Zinox Technologies will go a long way in helping to achieve this aim.

“We cannot talk about the ICT sector in Nigeria and indeed in Africa without mentioning Zinox. Zinox has been in the forefront of the digital revolution on the continent and has continued to play a major role. You have shown extreme world class capacity and passion as a leader in the sector and this is why we have come on this visit to restate our commitment towards working with Zinox to achieve our objectives of empowering tech start-ups and boosting the revenue profile of the ICT sector" he said.

Olatunji noted that the government under the leadership of President Muhammadu Buhari was committed to supporting local entrepreneurships, particularly in the ICT sector, he further solicited the support of Zinox Technologies in partnering with the agency ahead of GITEX 2016 Technology Week slated for October.

ITRealms recalls that GITEX 2016 is organized by the Dubai World Trade Centre (DWTC), and will feature local technology start-ups, with NITDA facilitating Nigeria’s participation at three levels including the Nigerian Pavilion, Nigerian Startups cobs inside the Innovation Hub, and the Gitex Africa Investment Forum being co-managed by the NITDA and the DWTC.

Chuks Egbune/GEE

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Pix: Zinox chairman, Ekeh showing off facilities to Dr. Olatunji of NITDA and his team