Tech in Nigeria: From the Mountain (Hubs) to the (Vibranium) Valley

If you were sleeping under a rock in Antarctica, you have definitely missed out on how tech is growing in leaps and bounds in Nigeria.

Gone are the day when people barely had any grasp of what is happening in the industry, everyone surely has at least app on his phone, that caters to daily needs.

Mobile banking ensures you can send money to friends and family from under your duvet. If you are movie buff, iROKO and its likes have you covered. Shall we talk about Taxify and Uber, which allows you to order rides to and from your destinations? Don’t get me started with the bloom of e-commerce.

The brilliant part of it all? The growth is being championed by bright, young minds.

Take Iyin Aboyeji for instance. Just 26, he chose to return to Nigeria, in a time where his mates are queuing dutifully at embassies for visas to seek greener pastures.

Aboyeji co-founded two successful startups, before launching Flutterwave in 2017. The payments company has already processed $1.2billion in transactions so far. His previous startup, Andela, recently received $24million in funding from the founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg.

Andela’s mission is two-fold: they are powering today’s teams on one hand and investing in tomorrow’s leaders on the other.

The plan is to have created 1.3million software development jobs in the next 10 years.

Gossy Ukanwoke is another tech genius doing great work. With focus on education, the 27-year-old founded Nigeria’s first private online university, Beni American University (BAU), in 2012. BAU allows students access to their classes whenever they need them, so far they own an internet-enabled device.

Ukanwoke is also behind the fancy-named ‘Vibranium Valley’. This world-class office space often referred to as the “Campus”, will serve as a hub for Tech start ups which will build an entrepreneur ecosystem, where people can be inspired to create companies and ultimately be able to create employment.

“In the last 2 years also, we have invested in 14 fintech-enabled companies across Nigeria and our early stage deployed capital has yielded over 5.6x portfolio returns and it is just getting started,” Bunmi Akinyemiju, MD/CEO, Venture Garden Group (VGG), says.

Somewhere on the bustling Herbert Macaulay Road in Yaba, Lagos, is a foresmost workspace, Co-Creation Hub (CC Hub), where dozens of hot heads gather daily to exchange and work on ideas. Yaba is widely regarded as the tech center of Nigeria and it houses numerous creative spaces and tech start-ups.

Little wonder it was Zuckerberg’s first point of call, when he visited last August. He met with at least 50 local startup founders and developers and checked up on the kids at the Summer of Code Camp.

This is what it is all about now. Not only creating, but sustaining brilliance in tech space in Nigeria.

Whether it is Andela, CC Hub or Vibranium Valley, the next set of developers, software engineers, etc are being groomed to take over and keep the torch burning.

The future does look bright for Nigeria. It is indeed exciting to begin to imagine the numerous innovations we will become accustomed to in years to come.