Nigeria Labeled Africa’s Next Silicon Valley @IoT West Africa’24
In the news:
- FG to establish research centres for IoT, AI, and Blockchain to boost technology research.
- NITDA highlighted regulatory challenges and outlined research priorities in emerging techs.
- Nigeria’s tech prowess and its role as a hub for innovation in Africa are highlighted.
The Nigerian Federal Government intends to set up research centres for emerging technologies such as the Internet of Things (IoT), Artificial Intelligence (AI), and Blockchain across all six geo-political zones of the country.
Kashifu Inuwa, Director General of the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), announced this during his keynote address on Tuesday at the opening of the 2024 IoT West Africa Conference in Lagos, Nigeria.
Represented by Dr. Aristotle Onumo, NITDA’s Director of Corporate Planning and Strategy, Inuwa stated that the initiative aligns with NITDA’s focus on fostering a strong technology research ecosystem.
In his keynote address titled “Regulatory Framework Challenges to Support IT Developments in West Africa,” Inuwa highlighted that the conference theme resonates with NITDA’s vision, and pointed out that the agency’s research priorities encompass IoT, AI, Blockchain Technology, UAVs, Additive Manufacturing, and Robotics.
Highlighting the accelerated service deliveries, the NITDA DG emphasized that emerging technologies are enhancing rural life by addressing waste disposal challenges, and smart agriculture is transforming food production through various automated agricultural processes.
“We are establishing a special-purpose vehicle that is going to look into these key areas and also establish research centres across the six geo-political zones of Nigeria that will be targeting these six key areas of emerging technologies,” Inuwa said.
He said that in addition to funding research in the aforementioned areas, NITDA would also provide support for Nigerian startups that are developing products on emerging technologies.
“We want to encourage development and also have innovation sandboxes where we can support and encourage those who have ideas to come up with use cases and through that, we can help them to stand, help them to create businesses, and also take them to market,” he said.
Addressing other initiatives of the technology development agency, Inuwa said NITDA plays a pivotal role in talent development by endorsing the federal government’s 3 Million Technical Talent (3MTT) programme, noting that the goal is to ensure that by the year 2027, three million Nigerians would have been technically trained and empowered.
Envisaging that some of the people being trained may leave the country, Inuwa was hopeful that this would contribute to Nigeria’s talent exports and boost the country’s foreign exchange through increased remittances.
In the afternoon keynote session titled, ‘Leveraging IoT for Business Transformation,’ Febisola Oyeniyi, General Manager, Enterprise Sales at MTN Nigeria, said the potential of Internet of Things is huge and announced MTN Nigeria’s readiness to lead the country’s journey to this emerging technology’s space.
Citing studies from McKinsey & Company which estimated that by 2025, the contribution from IoT would be about $11.1 trillion, 40per cent of which would come from developing countries such as Nigeria and others, the 40% will be for businesses such as logistics while 30% would go to industries.
Oyeniyi who cited MTN’s huge investment in infrastructure as eloquent testimony to its readiness to play big in the emerging technology era, identified human health and fitness as another huge market opportunity with wearable devices getting traction globally.
While identifying the use cases of IoT to include agriculture, smart grid, healthcare, oil and gas, and waste management among others, she said that Nigeria has the potential of a $4.39billion annual market value from the technology.
She said that MTN is well positioned to support and enable the transformation of the IoT space, noting that the telecom giant has started this in business transformation and ecosystem orchestration, best-in-class infrastructure, robust IoT platform and business transformation.
“Whatever your business needs is we have solutions for you. We can manage and scale your business,” Oyeniyi said.
During an interview with journalists at the IoT West Africa Conference, Shitij Taneja, Managing Director of Vertex Next, organizers of the event, explained that Nigeria was selected as the host due to its reputation as ‘Africa’s next Silicon Valley’.
Taneja said that Nigeria’s vast youth population and the vibrant startup ecosystem make it a powerhouse for technology development in Africa.
“The reason we are hosting the IoT West Africa, which is co-located with Africa Data Centre and Cloud Expo Africa is because we see a lot of potential in the market and the growing number of youths that are working towards the development of technology,” he said.
He noted that Nigeria is seeing a surge in investments in data centres, creating a substantial market for IoT as the adoption of these technologies grows, adding that the conference aims to attract investors to support Nigerian startups developing products based on emerging technologies.
The Opening Day of the IoT West Africa Conference featured a panel session that discussed the topic, ‘Embracing Digital Technologies to Modernise Utility Infrastructure and Operations’ as well as a Fireside Chat that focused on ‘How IoT and Digitisation is shaping the Oil and Gas Industry in Africa.’
IoT West Africa Conference has been connecting the technology ecosystem since 2022 and aims to explore and highlight game-changing technologies and dazzling innovations, as well as to provide service providers with a platform to explore the latest developments and best practices in IoT.