‘Technology is the enabler of all other sectors’

Nigeria is standing right ahead of other African nations, in the sense that its young population is overwhelming and so it has an internal market, that is why it brings a lot of potential and that is why many foreign companies including Intel is very interested in Nigeria. We have been in Africa for the past 16 years so we know that there are economic factors but we look at the future and that’s where we can add value as an innovative company. With technology, there is a possibility that the companies in emerging markets can innovate and lead from that perspective because Nigeria has the market, the youth and this is a great opportunity to create a disruption to the market because if you look at the internet economy in the past years, only the companies who are disrupting the business module are really doing business. Africa has its own entrepreneurial minded people who can disrupt. All they need to have is the right mental models and right skills to grow their businesses like Intel’s entrepreneurial programs. We can work together with the government to deploy it on a large scale. We can bring partners like the World Bank, the United Nation (UN) and so on to grow those entrepreneurship programs and introduce technology so that these entrepreneurial minded people can bring their great ideas to life and use technology to expand the new markets. I think that with Intel and our new technology we really can help the entrepreneurs in Nigeria.

Government needs to create policies that are more predictable, then the market will be more predictable and everybody will be ready to invest and more people will be interested in investing in startups. If the government can partner with the private sector and put areas like agriculture, renewable energy, ICT, healthcare, tourism and so on in a better position with incentives, companies will see its efforts and invest in the startups in those segments. Government can start by initiating big projects in those areas and then companies like Intel who are here to help and support will play our own part. We can teach entrepreneurs how to turn an idea into a business model, create a good business plan, source for financing, grow their business, and understand the benefits of computers and technology on their business and so much more, with programs such as the one we are currently running.

I was at a debate at the recently held economist summit in Lagos and quite surprisingly, nobody talked about technology. Intel sees technology as the solution to so many problems and that is why we are committed to work with government and have it put favourable policies in place. We are also here to work with NGOs and the local eco-system including universities, to help give more innovative solutions. We are training software developers with our recently launched program and all this we are doing regardless of the fact that everybody is talking about the decline of Nigeria’s economy, so this shows our commitment to Nigeria. We are focusing on bringing more investment to Nigeria so that people can utilize technology to get out of these crisis easier and faster.

Technology is not a single industry, it empowers all other industries. For example, if you want to advance agriculture, you need to utilize technology. Without technology you can’t really go far in this day and age when we are in the internet of things. If you look at more advanced nations who are doing great in agriculture, you will see that they are using every source of technology including censors, humidity gauges and so on. Everything is being automated and all these require technological connection. For every sector including healthcare, tourism, media, and education and so on, technology is the enabler and without it, you cannot really advance. That is why Intel is here to kick-start the use of technology in all industries before we even start to look at financing and all that. Intel has currently trained 150,000 teachers in Nigeria through its She Will Connect program, in order to help them catch up with the internet era and so we are working with software developers in this program to help boost the education sector with technology. We are already on ground and we are hoping to do more.

The biggest asset Nigeria has is its youth, and if they are not prepared for the future it is really going to be difficult for the country. I believe that the country’s main focus should be on those young people who are going to build the future and then look at the industries that are important for the growth of the country. One of such industries is the information communication technology (ICT) industry as we all know and have said countless times. Nigeria needs to take a few of these important industries and start to improve the skills gap, bring technology and those sectors to the fore front so that the country can really advance and bring advanced solutions to situations on ground in order to secure a better future.