Microsoft West Africa has said that it has donated software worth over $500 million to young people with the requisite skills to enable them become successful entrepreneurs in Nigeria.
This was disclosed to BusinessDay in an exclusive interview with Ugochukwu Nwosu, citizenship manager for Anglo-phone Microsoft West Africa, during one of his visits to Port Harcourt.
The donation of the equipment was done through non-governmental organisations (NGOs), most of them were the ones that drive the youth empowerment in the areas they were domiciled, Nwosu said.
The reason for this is the belief Microsoft has in encouraging young people, according to Nwosu, “we have created so much new programmes to support young people and help them because we believe that the future lies with the young people.
“And we want to create a platform where they can get advice, where they can get job, where they can get all the support they needed for those who will have businesses so that they can thrive and actualise their employment hope.”
Microsoft West Africa has been playing supportive roles to the young people and entrepreneurs by way of scholarship programmes and providing them with world-class software and devices to enable them achieve their full potential, hefurther said.
The citizenship manager said Microsoft had also developed a new curriculum called “build your business curriculum,” which is a new technology to aid entrepreneurs.
“We have come to understand that it is very important for your business to be seen and it is also very important for you to run your business in a way that it does not open your pocket and in a way that it does not shut your business,” he said.
However, he revealed that the year 2014 would see Microsoft driving activities on its employability portal and would sign up new partners, creating new curriculum, and training young people, these and others would form their major focus in 2014.
