Facebook has opened NG_Hub, the first flagship community hub space in Africa, in the city of Lagos, Nigeria. The company collaborated with the Co-Creation Hub (CcHub) to achieve the milestone on Tuesday, 22 May, 2018.
The social media giant has 2.07 billion monthly active users and 1.37 billion daily active users on average worldwide and 10 million daily users and 22 million monthly active users from Nigeria.
As part of the unveiling, Facebook plans to host developers, start-ups, and the wider tech community across Nigeria in a weeklong showcase of the multi-faceted space that it hopes will stimulate community collaboration, learning, and idea exchanges.
“Technology provides expansive opportunities to engage young, creative and resourceful Nigerians, especially, in delivering solutions to challenges across communities here in Nigeria,” Ime Archibong, Facebook’s Vice President of Partnerships said at the launch on Tuesday.
He added that Facebook’s mission is to build community and bring the world closer together.
“NG_Hub provides that physical space that will serve as a centre of learning and skills development in Lagos, and I am excited about the possibilities that this will create,” he said.
Facebook also announced partnerships with seven other hubs across the country. The hubs include Ventures Platform (Abuja); nHub (Jos); Colab Hub (Kaduna); DI Hub (Kano); Start Innovation Hub (Uyo); Roar Hub (Enugu); and Ken Saro Wiwa Hub (Port Harcourt).
The selected hubs will feature dedicated Facebook spaces, where many of Facebook’s training sessions will take place, and a space where people with creative minds and developers can book to help them advance their skills.
“Our aim has always been to provide a viable platform for creatives and innovators to express their talent and create solutions to the myriad of social and economic challenges faced by countries across the continent,” Bosun Tijani, founder and CEO of CcHub said. “Partnering with Facebook on NG_Hub enables us to achieve our objectives at scale and make the desired impact in the tech ecosystem here in Lagos.”
Other events planned for the weeklong unveiling include community roundtable, DevC meetup; VC and Policy Roundtable; She Means Business and Women in Tech; SME Boost Your Business Training; Facebook and Instagram for Creatives; and Fintech SMB Training.
