The model, called Sahara v2, supports 24 African languages and recognises more than 500 African English accents. The company said the system was trained using more than 14 million audio clips collected from over 40,000 speakers across Africa and the diaspora.

For many users on the continent, voice technology usually has challenges with everyday phrases and names. Common expressions can be misheard or completely distorted, making digital assistants unreliable for basic tasks.

Developers say the problem lies in how most global systems were built. Many were trained mainly on Western speech patterns and do not align with the tonal nature, accent variety and frequent language mixing common across African countries.

With Sahara v2, Intron says it wants to close that gap by building technology that listens to how people actually speak. The recordings used to train the system were gathered across environments, including clinics, courtrooms, call centres, streets and offices.

The new model covers languages such as Hausa, Swahili, Yoruba, Igbo, Zulu, Twi, Kinyarwanda and Xhosa. In total, Intron says its systems now support 57 languages.

One of the additions is a bilingual speech recognition system that switches between English and Swahili. Intron developed the model with Kenya-based health provider Penda Health to better match how people naturally move between both languages in conversation.

The company also released a Hausa text-to-speech system designed to power local language voice assistants that can run continuously for services such as customer support.

Intron said the new system can also operate offline, allowing organisations to run voice tools locally where privacy or data security is a concern.

According to the company, Sahara v2 performs better on African speech compared with several widely used global models. These include systems developed by Google, OpenAI, Amazon Web Services and Microsoft.

Testing carried out by the company showed stronger accuracy when recognising African names, locations, numbers and sector-specific terms used in areas such as finance, healthcare and telecommunications.

Several organisations have already begun using the system in their services. These include voice banking platforms, medical documentation tools, courtroom transcription systems and automated call centre software.

Ayo Oluleye, head of Data and Insights at ARM Investments, said the model improved the accuracy of automated transcription.

“Using Intron AI models, we’ve seen significant improvement in transcription and summaries compared to models we previously explored. Their systems capture context and nuance better, leading to more accurate results.”

Sarah Morris, chief product officer at Audere, said the system also performed well during testing. “In our testing, accuracy was excellent on several Southern African accents and APIs were robust with 99%+ success rates.”

Alongside the launch, Intron also released its first Africa Voice AI report for 2026, examining how voice technology is being developed and used across the continent.

The report aims to guide governments, businesses, investors and researchers working to expand digital services that rely on speech technology.

Tobi Olatunji, chief executive of Intron, noted that the project shows what happens when technology is designed with local languages in mind.

“Sahara v2 proves that when technology is built with deep cultural and linguistic understanding, amazing things can happen, and we’re just getting started.”

The post Nigeria’s Intron Launches Sahara v2 Voice AI Supporting 24 African Languages, 500 Accents appeared first on Tech | Business | Economy.

Banks are deploying chatbots. Startups are embedding AI into products. Governments are exploring automation and data-driven decision-making.

On the surface, this looks like progress. But beneath the momentum lies a growing and under-discussed risk: AI adoption without governance.

History shows that technological advantage does not come from adoption alone. It comes from how systems are governed, trusted and sustained. In the AI era, governance is no longer a compliance exercise, it is emerging as a strategic differentiator.

Adoption Is Easy. Capability is Hard

Across the continent, many organisations celebrate AI pilots as milestones. A chatbot here. A dashboard there. A proof-of-concept shared on LinkedIn.

Yet months later, many of these initiatives quietly stall.

Not because AI failed – but because institutions treated AI as a tool rather than a capability.

True AI capability requires more than software.

It requires clear accountability for AI-assisted decisions, reliable and well-governed data, ethical safeguards and transparency, skilled people who understand both AI and context, and importantly, leadership oversight and escalation mechanisms

Without these foundations, AI remains fragmented, fragile and difficult to scale.

When AI Moves Faster Than Governance: African Lessons

Africa already has early warnings of what happens when technology outpaces governance.

In several African financial institutions, AI-powered credit-scoring and fraud-detection systems have been deployed with limited transparency.

Customers denied loans or flagged as high-risk often receive no explanation, creating mistrust and reputational strain, even when systems are technically accurate.

In higher education, some universities have rushed to deploy AI-based plagiarism detection and assessment tools without clear guidance for lecturers or students. The result has been confusion, inconsistent enforcement and, in some cases, accusations of unfair treatment.

Government experiments with AI-enabled surveillance and data analytics in parts of Africa have also raised concerns around privacy, consent and accountability – not necessarily because the technology is malicious, but because governance frameworks were unclear or absent.

These examples point to a common issue: AI systems are being introduced into high-impact environments without clear rules, ownership or safeguards.

Why AI Governance Matters More Than Ever

AI governance refers to the structures, policies and controls that ensure AI systems are ethical, explainable, secure and aligned with institutional values.

For African organisations, weak AI governance creates four major risks:

1. Reputational Risk

When AI systems produce biased, opaque or harmful outcomes, public trust erodes quickly – and that is difficult to rebuild.

2. Operational Risk

Poorly governed AI systems generate unreliable outputs. Over time, staff lose confidence in the technology, leading to abandonment rather than scale.

3. Legal and Regulatory Risk

As global and regional AI regulations evolve organisations without governance frameworks will struggle to comply retroactively – often at significant cost.

4. Strategic Dependency

Heavy reliance on external AI platforms without internal oversight risks data leakage, loss of institutional knowledge and long-term dependency on foreign systems.

Governance Does Not Kill Innovation – It Enables It

A persistent myth is that governance slows innovation.

In practice, governance enables sustainable innovation.

Well-governed AI allows organisations to:

• Experiment safely without reputational damage
• Detect errors early and correct them quickly
• Scale successful systems with confidence
• Attract partners, funders and regulators
• Build public and stakeholder trust

In the AI economy, trust is the real competitive advantage.

What Practical AI Governance Looks Like in Africa

AI governance does not require copying complex Western regulatory models. It requires context-aware design.

At a minimum, African institutions should establish:

• Clear ownership of AI systems and decisions
• Data governance standards covering privacy, quality and access
• Ethical guidelines aligned with local social and cultural realities
• Transparency mechanisms for AI-assisted decisions
• Human-in-the-loop oversight for high-risk use cases

Crucially, governance must be embedded from the start, not bolted on after problems emerge.

Why Universities Must Lead

Universities occupy a unique position in Africa’s AI ecosystem. As centres of knowledge, research and talent development, they can model responsible AI use in teaching and administration, train future professionals in ethical and accountable AI practice, support national AI policy development, and serve as neutral testing grounds for governance frameworks

If universities fail to lead, governance standards will be set externally – often without sensitivity to African realities.

The Competitive Advantage Few Are Talking About

In the coming years, African institutions will not compete solely on how quickly they adopt AI.

They will compete on trustworthiness, reliability, ethical credibility, and institutional maturity. Organisations that invest in AI governance early will scale faster, recover from failure more easily and shape policy conversations rather than react to them.

Those that ignore governance may move fast – but will break quietly.

In a nutshell: Govern First, Then Scale

Africa does not need to choose between innovation and responsibility. It needs to recognise that AI governance is innovation infrastructure. The future will belong not to those who adopt AI first, but to those who govern it best.

The post AI Governance is the Next Competitive Advantage Africa Cannot Ignore appeared first on Tech | Business | Economy.

Only about 10% of roles in the sector are fully resistant to automation. This change is already influencing how startups and freelancers work with technology today.

I’ve spent months talking to founders, freelancers and labour specialists across the continent. What’s obvious is that this change is not hypothetical but real, it’s now, and it’s enhancing how entrepreneurs think about labour, expense and productivity.

The Outsourcing World in Africa

For over a decade, African countries have built thriving outsourcing sectors. Nations such as South Africa, Egypt, Kenya, Nigeria and Ghana host business process outsourcing (BPO) and IT services that serve clients worldwide. 

These industries employ millions and are expected to generate tens of billions of dollars by the end of the decade.

But this model is evolving.

Where once the biggest business challenge was reducing labour expenses to compete with India or the Philippines, now founders ask: “Can a subscription to a suite of tools do the work of a junior employee?”

Outsourcing was built on the premise that labour could be bought cheaply abroad. That premise is under pressure.

What it Means to Call AI an “Affordable Employee”

I’m going to use the term “affordable employee” deliberately. I’m not talking about futuristic humanoid robots. I’m talking about software and automation systems that can perform tasks humans traditionally did, reliably, quickly and at low cost.

These systems can:

• Draft text, emails and reports.
• Create and optimise digital content.
• Generate slides, summaries and data insights.
• Help with coding and debugging.
• Answer customer questions and route support tickets.

You might already be using these to draft content, automate replies or pull insights from spreadsheets.

That’s what we mean by an “affordable employee”: a tool that can do work for you, now, without the recurrent cost of a full-time staff member.

Where This is Already Happening Today

Many African freelancers and founders are not waiting for the future. They are using these systems as daily tools.

Data shows that up to 64% of African workers used AI tools last year, and a large majority say these tools improved their work and productivity.

Freelancers in Lagos and Nairobi tell me they use these systems to speed up work that once took hours:

• Drafting articles, proposals and business plans.
• Managing customer interactions.
• Cleaning and analysing data.
• Generating code snippets and automating testing.

Startups usually lack deep pockets. They cannot afford to outsource multiple tasks abroad. They must be lean, and that leanness is powered by software.

Can Software Really Replace Human Tasks?

Look at the outsourcing sector’s own data. By 2030, research shows:

• Up to 40% of tasks in Africa’s tech outsourcing sector could be automated.
• Only 10% of roles are currently fully resistant to automation.

This doesn’t mean robots will take every job. It means that four in ten discrete tasks, like answering routine customer questions, entering data or creating templated documents, are ripe for software replacement.

For workers in entry-level roles, especially women and young people, this is real and present. Studies reveal that women’s tasks are on average 10% more vulnerable to automation than those of men because of occupational patterns.

For founders in Africa’s AI sector, however, this brings out a dual truth.

One side is disruption.

The other is opportunity.

What Machines Handle Better (Today)

Software is already better than humans at:

• Repetitive tasks: filling forms, generating templated responses, sorting data.
• High-volume content production: bulk drafting and summarising.
• Rule-based work: routing emails, notifications, reminders.
• Pattern detection at scale: simple analytics without deep manual effort.

This is why many African startups integrate automation into customer experience, project management and internal operations.

It saves time. It reduces errors. It costs a fraction of a junior salary. That’s why many founders refer to these tools as digital assistants, workflow partners, or even part-time employees.

Where Humans are Still Important (And Will for Years)

There are tasks that software cannot replace:

• Complex judgement: strategy, negotiation, nuanced decision-making.
• Emotional intelligence: handling delicate customer issues, team leadership.
• Cultural nuance and local context: interpreting local languages, customs, and social cues.

These are the areas where founders and workers still take over, and will do for the foreseeable future.

Software can suggest a response, but it still takes a human to choose wisely.

Leveraging the Shift Without Losing Out

Here’s the pragmatic view I’ve formed:

• Software is not a replacement for all labour, but it can replace many tasks human workers once handled manually.
• For lean startups, embracing these tools is essential for growth.
• For freelancers, mastering automation tools is becoming a competitive advantage.
• For the wider workforce, upskilling is essential. Governments and companies across Africa are investing in training programmes to help workers move into higher-value roles as automation grows.

These are not distant issues. They are happening now.

A New Definition of the “Affordable Employee”

We shouldn’t be asking whether software can fully replace a human. It’s whether it can perform tasks at a fraction of the cost, with high reliability, and integrate into everyday workflows.

For many African startups and freelancers, the answer today is yes, for specific tasks, at least.

We are witnessing a transition where tech is an operational partner. It is how work is getting done in Lagos, Johannesburg, Nairobi and Accra, among other cities.

And it is challenging what “employment” and “labour” mean in the 2020s.

The post Can Al Become Africa’s Most Affordable Employee? appeared first on Tech | Business | Economy.

But then, even with that growth, Africa as a whole holds less than 1% of global data-centre capacity. 

It’s a little absurd and extremely strategic. Because when we look closer at the data-centre boom, we are left wondering who owns and controls Africa’s data.

The Global Drive for Digital Sovereignty

To understand what’s happening here, you need to see what’s happening globally. Across the world, countries are waking up to the idea that data is not just a commodity but an infrastructure. Think Europe’s Gaia-X initiative, India’s data localisation laws, or Gulf states building sovereign AI hubs.

Why? Because data stored domestically means more control over privacy, over regulation, and over who profits. There’s also the geopolitical angle, where data centres are becoming as strategically important as ports, roads or energy grids.

In Africa, this aligns neatly with governments’ vision to assert control, retain value, and build digital resilience.

Why African Governments Are Focusing on Local Cloud

There are four key motives:

1. Economic Retention
   If data stays in-country, so do a lot of the dollars that would otherwise pay foreign providers. Governments see data centres as a way to repatriate value, spur job creation, and strengthen their digital economies.
2. Security
   Local hosting mitigates dependence on foreign infrastructure, reducing exposure to geopolitical risk and foreign surveillance. For some governments, this is not just desirable but vital for national security.
3. Compliance Pressure
   With African nations enhancing regulation of fintech, health, identity, and public records systems, having data remain within national borders gives regulators oversight. Data localisation policies are being mooted or enforced in several countries to ensure “sensitive data” stays local.
4. Leverage Against Hyperscalers
   Domestic cloud infrastructure strengthens the hand of regulators and governments in negotiating with global tech giants. Rather than being entirely dependent on foreign cloud providers, African nations can demand better terms, or even build their own sovereign clouds.

The Reality on the Ground: Africa’s Cloud Infrastructure

• Out of 211 active data centres in Africa, South Africa is leading with 49. Kenya has 18; Nigeria 16; Egypt 14. 
• According to a recent report, Africa’s data-centre market is projected to nearly double to $6.81 billion by 2030.
• These facilities aren’t just for storage: newer builds are being designed for AI workloads, using advanced cooling systems like liquid cooling. 
• Power is a real issue. But some players are already building renewable-powered data centres. For instance, Teraco (a Digital Realty company) is working on a 120 MW solar PV facility to support its South African data centres. 
• There are still infrastructure risks, during the submarine cable cuts off West Africa in March 2024, local data centres like Open Access Data Centres (OADC) Lagos helped sustain connectivity and critical services. 

Protection vs Progress: The Two Sides of Sovereignty

At its core, the controversy boils down to two competing visions:

Protection

• Local cloud gives governments custody: less reliance on foreign data centres, fewer risks of foreign interference.
• It’s an insurance policy against geopolitical shocks or cyber-espionage.
• In storing and processing data locally, states can better regulate crucial systems (payments, identity, health).

Progress

• Local cloud can boost innovation: by investing in infrastructure, governments can bring about new layers of the digital economy; AI, fintech, civic tech.
• Domestic cloud providers build a local value chain: engineers, operators, data engineers, system integrators.
• It lowers latency for businesses, enabling real-time services that matter to African markets.
• For SMEs, sovereignty doesn’t just mean control, it means opportunity: to build faster, cheaper, and more native digital products.

But there is a risk: if regulation gets too protectionist, it could limit competition. Cloud costs might go up, innovation might slow, and smaller players could be shut out if the entry barrier is too high.

What Sovereign Cloud Means for African SMEs

Here’s where it gets real for the small and medium businesses, the engine of most African economies.

1. Costs
   Local hosting may raise or lower costs, depending on how infrastructure and competition evolve. SMEs could face higher bills if global providers are forced to build more local capacity. But the upside is predictable pricing, stable peering, and potentially lower latency costs.
2. Performance
   If data is hosted nearer to users, services improve. Faster response times, better uptime, and lower latency make a huge difference, especially for real-time applications in fintech or logistics.
3. Compliance
   New data localisation laws may require businesses to store certain customer data locally, or to follow stricter security protocols. SMEs will need to understand and plan for these, or risk hefty penalties.
4. Differential Advantage
   SMEs that adopt local cloud early could gain a competitive edge. They can build cloud-native apps optimised for African markets, leverage local data for AI, and use sovereign infrastructure to appeal to customers who prioritise data protection and residency.

Risks & Challenges to Watch

It’s not all sunshine:

• High Barriers to Entry: The cost of building and running data centres is large, meaning only well-funded companies or governments may lead.
• Fragmentation: If each country builds its own cloud regime, we risk a patchwork of regulations that fragment rather than unify the African digital market.
• Dominance Risk: Without enough competition, a few big domestic players could dominate, reducing innovation.
• Talent Shortage: Skilled cloud and data-centre engineers are limited; infrastructure may grow faster than the workforce.
• Power Constraints: Reliable electricity is a major issue in many regions; sustainable, green energy solutions are not yet widespread.

The Opportunity: Sovereign, Smart, and Scalable

If done right, sovereign cloud is a strategic lever for Africa’s digital growth.

• We can build regional cloud federations, where countries pool data-centre resources, enabling scale without duplication.
• Public–private partnerships can boost growth: governments providing land or incentives, private firms building capacity, SMEs using it.
• African cloud providers can compete internationally, carving out a niche in AI and edge computing.
• Importantly, SMEs that embrace this infrastructure early could build next-generation services grounded in African data, with local trust, compliance, and speed.

Macro Outlook (2025–2030)

Over the next five years, this is what I expect:

• Cloud adoption in Africa will surge, driven by SMEs, governments, fintechs, and AI startups.
• Data-centre investments will intensify, especially in under-served regions, not just in South Africa or Kenya, but also in West and East Africa.
• Sovereign clouds will emerge not just in national capitals, but at the regional level, backed by both private and development-finance capital (e.g., IFC backing in Raxio).
• Companies that lean into local cloud now will be well-placed to lead in AI, digital public infrastructure, and next-gen fintech.

At the end of the day, local cloud isn’t just about where data rests but who builds Africa’s digital sector sustainably, who controls its value, and who benefits from its growth.

Sovereignty is not inherently protectionist, it’s a foundation for progress. But unless we strike the right balance between regulation, competition, investment, and innovation, it could become an obstacle instead.

So I ask: should African countries double down on sovereign infrastructure in the name of control, or lean into hybrid models that prioritise speed, cost, and global competitiveness?

Because how we decide today will affect Africa’s digital economy of tomorrow.

The post Local Cloud and National Sovereignty: What It Really Means for African SMEs appeared first on Tech | Business | Economy.

The partnership aims to modernise how students learn and how teachers prepare lessons, starting with a large-scale pilot in Rwanda.

The programme builds on an earlier rollout among ALX learners across the continent. That first test phase recorded over 1,100 conversations and more than 4,000 interactions in just two days, a sign of early appetite for the tool. 

The partners are now changing their attention to Rwanda’s public education system, where thousands of teachers, lecturers and selected civil servants will be provided with digital training designed to strengthen lesson planning, stimulate curiosity and raise teaching standards.

The core idea is instead of simply giving answers, Chidi guides users through questions that encourage deeper thinking. Teachers can use it to refine lesson structure or spark new classroom discussions, while students gain round-the-clock access to support that helps them reason through problems at their own pace.

Under the second phase of the programme, up to 2,000 Rwandan educators will take part in ALX’s AI Career Essentials training. Participants will receive hands-on exposure to tools provided through Anthropic’s Claude platform, along with a year’s access to Claude Pro, Claude Code and additional education-focused features once they complete the pilot.

A joint working group drawn from ALX, Anthropic and Rwanda’s government will track the outcomes. Their findings will help build Rwanda’s national direction on technology in education, including the development of future tools such as Chidi for Schools and potential models suited to African languages.

Beyond the classroom impact, the collaboration aims to strengthen Rwanda’s long-term technical readiness. Several ministries are providing policy support, access to institutions and a framework to scale the initiative without taking on financial obligations.

The partners view this as a model that can be adopted by neighbouring countries. Rwanda is effectively serving as the first testing ground for a system designed to support both teaching and public-sector work, while enabling Africa to develop solutions that match global standards.

Fred Swaniker, ALX’s founder and CEO, noted the vision of the programme. 

“This collaboration marks a bold step in redefining how African talent learns, works, and leads in the age of AI,” he said. “Through our partnership with Anthropic and the Government of Rwanda, we are ensuring that Africa’s youth are not just consumers of AI, but creators, shaping the innovations that will define the global economy.”

The initiative supports Rwanda’s goal of building a workforce prepared for future industries, while giving African students and educators access to tools typically concentrated in global tech hubs. 

The partners intend to expand the programme once the pilot concludes and the impact becomes measurable.

The post ALX, Anthropic Partner Rwanda to Deploy Chidi AI Learning Tool, Boosting Education Across Africa appeared first on Tech | Business | Economy.

In partnership with the AI giant, the University of Lagos (UNILAG) hosted the continent’s first OpenAI Academy, aimed at enhancing AI literacy and empowering African innovators. 

The programme took place from October 16–17, 2025, as part of the University’s 5th International Week themed “Equitable Partnerships and the Future of AI in Africa.” Students, faculty members, and tech leaders were present to explore the opportunities and ethical challenges of AI on the continent.

Speaking during the interactive session at UNILAG, Emmanuel Lubanzadio, Africa lead at OpenAI, said: “This collaboration is important. There’s a sense of urgency to act, not tomorrow, not yesterday, but now.”

The initiative was led by UNILAG’s Office of International Relations, Partnerships and Prospects (IRPP) in collaboration with the African Engineering and Technology Network (Afretec). 

It aligns with both the African Union’s Digital Transformation Strategy (2020–2030) and Nigeria’s National Digital Economy Policy, which prioritise inclusive digital skills and ethical innovation.

Professor Ismail Ibraheem, director of IRPP, said the partnership reveals the University’s global outlook and commitment to locally relevant impact.

“At the University of Lagos, we are intentional about preparing our students to solve the unique needs of our continent through global partnerships. We prioritise inclusive access to digital skills, research, and learning opportunities to empower future innovators. Our goal is to help them approach AI with contextual understanding and ethical responsibility,” he stated.

The OpenAI Academy is a core part of OpenAI’s education mission launched in 2024 to make AI literacy accessible to everyone through free workshops, hands-on sessions, and community-driven learning. 

The Lagos edition, its debut in Africa, featured practical sessions on machine learning, generative AI, AI ethics, responsible innovation, and real-world applications for African contexts.

Lubanzadio described the launch as both a milestone and a call to action for inclusive development.

“Africa is home to some of the world’s most creative, resourceful problem-solvers. We want to make sure they have the tools to turn their ideas into impact. 

“Launching the OpenAI Academy in Lagos is a major step toward supporting the next generation of African innovators, giving them practical skills, connecting them to a global community, and helping ensure that AI reflects African voices and priorities,” he said.

Lubanzadio noted that while UNILAG is the first partner in Nigeria, OpenAI has a bigger goal to expand AI access and literacy across Africa. “You have to start somewhere. Our vision is that AI becomes as accessible as electricity, something everyone can use. But access or AI literacy is not one company’s responsibility. It has to be a multi-stakeholder approach.”

The sessions engaged lecturers and students on AI’s role in education, innovation, and societal development. Conversations ranged from ethical use in academic work to AI’s potential in agriculture, healthcare, and local language preservation.

Lubanzadio noted examples such as Digital Green, which uses OpenAI tools to help farmers identify crop diseases, and Jacaranda Health, which leverages chatbots to assist expectant mothers in Kenya. “It shows how AI can be embedded in essential sectors like health and agriculture,” he explained.

He maintained that the focus should be on balance and human adaptability. “Technology has always disrupted, but humans adapt. We’ve survived every wave of change, AI is no different.”

On the issue of African language representation in AI models, Lubanzadio acknowledged the gap but noted progress. “We recently closed a partnership with Orange, which operates in 18 African countries. We’ve made our open-weight model available for African languages, starting with Wolof. It’s not enough, but it’s a start,” he said.

He further encouraged institutions to engage with OpenAI’s Open Academy, a free learning platform offering AI education resources to students and professionals globally.

Highlighting privacy, data use, and ethics, Lubanzadio clarified that OpenAI allows users to control whether their data is used for model training and complies with data protection laws in every jurisdiction.

He added that responsible AI must be pursued collectively, by policymakers, educators, and the private sector. “AI is here to stay, not as an imposition, but as an opportunity. Everyone has the choice to use it or not, but we must prepare for its presence,” he said.

The Lagos event, which coincided with OpenAI’s rollout of ChatGPT Go, a new, lower-cost subscription tier available in Nigeria and 56 other countries, stresses a growing focus on Africa as an important part of the global AI conversation.

Lubanzadio concluded that this collaboration is “only the beginning” of OpenAI’s long-term engagement with African academia.

“This partnership with UNILAG is not ending today, it’s the start of something bigger. The fact that we’re having this conversation is progress. Let’s build on it,” he said.

The post OpenAI Launches Africa’s First AI Academy in Lagos, Calls for Multi-Stakeholder Collaboration appeared first on Tech | Business | Economy.

Yet in Sub-Saharan Africa, where student–teacher ratios can reach 50:1 and many children still lack access to quality learning resources, the need for innovative solutions is urgent.

What excites me most about AI in African education is the potential to address persistent inequalities in ways that haven’t been possible before.

For too long, students in under-resourced schools have had fewer opportunities simply because their teachers lacked access to support, materials, or professional development. AI can change this dynamic fundamentally, making world-class support accessible even in the most remote classrooms.

Across Africa, AI has the potential to drive change in schools, but only if it is shaped to fit the realities of African classrooms, rather than forcing classrooms to adapt to the technology.

The real promise lies in AI’s power to personalise learning at scale, helping teachers meet the needs of every student in classes that are often large and diverse.

When AI is guided by local priorities, cultural context and teacher expertise, it stops being a futuristic add-on and becomes a practical ally.

The challenges

Three obstacles stand out most clearly from our work across the continent.

Connectivity remains a major challenge across much of Sub-Saharan Africa. Teachers want to use AI tools but can’t always access them when they need them most. That means that classroom tools need to have offline capabilities, such as pre-generated material, and tools need to work effectively with intermittent internet connections.

Language barriers present another complexity. While many teachers are comfortable teaching in English, this is not their students mother tongue and they often need to explain concepts in local languages. We’re working on multilingual capabilities through researching the African language capabilities of leading AI chatbots, but this remains an ongoing challenge that requires careful cultural and linguistic adaptation.

Perhaps most importantly, we’re hearing that teachers want more time to explore and experiment with AI tools. The demanding nature of teaching, particularly in resource-constrained environments, means that many educators struggle to find space for learning new technologies.

If adoption is to succeed, professional development and time allowances must be built into the process from the start.

Making AI familiar

The beauty of AI integration in education lies not in expensive hardware or complex software, but in leveraging the tools teachers already have access to. Through our work across Sub-Saharan Africa, we’ve discovered that the most practical entry point is often the smartphone in a teacher’s pocket.

Our WhatsApp teacher support AI chatbot project in South Africa demonstrates this perfectly. Teachers are already comfortable with WhatsApp; they understand how to send messages, and they can access support instantly without needing new apps or training on unfamiliar platforms.

When a teacher in a rural classroom needs help differentiating a lesson for mixed-ability learners or wants quick feedback on a lesson plan, they can simply message our AI assistant and receive immediate, contextualised support.

This approach works because it builds on existing digital behaviours rather than requiring teachers to learn entirely new systems. We’ve found that teachers who start with familiar interfaces, such as WhatsApp, develop confidence that naturally extends to other AI tools over time.

Empowering educators as architects of learning

At Cambridge, we believe the power of AI in education lies in a human-centred approach that starts “where teachers are,” respecting their agency and empowering them as architects of learning, not just consumers of technology.

It is this human-centred approach that is key to helping students navigate change and use technology effectively. A recent Cambridge report, ‘Preparing learners to thrive in a changing world’, which captures the views of nearly 7,000 teachers and students across 150 countries, shows that while technology is widely embraced to support teaching and learning, over a third of teachers surveyed (34%) selected over-reliance on technology as the greatest challenge that technology might pose in preparing students for the future. In this age of AI, we believe that it is essential for students to develop a solid foundation of subject knowledge to help them interpret information critically and effectively.

This insight is one reason we are especially focused on helping African education systems avoid the challenges other regions have faced with technology adoption. Our approach emphasises teacher training, infrastructure readiness, and gradual implementation, rather than rapid, large-scale deployments that too often fail to deliver their intended outcomes.

We’ve structured our Getting Started with AI in the Classroom guide around practical scenarios that teachers encounter daily and our professional development programme for STEM teachers exemplifies this philosophy too.

Rather than starting with “here’s how to use this AI tool”, we begin with “here’s how AI can solve real problems you face in your classroom”. Teachers learn to evaluate AI outputs critically, asking questions like: Does this explanation match my students’ cultural context? Are there biases in the examples provided? How can I adapt this suggestion to fit my teaching style?

A future built for teachers

Teachers in Africa are incredibly creative and adaptable, and we’re starting to see them use AI in ways that we never anticipated.

They’re adapting tools to local languages, incorporating traditional knowledge systems, and developing approaches that reflect their deep understanding of their communities.

This innovation from the ground up suggests that AI integration in African classrooms will look quite different from implementations in other parts of the world, and that’s exactly as it should be.

Our vision is AI that helps preserve what’s best about African education while addressing its most persistent challenges. This means supporting the strong relationships between teachers and students, the collaborative learning approaches, and the community connections that characterise many African classrooms, while using AI to reduce administrative burden, enhance personalisation and provide teachers with better support.

To make this vision real, three things are essential: deeper investment in teacher training, stronger collaboration with ministries and local tech innovators, and sustained infrastructure development to bridge connectivity gaps.

Ultimately, I’m excited about a future where every African student has access to excellent education, supported by teachers who feel confident, well-resourced and professionally fulfilled. AI won’t create this future by itself, but it can be a powerful tool in the hands of dedicated educators working toward that goal.

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A new report by Column and Smarketers Hub reveals that while 71% of marketing teams across Africa already use AI tools regularly, only 26% have received formal training. 

Hence, Marketers are saving up to 10 hours a week with tools like ChatGPT, yet stumbling when it comes to strategy, automation, and data analysis.

The survey of 100 marketers, 90 based in Nigeria and others from Ghana, Zambia, and beyond, reveals that AI has become a fixture in everyday marketing. 95% of respondents use ChatGPT, 55% rely on Gemini, and 42% on Claude. Smaller groups use tools like Copy.ai (23%), Jasper (9%), DALL·E (11%), and Midjourney (4%). 

For 82% of marketers, content creation is the top use case, followed by ad copy (25%), audience research (22%), SEO (18%), and reporting (14%).

And the benefits are undeniable. 41% of respondents reported saving 4 to 6 hours per week, while 18% said AI gives them back more than 10 hours. Freelancers, who made up 15% of respondents, described AI as a lifeline, filling the gaps in teams too small to meet deadlines alone. 

One respondent said: “AI gives me a good structure. I then put my voice in the work before sending it out.”

But then, 57% described AI’s impact as very positive, 30% as somewhat positive, while only 8% held a neutral or negative view. When asked what still gets done manually, the answers were: “Everything.” and “99% of my work is content writing. So nothing I do is completely automated. AI-assisted? Yes. But it’s all manual.”

The problem isn’t desire but direction. 46% of marketers feel least confident in technical SEO, 40% in workflow integration, 39% in data analysis, and 38% in automation. 

Limitations are familiar, as 31% don’t know where to start, 26% lack time, 19% cite poor training resources, and 18% blame tight budgets. Despite these challenges, companies are offering little help, most respondents said they had received no AI-related training in the past year.

Aisha Owolabi, founder of Smarketers Hub, said “This report is a wake-up call for marketing leaders in Africa: AI isn’t just a future trend, it’s already reshaping how teams work. The data makes it clear — marketers are eager and experimenting, but without structured support they’ll remain stuck at the basics.”

Mo Shehu, CEO of Column, reiterated the urgency: “AI is reshaping how African marketers work. Teams are experimenting even without much formal training and already saving hours each week. The challenge for CMOs is turning those small wins into a structured, team-wide advantage.”

The report classifies teams into three categories. Beginners tinker without guidance, producing scattered results. Intermediates experiment more actively, especially in content and SEO, but lack standards and consistency. 

Only a handful of advanced teams embed AI fully into workflows, supported by playbooks, ongoing training, and ROI tracking; most African marketers today sit at the beginner or early-intermediate stage.

Looking deeper into the demographics, we see 88% of respondents were junior or mid-level marketers, meaning the future of AI in African marketing rests on early-career professionals with limited resources. For them, structured mentorship, localised training, and practical playbooks are highly important.

The report further forecasts three changes in the next 12 months:

1. Tool diversification: As Marketers get more confidence, they will start moving beyond ChatGPT into tools like Gemini, Claude, Canva AI, and Perplexity.
2. Formal training: companies embedding AI modules into onboarding, workshops, and performance reviews.
3. Team-level alignment: AI shifting from individual experimentation to coordinated campaign planning, reporting, and strategy.

But risks are increasing too. Regulation of AI use, particularly around data, content transparency, and ethics, is expected to tighten, both from governments and companies. The report warns CMOs to establish internal codes of conduct now, before misuse catches up with them.

“African CMOs have a chance to lead, not follow,” Owolabi said. For now, the continent’s marketers are eager but underprepared, productive but undertrained, saving hours every week but losing years of competitive advantage without the structure to take AI beyond the basics.

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Across the continent, founders are building products at record pace, but too many fail to scale. While African startups raised $2.6 billion in venture capital in 2024, a decline from 2023, poor user experience and weak product design have been among the top reasons why early-stage ventures collapse. 

It’s no coincidence that between 2022 and 2024, design thinking adoption among African startups rose by over 30%. Though uneven across sectors, this shows that technology without human-centred design rarely survives, leaving scale and retention elusive.

This is where Lucky Ekezie steps in. A product designer, mentor, and AI advocate, Lucky has made it his mission to build systems that don’t just look good but actually work for people, driving adoption, retention and measurable growth.

He transforms scarcity into opportunity, creating solutions that make startups investor-ready, user-ready, and scalable.

“Design isn’t just about interfaces,” he says. “It’s about people, resilience, and building systems that help others thrive.”

From his early days in Umuahia, where he built toys from scraps of wood and tin, to designing Bosscab, a ride-hailing platform for African cities, and Syncventory, an inventory management tool for SMEs, Lucky has turned curiosity into impact. 

Beyond products, he mentors emerging designers, develops AI-driven productivity solutions, and creates frameworks that help startups survive and scale where others fail.

Reimagining Tools for African Realities

In 2020, when the pandemic forced businesses across Africa to rethink operations, Lucky joined Nugi Technologies. There, he helped build Bosscab and Syncventory, platforms designed with Africa in mind, not Silicon Valley copies; they were tailored to local infrastructure, culture and user behaviour.

At Nugi, he mentored younger designers, embedding curiosity and user-first thinking into the culture. That kind of mindset shift is exactly what Africa’s growing ecosystem needs. 

In Q1 2025 alone, 83% of AI startup funding in Africa was concentrated in Nigeria, Kenya, South Africa, and Egypt, but funding without solid design foundations risks being wasted. Lucky’s work shows how product design can bridge that gap.

Lessons From Failure

Lucky’s resilience is built on hard lessons. His first startup, Gianx, shut down due to funding challenges, but it became his training ground in business structure and timing. 

Those lessons later informed his contributions to My Skool Tool, a school management platform founded by ThankGod Maduka Kalu. Today, it serves over 10,000 students, a direct result of design choices that prioritised usability and scalability.

Where many see failure as an end, Lucky treats it as raw material, the same way he once treated tin containers and wood scraps as a child.

A Mentor Building People, Not Just Products

By 2023, Lucky had expanded his mission beyond building products to building people. At LM Tech Hub, he mentored aspiring African designers trying to break into tech. Later, at CareerFoundry, he began teaching design thinking and product development to learners worldwide.

The results are measurable. Over 80% of CareerFoundry graduates secure jobs within six months, with mentorship ranked as one of the strongest success factors. For Lucky, it’s more than statistics. Mentorship is about instilling confidence. 

For a continent where over 5,000 young professionals transitioned into tech careers through incubators since 2020, his work sits inside a bigger story, where Africa’s design uprising is being shaped by teachers, not just by tools.

At the Edge of Africa’s AI Boom

Africa’s AI market is projected to hit $4.51 billion in 2025, growing at more than 26% annually. By 2030, AI could contribute up to $2.9 trillion to Africa’s GDP. These are huge figures, but they mean little if Africans are not building solutions for themselves. Lucky is already positioning to ensure they do.

In 2025, he delivered a talk at Tech Flock titled “From Sci-Fi to Reality: The Evolution of Artificial Intelligence”. In it, he charted AI’s history, human impact, and opportunities for Africa. Today, he is developing an AI-driven productivity platform aimed at helping both individuals and enterprises work smarter.

While global companies like Microsoft and G42 are pouring $1 billion into AI infrastructure in East Africa, Lucky represents the individual innovators ensuring that Africa doesn’t just consume these technologies but also creates homegrown solutions.

Why Lucky’s Story Matters

Nigeria’s tech ecosystem is one of the largest in Africa, accounting for over 25% of the continent’s venture capital inflow. Lagos is a top innovation hub, but behind the statistics are challenges, including unreliable infrastructure, high failure rates, and limited mentorship pipelines. People like Lucky Ekezie are shifting that narrative.

From sketching human figures on a blackboard as a child in Umuahia to building products, mentoring global learners, and pushing Africa’s AI story forward, Lucky Ekezie embodies the resilience and creativity that African innovation demands. His career is proof that design is not secondary to technology, it is its beating heart.

And perhaps that is the real problem he is solving: proving that in Africa, technology will not thrive without design rooted in people, culture, and context.

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As local and international guests descended on the nation’s commercial and innovation capital for a potentially future-defining two days, anticipation was high for the conversations shaping Africa’s digital trajectory.

From Babajide Sanwo-Olu, Governor of Lagos State, the message on Wednesday was emphatic: Lagos is ‘a launchpad for Africa’s tomorrow’ – ready to propel Nigeria’s quest for a data-driven government and digitally empowered population. 

Held under the patronage of Bola Ahmed Tinubu GCFR, President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, GITEX NIGERIA takes place across Abuja and Lagos from 1-4 September.

Supported by the Federal Ministry of Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy with the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), the event is endorsed by Lagos State Government and organised by KAOUN International, global producer of GITEX events.

Elaborating on Lagos’s digital economy leadership credentials and quest to harness technological capabilities for the betterment of regional society, H.E. Babajide Sanwo-Olu stated: “Lagos is not just a city for today – it is Africa’s innovation nerve centre and a launchpad for Africa’s tomorrow. At the heart of our efforts to unlock digital transformation possibilities is an unshakeable belief that governance in the 21st century must be digital, inclusive, and data-driven.

“As Peter Drucker once said, ‘The best way to predict the future is to create it’. Here in Lagos, we are creating that future, building a data-driven government where policy decisions respond to real-time insights and inclusive connectivity empowers every citizen in one of the world’s most vibrant tech ecosystems.”

Over two action-packed days, Nigeria’s commercial capital and innovation hub hosts dual showcases across the city: the GITEX NIGERIA Tech Expo & Future Economy Conference at the Eko Hotel Convention Centre, and the GITEX NIGERIA Startup Festival at the Landmark Centre.

Together, these platforms spotlight the immense digital potential of Lagos and the nation – enabling non-tech sectors to accelerate digitalisation roadmaps through enterprise-grade solutions while highlighting a burgeoning startup ecosystem, strong investor confidence, and valuable public-private partnership opportunities. 

Addressing GITEX NIGERIA attendees, Hon. Minister Bosun Tijani, Nigeria’s Minister of Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy, emphasised the essential nature of sustained digital economy development, insisting: “The digital economy is not just about mobile apps or platforms; it is about technical efficiency and delivering productivity gains that transform entire sectors. This is why His Excellency President Bola Tinubu GCFR has placed the digital economy at the heart of the Renewed Hope agenda.

“His vision is very clear – that technology must not only grow GDP but also expand opportunities, reduce inequality, and create shared prosperity for all Nigerians. Under the President’s leadership, Nigeria has embraced the digital economy as a key driver of inclusive growth. We are not building just for elites; we are building for every Nigerian.”

Between 2019 and 2024, Lagos attracted over US$6 billion in foreign tech investment, cementing its position as the epicentre of Africa’s digital growth. The state today hosts hyperscale data centres and extensive fibre connectivity, accounting for more than 70% of Nigeria’s total tech inflows. Already Nigeria’s undisputed innovation hub, Lagos is also home to 23 of the country’s 28 fastest-growing companies, according to the Financial Times. 

Reflecting on the significance of GITEX NIGERIA making its way to Lagos, Kashifu Abdullahi, Director-General/CEO of NITDA, said: “The energy is palpable, and the potential is boundless. Nigeria and Lagos in particular are a crucible of innovation, where raw talent meets the unshakeable will to succeed, a factory of unicorns.

“Lagos is the place where people use talent and come up with solutions without infrastructure. In other places, they use capital infrastructure to fuel innovation, while here, we use our resilience. Because we have no options, and we need to create the solutions. We are ready for it. As a nation, our vision is clear.”

GITEX NIGERIA is West Africa’s largest gathering of technology visionaries, industry leaders, and decision-makers overseeing digital transformation of non-tech sectors. The event also presents Nigeria’s largest and most globally diverse investor programme, facilitating concierge meetings between startups, investors, corporates, industry leaders, and prospective partners.

Discussing the unique value proposition that Lagos presents businesses, Trixie LohMirmand, EVP of Dubai World Trade Centre and CEO of KAOUN International, organisers of GITEX NIGERIA, said: “Lagos is a mega high-speed technology testbed that is dense, diverse, and demanding, where SMEs, startups, and entrepreneurs succeed not by conventional rules but by distinctiveness and necessity-driven innovation.

“Rising above power outages, currency fluctuations, and maturing infrastructure, they scale faster and endure longer. Survive and thrive in Lagos, and your products and solutions can compete and flourish anywhere around the world.”

The event runs with support from partners AWS, Cisco, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), Kaspersky, Federal Ministry of Art, Culture, Tourism and the Creative Economy; Federal Ministry of Youth Development, and Space42. 

For more information, news and updates on GITEX NIGERIA, please visit the website.

The post ‘Launchpad for Africa’s tomorrow’ – Lagos Ready to Lead Regional Digital Transformation Revolution, says Babajide Sanwo-Olu at GITEX NIGERIA appeared first on Tech | Business | Economy.