Ben Uzor Jr
There are burly indications that the private sector is
showing keen interest in federal government’s $15 million Information
Technology (IT) innovation fund primarily focused on strengthening local
content development in Nigeria’s burgeoning Information Communications
Technology (ICT) landscape. The IT innovation fund is one in a series of
government interventions aimed strategically at developing IT entrepreneurs to
build successful companies that would support critical sectors of the Nigerian
economy. Besides, the Ministry has already secured $3.5 million Seed Capital
secured from National Information Technology Development Fund (NITDEF) but
still requires contributions from private sector to assist incubates become
commercially successful. A source at the ministry of communications technology
told Benuzorreports, “We have seen a lot of interest in government’s IT fund.
“Few weeks ago, the ministry placed an advert for fund
managers that would manage the IT innovation fund. The ministry has received
positive responses from the private sector and is working assiduously to
finalise and put all the modalities in place for the IT innovation fund to
take-off. The fund will be managed by the private sector.” The source told
Benuzorreport that the innovation fund would help deepen innovation in the ICT
industry, further adding that the fund presents viable opportunities to
financially empower young Nigerians. “I think the fund is a good starting
point. The private sector would be really interested in such an initiative”,
Sola Bickersteth, managing director, OneNetwork, an agent manager for mobile
payment told Benuzorreport. “I have no doubt that the IT fund will definitely
spur innovation and creativity if people with integrity manage the funds well”
he said.
A number of initiatives by government have emerged to
harness local talent and develop a vibrant software and application development
ecosystem. The ministry launched a Technology launch pad initiative in December
geared towards developing the capacities of indigenous software developers in
Nigeria. The initiative will enhance local content growth and deepen technology
skills in the IT industry. The programme will provide mentorship and finance to
incubates and will create 10 successful software businesses before the end of
2013 that will focus on providing industry solutions for Banks and Oil and Gas
in the first instance. This will increase to 30 successful software businesses
by 2015 that will create solutions for other sectors of the Nigerian economy.
Mobile apps, a money-spinner for many developed economies is a critical area of
expected growth in Nigeria over the next few years, analysts have said.
Nigeria's over 101 million SIM cards, and a global app
market expected to reach $25 billion by 2015 according to research firm,
Markets and Markets, provides a mouth-watering opportunity for local app
developers to make large scale profits. In view of this, the CommTech Ministry
has concluded the development of ICT incubation centres to facilitate software
applications development in Nigeria. It was gathered that two centres will be
up and running before end of January 2013 in Lagos and Cross River state. The
goal is for the incubation centres to create 25 successful ICT businesses by 2015.
A new report said that with app developers earning 50 percent to 70 percent of
the retail price via the app-store platform of Apple, Google, Nokia, Research
in Motion (RIM) and Windows, incubating young developer’s innovation could have
significant multiplier effect domestically.
“Nigeria has a thriving and growing mobile software
start-up”, Teemu Kiijari, head of ecosystem and developer experience at Nokia
West Africa, said. The Institute of Software Practitioners of Nigeria (ISPON)
sees the potential of software production worth some $100 billion over the long
run, adding that app development will be critical to attaining the goal given
that mobile devices are the primary means by which Nigeria access the internet.
So far, ICT incubation centre have been developed by the private sector. Two
examples are the Co-Creation Hub and the Institute of Venture Design (IVD). The
former, a not-for-profit centre in Lagos was set up by two entrepreneurs, Femi
Longe and Bosun Tijani and has partnerships agreement with Nokia, Google, RIM,
MainOne Cable Company to mention a few.
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