Zinox founder urges investors to take advantage of Nigeria young population most inclined to information technology
Staff Writer:
Nigeria Young population are ready market are more than enough incentives to attract investors Africa’s biggest ICT hub.
This is according to Chairman, Zinox Group, Leo Stan Ekeh to CNN Tech during an interview pasted on its website.
Ekeh is the founder Zinox Group, a technology company based in Nigeria that manufactures and distributes computers at home and abroad. Zinox employs 1,800 Nigerians and Ekeh thinks the company can play a role in improving the tech economy, while tapping into Nigeria’s young population.
He noted that with right investment, government support , and enabling environment, Nigeria can effort produce global billionaires from ICT sector.
“The miracle of ICT is that it is the only profession in the world today that can make the child of a poor man the richest man in the world. The challenge, however, is that majority of our youths are in a closed community in which the standards are still poor so they cannot exhibit their innate intellectual strength. As a result, they are seen as defeated and a lot of them are unemployed.’’
“We are doing our bit to correct this situation but government support will go a long way in helping the country achieve more. Presently, Zinox is building digital training centres and tech hubs across the country and empowering many of our youths. We have also committed some significant investment in a number of tech start-ups. Recently, we invested in an Ibadan-based software company – Xputer. Interestingly, some of the apps being created by the young chaps Xputer are driving the business processes of the major e-commerce outfits in the country. All they needed was a bit of exposure and support to help them scale up.
“The same situation applies to many of our youth. Today, if you give these youths the right platforms, which I must say is not expensive, Nigeria can produce a minimum of 10 billionaires from the ICT sector in the next few years.”
“Ninety percent of youths today want to go into trending professions; lifestyle professions and that is what ICT really is. If government invests in this sector as it should, Nigeria is capable of producing several billionaires straight out of the technology space.”