The Founder of MainOne, Funke Opeke says shared infrastructure, lower costs and eliminating regulatory barriers are vital to ensure a thriving tech ecosystem in Nigeria. In a chat with CNBC Africa at this year’s Zenith Bank Tech Fair, she notes low orbit satellite internet is gaining traction while reiterating the need for innovative business models to drive internet penetration and quality of services.
The Founder of MainOne, Funke Opeke says shared infrastructure, lower costs and eliminating regulatory barriers are vital to ensure a thriving tech ecosystem in Nigeria. In a chat with CNBC Africa at this year’s Zenith Bank Tech Fair, she notes low orbit satellite internet is gaining traction while reiterating the need for innovative business models to drive internet penetration and quality of services. Take a look. The Founder of MainOne, Funke Opeke says shared infrastructure, lower costs and eliminating regulatory barriers are vital to ensure a thriving tech ecosystem in Nigeria. I think what we're seeing is that we need to be innovative, more innovative in terms of the business models we adopt because if we look at the growth of penetration, I think it's stalled in our urban areas and rural penetration and the quality of access is not really keeping up with what we see in other parts of the world. We also see new technologies like satellite, lower orbit satellites and Starlink starting to gain a lot of traction because of the speed of rollout and deployment that they bring in getting access to citizens in rural areas. So I think the challenge is on us really as an industry and as a nation, as a continent, to figure out those strategies that would enable us share infrastructure, lower the cost and get access to more of our people sooner. And another issue is also how do we also validate our markets here too, you had mentioned that earlier on and in terms of building that robust ecosystem, especially to support the tech offerings we have here, if you were to speak or recommend the near-term priorities, what the government should be focusing on, how do individual private players also along the value chain, how should they position as a whole and going back to that element of cooperation, partnership, engagement at every single level. I think we talk about digitalization a lot and we talk about AI, but we truly need to consider that all these technologies are driven by private sector investment and we need to drive the demand side of the equation. How can we leverage these technologies in education, in the delivery of government services to drive demand and to drive usage and how can government empower citizens to leverage such technologies, so that they are creating an enabling environment for our tech businesses to grow and sell into. I think, especially at these difficult times, that is one active area where government can look at participating in driving demand, in lowering fees and input taxes and regulatory barriers that would allow the ecosystem to grow and create more jobs and value for our society. And now we have a whole lot of innovators also in here now today, we're seeing businesses, some struggling with incorporating latest technology as well too. Let's talk about your word to these young innovators, geniuses and how they should also revise the strategy, the sort of offerings that are available on the table and the next line of growth, how do they scale? Be laser focused on delivering value to your customers, we've talked about tough times and how businesses pull through that, you need to focus on where you're able to drive value, double that on that and be adaptable in looking at your costs and how you drive that value. And I wouldn't let you go without also touching lastly on the fact that in terms of looking at the future mappings, urbanization as a whole, repeating the sort of losses we recorded earlier this year from the fiber optic, fiber cables repair, how do we position going forward to ensure that we don't have such repeats? Yes, we did suffer an incident this year offshore that disrupted services on the cable we built, however one of the beauties is we now have new cables from other players coming into the system and we have diversity capacity, we have integrated or interfaced the cables such that we're able to route traffic over multiple physical cables should any such incident occur, either on their cable to come to us or on our cable to leverage their capacity and that provides a degree of resilience for the future. And are you still bullish on the sort of investment appetite we have here? Excuse me? Are you still bullish on the sort of investment appetite we can gather here? Well with the size of our population, with the size of the youth population, with the energy and capacity of Nigerians, I have no doubt that there is a bright future and that the Nigerian youth have what it takes to create that bright future. With us Fonke Okpeke, founder of MainOne, speaking on Nigeria's tech ecosystem.
Theme: Key Strategies for Enhancing Nigeria's Tech Ecosystem
In a recent interview at this year's Zenith Bank Tech Fair, Funke Opeke, the Founder of MainOne, highlighted the importance of shared infrastructure, lower costs, and the elimination of regulatory barriers in ensuring a thriving tech ecosystem in Nigeria. Opeke emphasized the need for innovative business models to drive internet penetration and improve the quality of services provided to users across the country. She recognized the stagnation in penetration rates in both urban and rural areas and underscored the potential of new technologies like low orbit satellites and Starlink in bridging the digital divide. Opeke called for collaborative efforts within the industry and among government stakeholders to develop strategies that would promote infrastructure sharing, reduce costs, and expand access to technology for the Nigerian populace. She urged the government to focus on driving demand for digital services, particularly in education and governance, to create an enabling environment for tech businesses to thrive. Addressing a room full of young innovators at the event, Opeke encouraged them to remain laser-focused on delivering value to their customers, advising them to adapt to changing market dynamics and carefully manage their costs to sustain growth. She emphasized the importance of scalability and urged the innovators to revise their strategies to align with the evolving tech landscape. In response to concerns about future challenges such as fiber optic cable repairs and urbanization, Opeke reassured stakeholders of the industry's preparedness to handle such incidents. She highlighted the implementation of redundancy measures, such as multiple cable routes and capacity integration, to ensure service continuity in the face of disruptions. Opeke expressed optimism about the investment potential in Nigeria, citing the country's demographic advantages and the innovative capabilities of its youth population as key drivers of future growth. Overall, Opeke's insights shed light on the opportunities and challenges facing Nigeria's tech ecosystem, emphasizing the need for collaboration, innovation, and strategic focus to drive sustainable development in the sector.
"Be laser focused on delivering value to your customers, we've talked about tough times and how businesses pull through that, you need to focus on where you're able to drive value, double down on that and be adaptable in looking at your costs and how you drive that value."
Nigeria, tech ecosystem, Zenith Bank Tech Fair, MainOne, Funke Opeke, infrastructure, regulatory barriers, innovation, internet penetration, low orbit satellites, Starlink, digital services, scalability, urbanization, investment