Hundreds of jobs have been created with the spread of technology hubs across the country, as each employ between five and 10 workers engaged in developing various apps.

A ‘tech hub’ is a physical space – a city, a suburb or just a suite of offices – which has developed to help technology startup companies succeed and, they hope, become the next tech titan like Facebook or Microsoft.

The Guardian investigation showed that there are now over 77 technology hubs in Nigeria with about 12 new ones scheduled for launch before year end. As expected, Lagos has the largest number; 36 in all. Abuja currently has 13, while Rivers is home to five hubs.

Story from AllAfrica. Story by By Adeyemi Adepetun.

Lagos also has the largest technology hub ecosystem in Africa, ahead of Cape Town, and Nairobi, a 2018 GSMA report confirmed.

With over 440 active tech hubs in Africa, the report found that five countries, namely, South Africa (59), Nigeria (55), Egypt (34), Kenya (30) and Morocco (25) make up 45 per cent of the total hubs in the region.

The report noted that although South Africa has the most tech hubs in the region, Lagos alone, with 31 tech hubs, leads Cape Town (26 tech hubs), and Nairobi (25 tech hubs), making it the African city with the largest cluster of technology hubs.

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The GSMA report was released in March 2018, but between April 2018 and May 2019, Lagos added new hubs including Facebook NG_Hub; The Nest, Eko Innovation hub, among others.

According to Nigerian Startup Funding Report, the country’s startups raised $17.6 million in first quarter (Q1) 2019, 8.5 per cent above Q1 2018 level. The report noted that over 80 per cent of the total funding was raised by Fintechs. However, almost 70 per cent of the total funding for the quarter was contributed by foreign fund providers.

It must, however, be noted that 80 percent of the hubs are majorly private sector driven, as the government, though promised to encourage spread of hubs across the country, is still working on its plans as there are very few government-owned hubs.

Read more at AllAfrica.