Five Nigerians developers along with others from the continent had their achievements and products celebrated at the Facebook’s annual developer F8 conference (www.FBF8.com), held in San Jose, California, on April 18 and 19.
African developers at the event shared the stage with Facebook and developers worldwide showcasing innovative products and services they have created for their local communities and the global market.
The Nigerian developers who featured in the sessions include the following:
Pass.NG (http://Pass.ng) is an education start-up from Nigeria that helps students practice for their university entrance exams.
Truppr (http://Truppr.com) is a social fitness start-up from Nigeria.
Afrinolly (http://Afrinolly.com) is an app that allows users to catch up with Nollywood content on their mobile phones. It is one of the first Nigerian companies to build the Facebook Surround 360 camera.
Quiz.ng (http://Quiz.ng), an online quiz platform based out of Nigeria.
Kangpe (http://Kangpe.com): A health service from Nigeria that lets users ask real doctors their health questions.
Other Africa developers were:
Asoriba (http://Asoriba.com): A Ghanaian start-up that has built software that enables churches to better manage member engagement, donations, and attendance. The company was featured in the Keynote for its work using Facebook Analytics.
Rancard (www.Rancard.com), a mobile solutions company based in Ghana. Its Rendezvous (http://APO.af/J4GoJg), social recommendation system was featured in two sessions at F8.
Kudi.ai (https://Kudi.ai): Messenger Bot to send money for free to any bank, buy airtime and pay bills; first African bot to be featured on Messenger Blog http://APO.af/C3GyWz.
Eneza Education: An educational app from Kenya.
Refunite (https://Refunite.org): A service from Kenya that helps refugees to reunite with their families and loved ones.
Emeka Afigbo, Facebook’s Head of Platform Partnerships for the Middle East and Africa explained that the company was partnering with many African developers to launch products that not only meet the needs of their local markets, but which are also ready for the world stage.
“Events like F8 are a perfect opportunity for us to talk about how we will work with partners to do more with our platforms. As importantly, they are a forum for us to get feedback from our ecosystem and to showcase our partners’ work to the world,” Afigbo said.
This year, Facebook brought F8 to developers around the world through F8 Meetups hosted with tech hubs around the world. In Africa, it hosted F8 Meetups in Nairobi, Lagos, and Cape Town, where participants watched live streams of the sessions in San Francisco.
