Monday, October 28, 2013

Lagos hackatho: IBM promotes technology, ideas


IBM, reputed as one of the top corporate promoters of hackathons globally has held a four-day technology training and ideas incubation programme codenamed ‘The IBM “Lasgidi” Hackathon.’
DigitalSENSE Business News saw about 90 individuals made of young technology and computing practitioners, software developers, engineering and computer science students from 10 tertiary institutions in Nigeria  participating in the event.
The Country General Manager, IBM West Africa, Taiwo Otiti while declaring the hackathon event open charged participants to “get hungry for technology information and always be eager to soak in as much knowledge as they can.”
“This ‘IT Impact’ has been due to the evolution of organizational behaviour and the growing role that organizations like IBM play in ensuring that many of society’s challenges and problems do not go unaddressed or unresolved. Promoting talent in the field of Science and Technology has therefore become a way of life at IBM,” Otiti said.
It was also confirmed by DigitalSENSE Business News that IBM spends over $8 billion about N1, 268,000,000,000.00 annually on Research and Development (R&D), and has recently opened its 12th research laboratory in Africa, in Nairobi, Kenya.
IBM’s West Africa Leader for Developer Relations, Independent Software Vendors, Start-ups and Academic Initiatives, Mrs. Adeola Allison said IBM has been helping to power transformation and technology innovation for over 100 years, stressing that “Focusing on mobile payments and smarter government solutions is therefore a deliberate attempt to make a positive impact and contribution to the innovation agenda of Business and Government in Nigeria.”
IBM Innovation Partners for the Lagos hackathon are the Federal Ministry of Communications Technology, the Lagos State Ministry of Science and Technology, University of Lagos, Airtel, CBC Limited, Wecyclers, Coders4Africa, CcHUB, Smart Campus, ICT Brokers, Quality Certain and other academic and non academic institutions in Nigeria.
AN/GEE
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