Our interest in Nigeria, by Google

Posted by admin Headlines Thursday, March 15th, 2012

WEBSITE giant, Google, has declared that its drive into sub-Saharan Africa, particularly Nigeria, is not profit driven but to enhance development in the region, as well as help in maximization of information technology.

Speaking yesterday during the opening of Google’s third web and mobile conference, g|Nigeria, held in Lagos, the Vice-President of EMEA Product Management and Engineering for Google, Nelson Mattos, said the size of ecosystem in Nigeria and many countries of the sub-Saharan is very small.

“Our role here is developmental. Maybe, after five years or so, we may start looking at the business opportunities. But right now, what we are doing is merely training”, said Mattos.

Google is currently involved in web collaboration in seven Nigerian universities, which included the University of Nigeria, Nsukka; University of Lagos, Lagos State University, Ade Bayero University, Kano; and Benson Idahaosa University, among others.

The Country Manager for Google Nigeria, Juliet Ehimuan, said the aim is to capture, in its training assistance, all universities in the country desiring the assistance.

The two-day event brought together hundreds of tech savvy entrepreneurs, developers and journalists, and provided training sessions on how to get the best from the Internet.

Participants got the opportunity to discuss the future of web application development, receive training on Google’s products and learn about online business skills.

One of the notable highlights of the g|Nigeria event was the launch of Gmail Chat SMS. This new feature allows users to use Gmail Chat to communicate between all mobile phones and platforms, even if they are offline or have an SMS and voice only phone.

The new product also allows users to receive Google+ SMS notifications and post status updates via SMS, and will ensure that the users are always connected with the people in their circles.

The third yearly g|Nigeria event reemphasises Google’s commitment to making the web more relevant to the everyday Nigerian.

The conference featured capacity-building sessions for top-tier journalists, news webmasters software developers, and business owners.

The sessions were focused on showing Nigerians new opportunities to make money from the Internet.

Attendees were able to explore Google’s platforms through a combination of tech talks, breakout sessions and code-labs run by engineers and business teams from across the globe.

-Guardianwp_posts