African AI Foundation Is Empowering Africans for Relevance In AI Revolution

As the whole world got into a gold rush on deployment of artificial intelligence technologies for various use cases, it was little surprise that Africa had no plans and wasn’t ready for the most part. This massive gap is what the African AI Foundation hopes to fill by upskilling, training and developing AI talent for Africa, while creating a community of AI experts that can solve real African challenges with Artificial Intelligence. 

African AI Foundation hopes to see more AI CEOs, AI product managers a and AI developers etc over the next few years from the community of experts its creating. The foundation was founded in 2023 when the non-profit trained over 800 people across 5 countries in various AI skills during its first cohort.

The advent of AI systems like Chat GPT, Mid Journey, Dall-e, Bard etc, has made so many people curious and worried about the potential impact AI might have on their businesses and their careers. Many wonder if their job will still be around in a few years or if they will be replaced by AI agents that can do their jobs more efficiently.

Interestingly, every major shift in technology truthfully disrupts some domains and sectors and, at the same time, creates new categories and opportunities. The main focus of every individual involved should be on skill acquisition to stay relevant during and even after the disruption. The opportunities that come with disruptive eras are always immense and can only be explored by people equipped to participate in the disruption.

This is why the African AI Foundation and the American Spaces teamed up to train one thousand people in AI skills annually so that Africans can be more equipped to participate in the ongoing AI revolution. As it’s popularly known that Africa missed out on nearly all single revolutions to date, including the Agricultural Revolution, Industrial Revolution and even the recent Information Technology Revolution.

The AI revolution is currently at the 1990s stage of the internet revolution, and it’s being predicted to add up to $15 trillion to the global GDP by 2030. The mission of the African AI Foundation and the American spaces is to see Africa participate actively in the AI revolution and to grow its GDP by creating an army of Africans that will actively define the direction of innovation instead of simply observing, as Africa used to. By actively participating, Africa is able to contribute to the direction of the AI emergence and adapt AI solutions to local problems only known to Africans.

The African AI Foundation is a non-profit social-good NGO founded by Oyinlola Israel, an IT executive with 15 years of industry experience. Joined by a team of impact-driven AI experts and volunteers around the world, the African AI Foundation training is scheduled to happen annually, with the 2024 edition being the second. 

Other notable trustee of the foundation include Tolulope Odetola, a PhD holder in applied machine learning, Abdulrahman Oloritun who has over 15 years experienced in building advanced data systems, Kola Ojoodide and Mario Omokaro who both have extensive product and application experience. 

The free AI Bootcamp organised by the African AI Foundation and the American Spaces will last for three months, with another month of hackathons. Every Saturday, classes will be held online starting from August 10th by 5 PM WAT.

Also, the American Corner is providing access to computers and internet for students to practise and engage with others via the online classroom provided. All resources provided by the American Corner can be accessed from Monday – Friday between the hours of 9 AM – 5 PM, and across all American corner centres across the country. 

The future is for those that are able to create it, and the African AI Foundation with the American Corner is investing in lowering the barriers to entry so that almost anyone with the will to learn and courage to continuously upskill can be relevant in spite of the brewing AI disruption. To enrol for the cohort 2, check their website on https://africanaifoundation.com for a chance to participate.