Thursday, October 9, 2025
29.4 C
Lagos

African Developers Thrill at Facebook’s F8 Conference

Facebook announced at its annual F8 developer conference held in San Francisco on 12 and 13 April, that the company partnered with many African developers to launch products for the global market. Facebook, with its global reach and scale, is including African developers in its beta testing programme for the launch of new global products and features as it increases its presence and deepens its partnerships on the continent.

F8 hosts more than 2,600 people and hundreds of thousands of people watching via Facebook Live for two days of new products, tools, interactive demos and speakers to help developers build, grow and monetise their apps. And, more than 70% of Facebook’s developer partners are located outside the United States and about a third of the attendees at F8 joined us from abroad.

“We believe that local entrepreneurs and developers will be the ones to meet the needs of their immediate community, and we are working with developers to know how we can support them in doing so,” says Emeka Afigbo, Strategic Product Partnerships Manager at Facebook.

“We are listening to our developer partners in Africa, and the strong showing for F8 is a reflection of our commitment to doing more with our partners across the continent to help them build products and businesses.”

African developers who partnered with Facebook to launch products at F8 include Afrinolly (Entertainment, Nigeria), GumTree South Africa (Classifieds, South Africa), vZikoko (Entertainment, Nigeria), Jobberman (Jobs, Nigeria/Ghana), The Net (Entertainment, Nigeria) and My Music (Media, Nigeria).

In addition, this year Facebook brought F8 to developers around the world through F8 Meetups hosted with tech hubs around the world. In Africa, we hosted F8 Meetups in Nairobi, Lagos, Cape Town and Morocco where participants watched the sessions in San Francisco.

Two developer teams from Malawi won a developer challenge supported by mobile operator TNM Malawi and Facebook, and were featured on F8’s international stage.Maternitech, founded by three 22-year olds – Walter Moyo, Thandie Magasa, and Daniel Mvalo, provides educational information aimed at combating Malawi’s high under-18 pregnancy rate. The team was featured in an international livestream interview.

Talk To Me, an app created by 10-year old Panashe Jere, who learned to code at a Coding for Kids session at Malawi Hub. This app converts input text into voice so children always have someone to talk to.

Both teams were congratulated by Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg personally for their achievements.

spot_img
spot_img
spot_img

Hot this week

Zenith Bank, NEM, Seplat, AIICO, Dangote Cement, First HoldCo Recognised as Nigeria’s High-Performing Companies

L-R:    Michael Ani, Manager, Investor Relations, Dangote Cement; Oluseyi...

Rosatom: Nuclear Energy Holds key to Africa’s Sustainable Future

The role of nuclear energy in meeting Africa’s future...

RMRDC Targets 30% Value-Added Policy on Export of Local Raw Materials

The Raw Materials Research and Development Council (RMRDC) says...

NDIC, CIBN Strengthen Collaboration in Emerging Issues in the Financial Sector

L-R: President/Chairman of Council, Chartered Institute of Bankers of...

Fidelity Bank Commences Disbursement of FGN MSME Intervention Funds

Tier One Lender, Fidelity Bank Plc, has commenced the...

Topics

NPA’S New Spokesman, Nduonofit, Assumes Office

The newly appointed General Manager Public Affairs of the...

Is the CBN Pushing Nigerians Back into the Banking Halls? 

By Elvis Eromosele  Public institutions in Nigeria have a knack...

Ecobank: How Banks, Telcos, FinTechs, Regulators Can Grow Economy

The Managing Director, Ecobank Nigeria, Patrick Akinwuntan has advocated...

Nigeria: 2018 GDP Forecast Climbs to 2.6%

The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) released Q4:2017 Gross...

Big Tech, Not Fintech, Causing Greatest Disruption to Banking, Insurance Markets

Financial institutions’ drive to become more “experience-driven” is opening...

UBA Announces Strategic Expansion into Key Markets across Africa

UBA Group senior executives recently concluded the Group’s Half...

Africa, Middle/East Tablet Market Declines 12.3% in 1st Qtr

The Middle East and Africa (MEA) tablet market declined...
spot_img

Related Articles

Popular Categories

spot_imgspot_img