Two Nigerian startups received $300,000 after attending the 2nd LEAP Technology Expo in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Two startups are RiceAfrika Technologies and Wicrypt Technologies.
They became winners in various categories of the rocket fuel competition, which was attended by Professor Isa Pantami, Minister of Communications and Digital Economy.
More than 10,000 startups from different countries have registered, according to Hajiya Hadizah Umar, director of corporate communications at the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA).
After a thorough selection, the number of applicants was reduced to 220, and only 90 startups had to submit their business ideas in the semi-finals. Eight Nigerian startups participated in the semi-finals and three made it to the final,” Umar said.
Giving details of the competition she said:”RiceAfrika Technologies – is a tech-driven agric optimisation startup that deploys IoT-enabled harvester and its FARMEasy mobile app for smallholder farming communities in Africa.
RiceAfrika believes Africa can feed itself and feed the world. It emerged as the global best in ‘The Tech for Humanity Award’ category and is coming home with 150,000 dollars.
“While Wicrypt is an innovative tech startup that is decentralizing the internet around the world. These startups have specialized operating systems and hardware that allow users to share data with the people around them at low cost. It was also named the best company in the world in The Into New World Award category and received a $150,000 prize.
According to Professor Hajiya Umar, Pantami congratulated the Digital Cooperation Organization (DCO) in Riyadh for hosting the global event and expressed his satisfaction with the work of the Nigerian team.