Category: Business Day

For decades, Nigeria has flared billions of dollars’ worth of natural gas into the atmosphere, a symbol of misaligned incentives, underdeveloped infrastructure, and chronic underinvestment.

Now, as artificial intelligence rewires the global economy and sends power demand surging to levels that are straining grids from Virginia to Singapore, a debate is forming in boardrooms and government ministries alike on how Silicon Valley’s insatiable appetite for energy can finally be the catalyst that unlocks Nigeria’s stranded gas wealth.

Nigeria holds the largest proven natural gas reserves on the African continent, an estimated 209 trillion cubic feet, and yet has failed to convert that endowment into reliable electricity, industrial output, or export revenue at anything close to its potential.

Meanwhile, hyperscale data centres powering the AI models of Microsoft, Google, and Amazon now consume as much electricity as mid-sized nations, and their operators are scrambling for secure, affordable, long-term energy supply. The convergence of those two realities is beginning to draw serious attention.

‘No one questions Microsoft’s balance sheet. That changes the financing equation for Nigerian gas,’ said NJ Ayuk, executive chairman of the African Energy Chamber.

‘For the first time, African gas projects can potentially be underwritten by companies whose energy demand is as large and as strategic as entire industrial sectors,’ he added.

Historically, the financing of upstream gas development in Nigeria has been hobbled by a familiar set of obstacles, political risk premiums, currency volatility, and the lingering reputational damage from decades of oil spill litigation in the Niger Delta.

Read also: AI systems failing many global users have a data Problem, not technology – Analyst

International lenders have grown increasingly cautious, with many European development banks pulling back from fossil fuel financing under pressure from climate commitments. The entry of technology companies as potential off-takers, with investment-grade credit ratings, decade-long demand horizons, and strategic urgency, could rewrite those risk calculations entirely.

Africa currently accounts for only 0.6 percent of global data centre capacity despite housing nearly 20 percent of the world’s population.

Experts said that the gap is not merely an economic embarrassment but also represents a structural exclusion from the infrastructure layer on which the next generation of economic activity will be built: finance, logistics, healthcare, agriculture, all of it increasingly dependent on cloud computing and AI inference running through servers that, for most of Africa, sit on another continent.

Bukola Ajayi, general manager of architecture and enterprise IT at MTN Nigeria, said reliable electricity and connectivity are non-negotiable for AI readiness.

High-density racks and advanced cooling systems cannot operate consistently on unstable grids, she said.

Ayotunde Coker, chief executive of Open Access Data Centres, said even advanced economies are exploring small modular nuclear reactors to support hyperscale AI facilities, underscoring how central energy security has become to the global AI race.

Nigeria, however, is making moves to narrow the gap. Industry estimates show the country had 21 operational data centres by early 2026, with close to $1 billion worth of AI-ready facilities currently under development.

Many of the planned projects are being designed around dedicated gas-powered energy systems, a deliberate architectural choice that sidesteps Nigeria’s notoriously unreliable national grid and instead creates self-contained energy ecosystems where a gas supply agreement, a power plant, and a data centre are bundled into a single project structure.

In March 2026, Tetracore Energy Group announced plans to build a $400 million, 20-megawatt gas-powered data centre in Ogun State in partnership with Huawei and Inspirive Technologies.

The project is being positioned explicitly as AI infrastructure, designed not just for general cloud workloads but for the high-density GPU computing that large language models and inference engines require.

Ogun State, which borders Lagos and has become a preferred destination for industrial investment given its relative ease of land acquisition and proximity to port infrastructure, has emerged as an early frontrunner in Nigeria’s data centre geography.

The structure of deals like Tetracore’s reflects a broader rethinking of how energy and digital infrastructure can be co-developed in markets where grid reliability cannot be assumed.

Rather than connecting to a national system that loses an estimated 40 percent of power to transmission and distribution losses, developers are building generation assets, typically gas turbines or reciprocating engines, directly adjacent to the compute facilities they power. The model is more capital-intensive upfront, but it offers something Nigerian grid power rarely does: predictability.

Still, the obstacles are real and should not be minimised. Gas-to-power projects in Nigeria have a long history of announcement without delivery, stalled by delays in pipeline connections, gas supply agreements that collapse under price disputes, and an investment climate that can shift with the political winds.

The regulatory framework governing data infrastructure remains fragmented across multiple agencies, and local financing markets are too shallow to absorb the scale of investment the sector requires without significant foreign participation.

Experts said countries that build sovereign AI infrastructure- the servers, the connectivity, the power systems- tend to retain more of the economic value that AI generates. Those that do not become consumers of compute capacity controlled elsewhere, paying in hard currency for access to tools that shape their own economies.

Speaking at Hyperscalers Convergence Africa 2025 in Lagos, Bill Kleyman, chief executive of Apolo.us and executive chair for Data Centre Programs at Informa, said data-centre power demand in Africa is rising by 20 percent to 25 percent annually and could reach 8,000 gigawatt-hours.

‘Success requires two things, which are power and bravery,’ Kleyman said, warning that rapid AI adoption is driving rack densities far beyond what many facilities were originally designed to handle.

Nigeria’s gas reserves, long a source of frustration and environmental damage, may now represent an unlikely entry point into that contest. Whether the country can move fast enough to seize it remains the defining question.

Nigeria posted its largest merchandise trade surplus on record in the first quarter of 2026, as the twin forces of the Middle East war and the long-awaited ramp-up of the Dangote refinery fundamentally reshaped the nation’s export basket and slashed its fuel import bill.

The surplus soared to N7.5 trillion in Q1 2026, surpassing the previous record of N7.42 trillion set in Q2 2025, according to BusinessDay’s analysis of the latest data released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS). Total exports in the first quarter were valued at N21.1 trillion, a 2.7 percent improvement from the same quarter in 2025 against imports of N13.6 trillion, a 18.1 percent decrease from the value recorded in the corresponding quarter of 2025 and lowest on record since Q2 2024.

March 2026 was an outlier even within a blockbuster quarter. Exports hit N8.8 trillion, the highest single-month value in Nigeria’s recent history.

Analysts attribute this directly to the outbreak of war in the Middle East in late February, which triggered a blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, a major maritime passage for roughly 25 percent of the world’s oil trade.

‘Because of the blockade, demand for Dangote products, even to the United States, increased,’ Ayo Teriba, an economist, told BusinessDay in a phone conversation. ‘Countries that weren’t importing from Dangote before now do so to compensate for the loss of supply from the Middle East.’

For the first time, refined petroleum products including Premium Motor Spirit (PMS), automotive gas oil (AGO), and kerosene-type jet fuel entered Nigeria’s top five exports, as per the NBS. Nigeria has famously been a net importer of these items.

‘You were not exporting those items at all last year. And now they dominate,’ Teriba said.

At the peak of the Middle East conflict in March, the Dangote Refinery quickly became a swing supplier.

As the war cut off cheap fuel imports from the Gulf and disrupted traditional energy routes, the 650,000-barrel-per-day Lagos facility doubled its domestic crude intake and increased exports across Africa and globally.

Taking advantage of war-related disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz, the refinery shipped millions of barrels of aviation fuel to the United States and made similar massive export pushes to Saudi Arabia.

The Hormuz blockade also drove oil prices past the $100 per barrel threshold. Nigeria, a major oil producer, stared at a windfall as other countries scrambled for the resource.

Yet, analysts believe it helped little to push up Nigeria’s export revenue due to the country’s inability to ramp up output.

‘Even if the price is high, you may still get disappointment,’ Teriba said. ‘Crude oil is higher, price is higher, but your output is less. You shoot yourself in the leg.’

Nigeria’s total crude output has continuously hovered around 1.4 to 1.5 million barrels per day, falling consistently short of the national budget targets and frequently struggling to hit OPEC production quotas.

Total crude oil exports stood at N11.2 trillion in Q1, up just 15 percent from the previous quarter.

Non-crude oil exports surged to N9.9 trillion, accounting for 47 percent of total exports.

Within that, liquefied natural gas and refined petroleum products alone were valued at N6.7 trillion, a 51.5 percent jump from Q4 2025.

‘We are beginning to see a structural shift in our exports,’ said Muda Yusuf, CEO of the Centre for the Promotion of Private Enterprise (CPPE). ‘Before now, non-oil exports were basically cocoa and sesame seed. Now we are seeing fertiliser, urea and non-traditional exports.’

The record surplus was also a function of collapsing imports, which fell 18.2 percent year-on-year to N13.6 trillion. The most dramatic decline was in ‘other oil product imports,’ which crashed 85 percent, a direct consequence of Dangote’s local supply displacing foreign refined products, analysts believe.

‘For most of that period, Dangote was dominant in terms of supplying petroleum products,’ Yusuf noted. ‘That’s a sharp drop in our import bill.’

The war added further pressure on the import side. Shipping costs, marine insurance, and freight rates spiked following the Hormuz blockade, making imports from the Middle East prohibitively expensive or impossible.

India emerged as Nigeria’s top export destination, absorbing 13 percent of total exports, followed by France with 9.3 percent and the Netherlands 9.2 percent. The five leading destinations, including Spain and the US, accounted for nearly 45 percent of all exports. China remained the largest source of imports at 37.4 percent, followed by the U.S. at 20.6 percent.

But not all sectors benefited. Agricultural exports fell 31.2 percent year-on-year to N1.17 trillion, despite strong global demand for cocoa and sesame seeds. Manufactured exports remained modest at N302.6 billion.

Raw materials exports rose to N1.53 trillion, driven by urea shipments to Brazil and gold exports to Switzerland. Solid minerals exports jumped 74.6 percent to N102.8 billion. Total trade in the first quarter of 2026 was valued at N34.7 trillion, the lowest recorded in seven quarters, according to BusinessDay’s findings.

Lisa Udechukwu, a data quality analyst whose work focuses on AI annotation, data integrity, and trustworthy AI evaluation, says the AI Systems failing many global users have a data problem and not a technology problem

Udechukwu, also an executive member of Africa Privacy Roundup, an African-led organization focused on data protection and AI governance, told BusinessDay that when the data used to train AI ignores most of the world, the failures aren’t bugs. They’re built in.

‘In 2015, Google Photos automatically tagged photos of two Black people as ‘gorillas.’ The company’s fix, years later, was to remove the categories ‘gorilla,’ chimp,’ and monkey’ from its image classifier entirely, not to fix the underlying data. The problem wasn’t a glitch. It was a symptom.

‘I’ve spent years working inside annotation pipelines at companies like Pinterest and Meta – the unglamorous infrastructure layer where human judgment gets converted into training signals for machine learning models.

‘And what I’ve seen, consistently, is that the data problem in AI is not a resource problem. It’s a representation problem. And it’s more systematic than most people building these systems want to admit,’ she explained.

She stressed that most major AI datasets are heavily concentrated in Western, English-language contexts.

The ImageNet dataset – foundational to a decade of computer vision – drew over 40% of its images from the United States alone. African countries, which account for 17% of the global population, collectively contributed less than 1%.

Language model benchmarks follow the same pattern: English dominates, followed by a handful of European languages, with vast multilingual regions effectively absent.This matters in ways that go far beyond misclassified photos.

She posted that when AI systems trained on unrepresentative data are deployed into global markets, which they routinely are, they carry their blind spots with them. Hiring algorithms that misread non-Western names, medical AI that underperforms on skin tones that weren’t in the training set.

Search and recommendation systems that misinterpret user intent because cultural context wasn’t part of the label design.

These issues are often treated as edge cases, but many are actually predictable outcomes of incomplete and unrepresentative training data. And yet they rarely appear in model performance reports, because the benchmarks used to evaluate ‘accuracy’ are

themselves built on the same skewed data foundations.

‘In my work managing annotation pipelines – overseeing quality across thousands of human-labeled data points – I’ve seen how cultural blind spots enter training data not through malice, but through the quiet assumptions embedded in labeling guidelines.

‘When an annotation task asks workers to judge whether a search result is ‘relevant,’ the definition of relevance is written by someone. That someone is almost always located in a high-income, English-speaking country.

‘The resulting guidelines can work reasonably well for users who look, speak, and search like the guideline-writer. For everyone else, the signal degrades – and that degradation rarely surfaces until a model fails loudly in a market the company cares about.

‘Three patterns repeat across nearly every pipeline I’ve worked in: inconsistent labeling when cultural context is ambiguous and guidelines don’t account for it; systematic misclassification in product categories or content types that are common outside the West but were never included in taxonomy design; and relevance scoring that quietly penalizes regional expression, local idiom, and non-standard syntax,’ she added.

Individually, these look like quality issues. Collectively, they are a structural gap in how AI is built.The Culturally Contextual Datasheet: A Framework for What’s missing in my published research in AI and Ethics (Springer), I introduced the Culturally Contextual Datasheet (CCD) – a framework designed to document not just what data a dataset contains, but what cultural assumptions are embedded in how it was collected, labeled, and defined.

According to her, standard data documentation – model cards, datasheets for datasets – asks questions like: Where was this data collected? How many examples are there? What are the known limitations?

These are necessary. But they don’t ask: Whose definition of ‘correct’ was used in labeling? Whose dialect was treated as standard? Whose concept of relevance, safety, or appropriateness shaped the annotation guidelines?

The CCD framework treats those questions as first-class documentation requirements. Because until organisations are required to disclose the cultural assumptions baked into their data, there’s no accountability for the outcomes those assumptions produce.

Udechukwu, whose research on the Culturally Contextual Datasheet (CCD) framework, which explores cultural context and accountability in AI datasets, is published in AI and Ethics (Springer), said the people most harmed by culturally incomplete AI data are rarely the people building the systems.

A facial recognition system that misidentifies black individuals isn’t used by its engineers in their daily lives. A medical AI that underperforms on darker skin tones doesn’t affect the dermatologists who deployed it.

A content moderation system that over-removes posts in Arabic, Yoruba, or Tagalog doesn’t silence the moderators writing the policy.

‘As an executive member of Africa Privacy Roundup – an African-led organization focused on data protection and AI governance across the continent – I see this unevenness clearly. African users and communities are increasingly the subjects of AI systems they had no role in training, no voice in designing, and no recourse when those systems fail them.

‘That is not just a technical problem. It is a governance problem and an ethical one. The EU AI Act, now in enforcement, requires transparency and risk assessment for high-stakes AI systems. But it was written largely for a European context, with European data realities in mind.

‘The Global South needs equivalent frameworks – and the organizations deploying AI in those regions need to be held to equivalent standards, not exempted because the markets are considered ’emerging.’

Fixing culturally incomplete AI data doesn’t require tearing systems down. It requires changing what we measure and who we involve. Organizations building AI need to audit their annotation guidelines for cultural assumptions – not just their datasets for demographic balance.

They need to invest in annotator communities that reflect the populations their models serve, not just the populations that are easy to source at scale. And they need to treat cultural documentation as a core deliverable of model development, not an afterthought.

For the companies deploying AI in globalu markets, the business case is clear: models trained on unrepresentative data fail more frequently, in more expensive ways, in the markets that represent the most growth. Inclusive data is not a values exercise. It is a quality imperative.

‘The future of AI will not be determined by who builds the most models. It will be determined by who builds the most reliable ones – and reliability, at scale, requires data that reflects the full complexity of the world those models are asked to serve,’ Udechukwu who is also exploring initiatives centered on culturally aware AI evaluation and governance systems,’ highlighted.

The Stella Health Foundation has launched a campaign against substance abuse, using an event in Lokoja to promote awareness on healthy living and mental well-being.

Stella Monisola Ibileye , the Director of the Foundation, while speaking during the programme, urged young people to avoid drug abuse and make choices that support their health and future.

She said ‘The foundation was established to promote health education, support mental wellness and increase awareness of the dangers associated with substance abuse, particularly among young people’.

She said the campaign seeks to encourage healthier lifestyles through community engagement, advocacy and public education, booting that substance abuse remains a growing concern with implications for education, productivity and social development, stressing the need for early intervention and sustained awareness efforts.

Addressing youths at the gathering, she encouraged them to resist negative influences and focus on decisions that support their personal development.

She said ‘I want young people to choose healthy living and stay away from substance abuse and influences that can affect their future. Everyone has the opportunity to build a productive and meaningful life’.

She pointed out that the foundation intends to work through awareness campaigns and community -based initiatives to promote healthier outcomes and strengthen public understanding of mental wellness.

Several presentations were delivered during the programme highlighting the health and social consequences associated with drug and substance abuse.

The event also served as an opportunity for the foundation to outline its plans to engage communities on issues relating to mental health, prevention and youth development.

Representatives of the Office of the First Lady of Kogi State, Sefinat Ahmed Usman Ododo, and Folashade Arike Ayode ,the Secretary to the State Government, were among dignitaries present at the event.

Experts in the medical and healthcare sector have called for stronger healthcare systems, backed by actionable strategies to bridge Nigeria’s medical and diagnostic gaps.

The call was made during the 3-day sub-regional healthcare trade, medicine, and innovation platform, tagged World Health Expo (WHX in Lagos 2026), formerly known as Medic West Africa, recently concluded in Lagos.

Akin Abayomi, Lagos State Commissioner for Health, while speaking on the future of medical technology, said Nigeria must prioritise the collection of clean, indigenous data to drive local technological innovation.

He highlighted the enforcement of the National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA) Act in Lagos State as a landmark regulatory milestone.

‘This process moves the healthcare sector directly into the center of the economy,’ Abayomi said.

The Act mandates health insurance for all residents, structuring the financial environment to guarantee medical protection across various socioeconomic levels.

‘The government must establish the standards and trust that create an enabling environment for both demand and supply,’ Abayomi said.

Felix Ofungwu, CEO, ISN Medical, while speaking on the future of healthcare in Nigeria, said that without proper diagnosis, patients cannot have proper treatment.

According to him, ISN has been in the business of helping healthcare practitioners save lives by providing solutions that they need to diagnose their patients’ disease conditions.

‘So for nearly half a century now, we’ve been in that business of providing the right diagnostic solutions to our customers,’ Ofungwu said.

Ofungwu also disclosed that ISN Medical is currently working in the area of precision medicine and personalized medicine, and recently partnered with companies like Illumina, which is a global leader in gene sequencing and DNA sequencing.

‘And using their technology and their solutions, we’re able to actually predict disease conditions even before symptoms start to show,’ Ofungwu said.

Earlier in a keynote address, Aliko Ahmed, Special Regional Representative of the Director General of the Africa CDC Western Regional Coordinating Centre, reflected on the lessons learned from the Ebola and COVID-19 crises.

He noted that while these pandemics exposed severe vulnerabilities, they also revealed massive opportunities for Nigeria and Africa within the global health architecture, adding that external aid is entirely unsustainable for achieving long-term sovereignty.

Ahmed emphasised that the Africa CDC would prioritise building trust in locally manufactured healthcare products, and urged regional leaders to enact trade policies aligned with the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) to shape the continental agenda.

The WHX Lagos 2026 featured accredited forums, cutting-edge product showcases, and high-level networking tracks designed to translate billions in public and private investment into immediate technology access for hospitals and patients.

Moniepoint Inc. has graduated the second cohort of its DreamDevs Bootcamp, deepening its investment in homegrown engineering talent as Nigeria’s fintech sector grapples with a growing shortage of skilled software developers needed to sustain Africa’s digital economy.

The financial technology company said the programme is designed to address the widening gap between demand for experienced software engineers and the available talent pool.

At a Demo Day event in Lagos themed ‘Training Done! Demo Up!’, participants showcased capstone projects built to industry standards after completing an intensive nine-week training programme covering software engineering, system design, cloud infrastructure, application programming interfaces (APIs), software testing, data structures, algorithms and frontend development.

The graduates, working in nine teams, presented practical solutions targeting sectors including healthcare, agriculture, real estate, food services and event management, demonstrating how technology skills can be applied to solve real-world business and social challenges.

The programme comes as technology companies across Africa increasingly compete for engineering talent amid rapid digitalisation and growing investor interest in the continent’s fintech ecosystem.

Industry estimates suggest that the global shortage of software developers could reach 85 million by 2030, potentially resulting in economic losses of about $5.5 trillion. For African markets, where digital infrastructure is still developing, the shortage poses a significant risk to innovation, product development and long-term competitiveness.

Speaking at the event, Felix Ike, Moniepoint co-founder and chief technology officer, described DreamDevs as a long-term investment in Nigeria’s digital economy rather than a recruitment programme.

‘DreamDevs is a structural investment in Nigeria’s digital economy, not a recruitment exercise, not a pipeline built solely to serve Moniepoint’s hiring needs,’ he said.

He noted, however, that some graduates from the first cohort have already joined Moniepoint’s engineering team, demonstrating the programme’s ability to produce talent capable of operating in highly demanding technology environments.

According to Ike, engineering excellence requires deliberate investment in systems, mentorship and practical exposure rather than relying solely on academic training.

‘Building that process and making it accessible to the brightest young engineers on this continent is a responsibility we have chosen to own,’ he added.

The bootcamp was developed by Moniepoint’s engineering unit in partnership with Semicolon, a technology training institution. Participants received stipends and mentorship from Moniepoint engineers while gaining exposure to the company’s production environment and software development processes.

The initiative reflects a broader shift among African fintech companies, which are increasingly investing in talent development as a strategic necessity rather than leaving workforce training entirely to universities and external institutions.

As digital payments, lending, embedded finance and enterprise technology services expand across the continent, the availability of highly skilled engineers has become a critical factor in determining which companies can scale successfully.

Africa’s technology ecosystem has attracted significant global capital over the past decade, but investments in technical talent development have not kept pace with the industry’s growth ambitions. This has led to fierce competition for experienced developers, higher recruitment costs and increased dependence on foreign expertise.

Moniepoint’s approach appears aimed at tackling the problem from the supply side by creating a structured pathway that develops engineers from foundational skills to industry readiness.

The programme also complements the Federal Government’s ongoing 3 Million Technical Talent (3MTT) initiative, where Moniepoint serves as a key sponsor. While the national programme focuses on training large numbers of technology professionals, DreamDevs seeks to provide specialised engineering depth and practical experience.

The company’s growing focus on talent development underscores a wider reality confronting Africa’s digital economy: infrastructure alone will not drive the next phase of growth. The continent’s ability to build competitive technology companies will depend largely on whether it can produce enough highly skilled engineers to design, maintain and scale digital platforms.

For Moniepoint, one of Africa’s fastest-growing fintech firms, the answer appears to lie not only in building products, but also in building the people who will create the next generation of them.

As Nigerian fintech companies expand into new markets and deepen their infrastructure ambitions, industry observers say initiatives like DreamDevs could become increasingly important in reducing Africa’s engineering talent deficit and ensuring that the continent’s digital transformation is powered by locally developed expertise rather than imported skills.

To: Nigerian Business Leaders, Start-ups, Entrepreneurs, Policy Makers, Financial Institutions, Artists, Trade and Investment Institutions, The Diplomatic Community, Academics, International Organizations, IGOs, and Angel Investors.

We are proud to unveil the World Business Angels Investment Forum Investors week 2026 global theme- ‘Fostering Diversity and Inclusion in Entrepreneurship: Building Stronger Business Ecosystems to Increase Financial Inclusion.’

This initiative highlights the urgent need to create equitable, accessible, and resilient entrepreneurial environments across Nigeria and the world.

2026 Thematic Goals:

Promote Diversity and Inclusion: Position diversity as a competitive advantage and inclusion as the foundation for sustainable economic growth.

Expand Financial Access: Ensure all entrepreneurs, regardless of background, can access finance, markets, mentorship, technology, and institutional support.

Strengthen Ecosystem Collaborations: Foster partnerships among government, finance, academia, investors, and international organizations and communities to build adaptive, resilient business ecosystems.

Groups Facing Barriers:

Women Entrepreneurs: Encounter stricter lending requirements, limited access to investment networks, and cultural constraints.

Youth: Face limited access to markets, mentorship, digital tools, and age-related biases.

Migrants, Rural Populations, Underrepresented Communities: Experience exclusion from networks, technology gaps, and institutional barriers.

Types of Barriers:

Financial Barriers, Institutional and Policy Barriers, Cultural and Social Barriers, Technological Barriers.

Roles in Resolving Barriers and Expected Outcomes: Policymaking and regulatory reforms, Angel investment and mentorship, Academic research and capacity building, Trade and investment facilitation, Inclusive financial services by business leaders, international collaborations via IGOs.

Call to Action: We urge stakeholders to champion inclusive entrepreneurship by collaborating across sectors, empowering marginalized communities, and building stronger, more adaptive business ecosystems.

Together, we can make diversity and inclusion the cornerstone of Nigeria’s economic resilience, innovation, and shared prosperity.

The smartphone market has become increasingly competitive, with manufacturers seeking to differentiate their devices through larger batteries, smoother displays, and enhanced user experiences. TECNO’s latest offering, the SPARK 50, enters the market with a clear proposition: deliver reliable performance, impressive battery life, and a modern design for users who prioritise functionality and endurance.

After spending time with the device, one feature stands out almost immediately – the battery.

A Battery Built for Heavy Users

The TECNO SPARK 50 comes equipped with a massive 6,700mAh battery, one of the largest capacities currently available in its category. For users who spend long hours on social media, video streaming, mobile banking, navigation, and work-related tasks, the device is capable of comfortably lasting more than a full day on a single charge. In moderate-use scenarios, stretching into a second day is entirely possible. The phone supports 18W fast charging via USB Type-C, helping users return to productivity without excessively long charging periods. An additional benefit is reverse charging, which allows the SPARK 50 to serve as a power source for smaller devices and accessories.

Smooth Display Experience

TECNO has fitted the Spark 50 with a 6.78-inch display featuring a 120Hz refresh rate. While many users may not immediately recognise the technical significance of the specification, the practical result is smoother scrolling, more responsive navigation, and an overall fluid user experience. Whether browsing websites, scrolling through social media feeds, or watching videos, the display feels responsive and modern. The large screen also makes the device suitable for content consumption, particularly for users who frequently watch videos or participate in virtual meetings.

Performance for Everyday Tasks

Under the hood, the SPARK 50 is powered by the MediaTek Helio G81 processor and comes with multiple memory configurations, offering up to 256GB of storage and extended RAM support. The device handles routine smartphone activities efficiently, including web browsing, messaging, video streaming, document editing, and multitasking. While it is not positioned as a high-performance gaming smartphone, it delivers enough processing power for everyday users seeking reliability rather than raw performance.

Camera Delivers in Good Lighting

The SPARK 50 features a 50-megapixel rear camera and an 8-megapixel front-facing camera. In daylight conditions, the main camera produces detailed and vibrant images suitable for social media sharing and everyday photography. Colours appear balanced, and the camera app includes several AI-enhanced shooting modes aimed at improving image quality. The front camera is adequate for selfies and video calls, while both cameras benefit from built-in flash support for low-light situations. As expected, image quality is strongest in well-lit environments.

Audio and Additional Features

One pleasant surprise is the inclusion of dual speakers with DTS sound enhancement, providing a fuller audio experience compared to many devices in the same segment. The phone also retains practical features such as a side-mounted fingerprint scanner, infrared remote-control functionality, FM radio support, and expandable memory options. These additions contribute to the device’s appeal for users seeking versatility without sacrificing convenience.

Design and Build

The SPARK 50 adopts a contemporary design language with multiple colour options, including Halo Blue, Titanium Grey, Ink Black, Aurora Purple, and Dynamic Orange. Despite housing a large battery, the device maintains a relatively slim profile, giving it a modern appearance that feels comfortable in the hand. The overall build quality feels solid, while the large display and minimal bezels contribute to a premium visual impression.

Verdict

The TECNO SPARK 50 focuses on the features that matter most to many smartphone users: battery life, display smoothness, storage capacity, and dependable daily performance. Rather than chasing flagship specifications, TECNO has prioritised practicality and endurance.

For professionals, students, entrepreneurs, and everyday users who require a smartphone capable of lasting through demanding days without frequent charging, the SPARK 50 presents a compelling option. Its standout battery, smooth 120Hz display, generous storage configurations, and capable camera system makes it one of TECNO’s most balanced Spark devices to date.

Food delivery startup Swoop is making an ambitious bet on Nigeria, positioning Africa’s largest city as the launchpad for its continental expansion plans despite entering one of the continent’s most competitive delivery markets.

The Eswatini-born company, which recently raised $7.3 million in seed funding from international investors, has begun operations in Lagos and says its immediate goal is simple: win Lagos before attempting to conquer the rest of Africa.

‘We are number one in Eswatini right now, and our goal is to be number one in Nigeria as well. If we hit that goal, it becomes easier to go across the continent. Nigeria is an important market to us,’ Demola Adesina, Swoop’s country manager, said in an exclusive interview with BusinessDay.

The strategy reflects a growing trend among African technology startups that increasingly view Nigeria’s more than 220 million people as the ultimate test market. Success in Nigeria often provides credibility, scale and operational experience needed to expand into other African countries.

Unlike international competitors that entered Africa from Europe or other regions, Adesina said Swoop considers itself fundamentally an African company.

The startup traces its roots to Eswatini, where it first launched before expanding into Nigeria. Lagos is now becoming the company’s most important growth market.

Swoop’s arrival comes as competition intensifies in Nigeria’s food delivery sector, where established players have already spent years building consumer trust, logistics networks and restaurant partnerships.

Yet Adesina rejects suggestions that the market is saturated.

‘Just Lagos alone is a huge market. We are looking at people who are not consuming today and moving them from non-consumption to using food delivery apps,’ he said.

That focus on first-time users could prove significant. Despite the visibility of delivery platforms in major cities, food delivery penetration in Nigeria remains relatively low compared with more mature markets, largely due to affordability concerns and high delivery costs.

For many Nigerians battling rising food prices and inflation, convenience often comes second to cost.

Recognising this reality, Swoop is attempting to compete on pricing and speed rather than brand recognition.

According to Adesina, the company charges what he describes as the lowest service fees in the industry and aims to ensure that food ordered through its platform costs nearly the same as buying directly from restaurants.

‘Our competition is not another app. Our competition is walking downstairs and buying food,’ he said.

The company claims customers receive their food in less than 30 minutes on average, a target achieved through technology, restaurant incentives and performance-based rewards for delivery riders.

Industry analysts say execution rather will determine whether such promises can be sustained.

Nigeria’s food delivery business has historically proven difficult. Earlier operators spent years educating consumers, building payment systems and shifting customers away from cash-on-delivery models.

‘We are standing on the shoulders of giants,’ Adesina acknowledged, crediting earlier players with helping to create the ecosystem that newer entrants now benefit from.

One area where Swoop believes it can differentiate itself is localisation.

The company says it has already adjusted parts of its operations within weeks of launching in response to Nigerian consumer behaviour and market demands.

Because the business is managed locally, Adesina argued, it can react faster to changing customer expectations.

‘We can respond to the needs of Nigerians,’ he said.

Trust is another major focus.

Food delivery platforms globally have faced challenges ranging from fake merchants to poor-quality food and identity fraud. To address these concerns, Swoop says it physically inspects restaurants before onboarding them.

According to Adesina, every merchant listed on the platform undergoes verification, including business documentation checks, account verification and physical visits by company representatives.

‘We know where your food is coming from,’ he said.

Currently operating in Yaba, Surulere and parts of Lagos Mainland, Swoop plans a rapid expansion across the city. The company expects to add Gbagada, Ikeja and other districts in the coming months, with a target of achieving broad Lagos coverage before the end of the year.

The Lagos-first approach mirrors strategies adopted by several successful African technology firms, which often use the city as a proving ground before expanding nationally and regionally.

For Swoop, Lagos represents more than a city. It is a test of whether an African-born startup can successfully challenge both local champions and global competitors in one of the continent’s toughest consumer markets.

The broader ambition stretches beyond food delivery. Like many technology platforms globally, Swoop sees food delivery as the first step toward building a larger consumer ecosystem that could eventually include groceries, pharmacy services and other everyday transactions.

Whether that vision succeeds will depend on the company’s ability to solve a challenge that has troubled many delivery businesses before it: balancing affordable prices for consumers with sustainable earnings for riders and merchants.

For now, Swoop’s message is clear. Before conquering Africa, it must first win Lagos and in Nigeria’s fiercely competitive food delivery market, that may prove to be the harder task.

Lagos State is intensifying efforts at attracting domestic and foreign investment as the third edition of the Invest Lagos Summit opens on Monday on Victoria Island.

The two-day summit, scheduled for June 8-9, is being organised by the Lagos State Government in partnership with the Commonwealth Enterprise and Investment Council (CWEIC) under the theme, ‘Lagos: Business Gateway to Africa.’

The event will bring together policymakers, investors, business leaders and development partners to explore opportunities across key sectors of the economy, including technology, infrastructure, energy, manufacturing, finance, creative industries and urban development.

Among the high-profile speakers expected at the summit are Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu; Taiwo Oyedele, minister of finance; Aig-Imoukhuede, co-chair of the Lagos Finance and Investment Council (LFIC), and Tosin Eniolorunda, chief executive officer of Moniepoint Group,

Organisers said discussions will focus on positioning Lagos as Africa’s leading investment destination through sessions on technology and innovation, infrastructure development, sustainability, global partnerships, talent development, culture and the future of cities.

According to Gbenga Omotosho, Lagos State Commissioner for Information and Strategy, the event has been designed to deliver measurable outcomes capable of driving investment inflows into the state.

‘Invest Lagos 3.0 is more than a conference; it is a strategic platform designed to connect investors with opportunities, facilitate meaningful partnerships and showcase Lagos as Africa’s most attractive investment destination,’ Omotoso said.

He noted that the summit will highlight investment opportunities arising from the state’s ongoing investments in transportation, technology, energy, manufacturing, tourism and urban development, while providing a platform for engagement between investors and policymakers.

In addition to panel discussions, the summit will feature investment pitches by state governors, exhibitions, business networking sessions, a gala dinner and guided visits to major industrial and infrastructure projects, including the Dangote Petroleum Refinery, Lagos Free Zone, Lagos Port and RusselSmith’s advanced manufacturing facility.

The summit forms part of Lagos State’s broader strategy to strengthen its position as a leading commercial hub and gateway for investment into Africa.