OCTAVE INCORPORATIONS

Problem Statement : Digitalization is epileptic in Nigeria and Africa at large because of unavailable, inaccessible and unaffordable on demand digital skills education and services.

Solution : Provision of available, accessible and affordable on demand digital education and services.

This Solution will advance Digitalization in Africa in a short while because the people will have access to education that could not initially afford, talking about making a $1000 course become $50. By working with tech experts to develop online courses on these Digital skills.

Will also include a personality test to ensure the students really enjoy and love what they choose based on their personalities.

The specific problem is that of lack of quality digital education in Africa which is quite dangerous for us with the level at which technology is at this time. And the scale of the problem is so big that about 70% of the whole African population lack this opportunity because of its inaccessibility and how expensive it is to get a quality Digital Education in Nigeria and Africa at large. Basically my Solution model is related to all factors of the problem stated, because aside the very affordable fee that will be paid to learn the Digital skills online, we will also have physical trainings to reach out to those who may not have the required resources to go online and also offer a lot of Scholarships to the less privileged. I believe and am confident that this will advance Digitalization in Africa and I hope you help me achieve this dream.

The Solution model is basically to provide available, accessible and very affordable on demand quality digital skills education. We will have a website that works like Coursera or Udacity and also the Application for the Octave Inc. platform and we will upload the online course contents curated by the tech expects and tutors we have on board. After the upload, we make these courses accessible and very affordable to Africans.

Another unique proposition about this Solution is that, some students and individuals in Africa may not be fully sure of what to learn and develop themselves in. To solve this problem, we will incorporate a personality test system in the website where they are asked a few questions about themselves.

This will enable us to filter the courses based in the results of the personality test and expose them to courses they would likely love and enjoy.

We will also ensure that all students enrolled in a particular course are out in a discussion forum where the course developer will guide and help them in case of any difficulties they may face in course of taking the online digital skill course.

The target population are the people of Africa. Africa now has about 1.36 billion people and in this population only about 35%(476 million) or less are privileged enough to afford this quality digital education. This is very poor and does not speak well of the continent that at this point in time we are still far behind in terms of digitalization. 

What I learnt from most of the population through a survey is that they tend to develop themselves as much as they can so that they can be considered to work in already developed countries while leaving their country in shambles and their people suffering and lacking the necessities they would afford if they had stayed back.

Now the Solution I am proposing will ensure that those who are not able to afford this digital education will by far be able to afford it on our Platform, they have the chance of interning in our company and they are equipped with enough skills to have their own startups.

I believe that the only way a country can move forward is by educating it's people. But my continent Africa has failed to realized that.

Well I am here for them.

The problem and solution I am addressing is very much aligned with this challenge because I believe the goal of the MIT solver challenge is to empower and support individuals who are passionate about changing the world and making it a better place for all. Technology has come to stay and it's the future, but African are way far from this modernization. This Solution model will ensure that if not all, most will have access to the required education and this gives us an assurance that we won't be left behind in the Digitalization world.

We are at the prototype stage because we have done all the required feasibility studies and survey required to validate the hypothesis that our product will be accepted and used by the people who we are proposing it for. In fact a national television in Nigeria, NTA2 has partnered with us and promised that we will be supported in terms of advertising and publicity. We are very confident of this product and we are dedicated to our cause.

Honestly, what we need to move forward to the next stage is funds because i want to ensure everyone involved in this team is comfortable and do not lack any resources required to ensure this becomes a huge success.

My Solution is Innovative because it's more like a novel idea in Nigeria to have a platform like Coursera or Udacity, and also making the courses very affordable to the people. And the Solution is fully dependent on technology as we are currently developing the app and website, and the tutors are also tech experts and practitioners. 

Another thing we would do on the platform is to consider the fact that not everyone will be willing to be tech oriented so we ensured that others who wants to learn other form skills like carpentry, baking, cooking, physics, hairdressing and so on can find online videos there to help them learn and develop these skills. The app and website will be fully user-friendly and interactive.

My Solution currently serve over 500 persons as some of them have been provided jobs, some came for our free Internship program and others are tutors and team members. We are sure to serve over 50million African before the end of next year and in five years we should by then have served over 700m persons all across Africa with the aid of our amiable and capable digital Marketing team.

I ensure that all projects laid down in the company are time-bound as we strictly adhere to the SMART goals initiative.

Progress indicators include;

Tutors submitting their online course contents on or before the deadline

Each project are split into different phases, with the phases attached to a specific time to be completed.

Ensure that all goals are specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and time bound.

All employees and team member are given weekly/monthly KPIs, these will help us monitor progress in each department in the company and ensure we are progress everyday and moving closer and closer to our vision.

We have about 11 departments currently

Analytics team : 8

Digital Marketing : 7

Developers : 12

Interns : 180

AI/Robotics team : 10

Financial team : 6

Content team : 5

All in total approximately 250 people are currently working on the Solution model.

My team and I are very much well positioned to deliver this Solution because we are all Experienced tech practitioners. I, for instance am a IoT engineer, Digital Marketing x Product Manager and Data Scientist and I also teach teach to a lot of other persons. Most of my team members have worked in tech institutions and industries and are very much experienced in the field. I have everyone for everything needed to ensure that this dream becomes a success. 

Even most of the interns too are quite confident of their digital skills but after their Internship with us, they will be overly professional at what they do and would get a chance to work with us. Hence we have a lot of tech talents who shares the same goal and are working together to ensure it becomes successful.

I was recently a program manager for a startup edtech company where we help students to bridge the gap between the academia and the industry but teaching them relevant future of work skills. But something was missing in that organization, which was effective leadership and management. I tried solving it but the Founder was not listening. 

Now that I have learned this among other problems like non transparency and trust, I have developed my leadership mindset and know exactly how to ensure I don't make the same mistake in out Company. 

We ensure that there's no form of boss or inequality among employees and team members, everyone will be treated with the respect they deserve. We will also provide people of all backgrounds a genuine opportunity to thrive.

Even if they work for me, I see it as them working with me because we share the same goal which is to ensure that our continent will advance and follow the trend of new technologies without being left behind.

I will be a leader and not a boss, ensure that everyone is comfortable in their workspace and no form of disrespect by employees will be tolerated. There will be time to work and time for fun. Time to brainstorm and time to play together.

There will be love, peace and unity. I believe all of these will not just let the organization succeed but also get to the vision in a lesser time than the expected.

I am applying to Solve because I believe it's a platform where innovators who are passionate about changing the world and making it a better place is supported and guided to a path of success.

Also Solve aims to connect all Fellows with partners who can help advance their solutions through monetary and/or non-monetary support. 

My solution is a very good one and I am so confident that it would help solve the problem of digitalization in Africa. As I have stated, the barrier my team and I are facing now is funding and I believe Solve can help us with this.

I also stated that we need a sum of $450,000.

The most faced barrier now is funding hence the financial aid is most pressing at the moment. We may also require human capital, legal matters and technology if that can be given. But most pressing is the financial aid 

I would like to partner with MIT for things like research and development as we won't be delivering only digital education but also rendering services like production of robots and autonomous cars in commercial size to the public for sale. So having MIT partner with us will be a very great push in the aspects of R & D.

Also if there are Solvers with like mind and mission who would love to also partner so we can work together and ensure the mission and vision is achieved, it will be a great one too.

Our Solution is based on the use of technologies like data science, Artificial intelligence and robotics. We are currently teaching over 100 students AI technologies and how to use it to solve problems around them. We believe AI is the future and would aid humanity in many ways, so there is a need to ensure that education in this aspect is accessible and affordable for all which is what we are doing at Octave Incorporations