With about 2 years in existence, Utiva has trained over 10,000 individuals in data science, product management, product design, analytics with python and about 20,000 learners through its sponsored masterclass, some of these individuals have gone ahead to transition into tech, gotten new jobs and even relocated to work abroad.
As a part of Utiva’s commitment to enriching lives by providing opportunities to tech learning, the company designed an affordable option of learning called Ubuntu, a concept that lowers the barrier to people regardless of their gender and economic background. This opportunity gave a strong rise in women’s participation across the board. Today, about 45% of Utiva learners are women and girls.
The mission is to change the narratives of female underrepresentation in tech which is still about 20% active representation in tech.
On the 21st of July 2021, the technology giant, Hewlett-Packard, HP, hosted a virtual event and the event had incredible personalities like Alex Cho, President of HP Inc’s Personal Systems business group, Alex Amouyel who is the Executive Director of Solve – an initiative of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sarah Brown, Executive Chair of the Global Business Coalition for Education and Chair of Theirworld, a global children’s charity committed to ending the global education crisis and unleashing the potential of the next generation.
During the event, Eyitayo Ogunmola, founder of Utiva mentioned that the goal for Utiva was to build an ecosystem of technology talents for the African continent and that Utiva was open to opportunities and support that will accelerate the realization of this goal.
This was celebrated by Alex Cho, President of HP Inc’s Personal Systems business group who commended the work being done at Utiva and went ahead to say ‘Tayo, I wanted to let you know that today, we’d like to make sure that we are helping you from the HP perspective and so through our partnership with our girl rising, we are going to purchase $50,000 of nucleus devices and help you distribute them to the women and girls in Africa. What you are doing is amazing’
The announcement of this support by Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HP) to support Utiva -Africa’s largest tech education company is a huge win for the African continent. With the nucleus devices, this means that people in underprivileged countries/communities can learn even if they have no access to data. In the nucleus device, the Utiva programs ranging from Product Management, Product Design, Data Science can be learned by underprivileged young girls.
At the event, the CEO of Utiva, Eyitayo Ogunmola, mentioned the commitment to bringing down the barrier to learning for women on the continent through different initiatives designed for this purpose. In 2022, Utiva will also be launching a 20% annualised discount to learn technology skills in Africa. This project will be designed to provide a new path to over 10,000 women and girls.
Worthy of note is the partnership Utiva has with MIT Solve to provide Nucleus which are devices to aid learning to people who can’t afford them. In a partnership meeting between MIT Solve and HP, who is a partner funding MIT Solve, Utiva was called as a benefactor to this partnership to come and discuss the progress so far.
From the progress made so far, the mission to democratise learning for girls and women in Nigeria is now being geared at full speed.
