Google CEO Sundar Pichai met with Nigeria’s President Bola Tinubu in Paris on Wednesday to discuss a partnership aimed at expanding Artificial Intelligence (AI) skills in Nigeria. Pichai shared a picture of the meeting on X. He mentioned the immense potential of AI in Nigeria and Google’s commitment to enabling innovation and supporting the country’s growing tech ecosystem.
“It was great meeting with President Tinubu @officialABAT. We talked about the immense potential of AI in Nigeria, and how we can partner to expand AI skills, enable innovation, and support Nigeria’s growing tech ecosystem,” Pichai posted.
Minister of Communications, Innovation, and Digital Economy, Dr. Bosun Tijani, who was also present at the meeting, described the discussions as “extremely productive.” He emphasized that the Nigerian government remains committed to AI development and praised Google’s ongoing support in building AI skills and fostering innovation in key sectors.
Google has already launched two AI initiatives in Nigeria, in collaboration with the Ministry of Communications, Innovation, and Digital Economy. One initiative involves a N100 million AI Fund through the National Centre for Artificial Intelligence and Robotics (NCAIR) to support Nigerian startups leveraging AI. The second initiative includes a N2.8 billion grant from Google.org to Data Science Nigeria, aimed at accelerating AI talent development and upskilling youth, as well as under- and unemployed Nigerians.
The Nigerian government has recently released a National Artificial Intelligence Strategy document, currently under review before being adopted as a national policy. Additionally, the government has launched the AI Collective to facilitate collaboration on research, hackathons, and seminars, ensuring an inclusive approach to AI development.
Nigeria has also introduced its own Large Language Model (LLM) to position itself as a leader in AI innovation in Africa. This LLM is designed to support five low-resource languages and accented English, improving language representation in AI datasets and advancing the country’s AI capabilities.
