Nairobi gears for Connected Africa Summit with focus on digital economies

High-level attendees from the public, commercial, academic, and development sectors are anticipated to attend the four-day summit, which is being organised by the ICT Authority of Kenya and will take place at the Edge Convention Centre.

The goal of the event is to promote quantifiable advancements in Africa's digital economy through collaborations in addressing cybersecurity, digital public infrastructure, and artificial intelligence.

Stakeholders will reflect on Africa’s urgent priorities in building resilient, inclusive, and future-ready digital economies. Additional agenda themes will include digital identity, fintech, connectivity, smart infrastructure, cloud, data governance, and innovation ecosystems.

According to ICT Cabinet Secretary William Kabogo, the summit expands on earlier iterations and focuses on execution and concrete results.

"This year, delivery has to become measurable,” Kabogo stated at a press conference in Nairobi.

The summit's goal, according to ICT Authority Chief Executive Officer Jessy Maruti, is to combine innovation with access to markets, capital, and skills in order to open up opportunities for Africa's youth.

“The global digital economy presents immense opportunity for our youth. Our focus is to unify innovation across Africa so that young people can access skills, investments and markets that enable them to create enterprises, secure jobs and participate meaningfully in the digital age,” said Maruti. 

Adam Lane, Policy and Partnerships Lead at Huawei Technologies Kenya echoed these sentiments while announcing their participation and support for the summit.

“Africa’s digital transformation must be powered not only by technology, but by skilled people who can build, manage and innovate with it. That is why talent development is a major focus for Huawei at this year’s Summit. We remain committed to supporting universities, TVET institutions and professional training programmes, while initiatives such as the Huawei ICT Competition continue to nurture the next generation of digital leaders for Kenya and the wider continent,” said Lane. 

On his part, Frankline Okata, the Chief Enterprise Business Officer at Safaricom argued that the conversation is shifting from ideas to execution, from pilots to scale, and from isolated systems to integrated digital ecosystems that create measurable impact.

“Our collaboration with ICT Authority demonstrates what is possible when public and private sector players work together to accelerate national digitisation and deliver better outcomes for citizens,” said Okata.