MTN Ghana is giving local developers, start-ups, and businesses an opportunity to explore and develop micro apps that can be hosted on the Ayoba platform through the launch of the Ayoba Hackathon 2021.
The Ayoba Hackathon forms part of the initiatives MTN is undertaking to drive its digital agenda where participants will get the opportunity to better place themselves as they take on the digital future that is now at hand.
Speaking at the launch at the MTN House in Accra, the Chief Marketing Officer at MTN, Noel Kojo Ganson noted that as part of MTN’s Ambition 2025, the business is ably positioning itself to be a digital company and events such as the Ayoba Hackathon will help to set the tone for the total transformation of the business.
According to him as MTN Ghana marks its 25th anniversary, with a keen focus on celebrating and rewarding the customer at every touchpoint, the Hackathon will make sure that the App developer community and start-ups are not left out of the celebrations.
“The winner for the hackathon takes home an amount of GHC 20,000.00, second place will receive GHC 10,000 whiles the third place winner receives GHC 8,000.00. Again, based on the value MTN places on partnerships, MTN has created an API marketplace where businesses and start-ups can upscale their Digital products,” he disclosed.
MTN Ghana launched Ayoba in April last year at the onset of the COVID 19 pandemic to allow customers access to chat with friends and family during the lockdown and access information on various themes, and it’s one of the main platforms MTN is using to drive its digital transformation agenda.
Ayoba is the African Super App designed for the African digital consumer, available to customers on all networks in Ghana. MTN customers can use Ayoba services at no data cost.
With over 1 million local monthly active users, the Applications and Partnerships Manager at MTN, Winnie Dzidonu believes that the Ayoba platform is ripe to launch more micro-apps through which developers, start-ups and businesses can reach out to over 1 million users who can enjoy their services without using their data bundles on MTN.
Ms. Dzidonu then challenged developers, start-ups and businesses to put on their thinking caps and zoom into the innovation zone and come up with solutions that can catapult Africa to the next level of digitization.
“We have a lot of confidence in our judges to select the right Applications that will feature on Ayoba,” she stated.
Prospective applicants have until Wednesday 25th August, 2021 to submit their applications.
