Impact of Google Presence in Nigeria Internet Market

I was at the Google event for 3 straight days and covered the event; it was very interesting as hundreds of developers and internet business people in came around. Read more on Day One, Day Two and Day Three.

The Nigerian internet market is growing progressively; in recent stats, Nigerian internet users are over 11 million second only to Egypt in Africa. Social media adoption is also on the rise as more than a million Nigerians now use Facebook. Before this, Nigeria is widely known for scam in Nigeria, but now things have changed! With the rate of internet adoption and technology development, in the next couple of years, the perception would have changed.

Google, the brand!

Google is hugely a successful company with more than $171.95B market capitalization. World biggest internet service firm company and biggest advertising company in the world. If there is one thing Google is known for, that is search! Google’s goal is to organize world’s information and make them accessible from any device connected to the internet.  With its success in search, it has leveraged it to launch other successful products!

Google has to a large extent done well and has earned brand loyalty and trust! It has so far acquired 61 companies since 2001 and has projected to acquire at least 1 company per month. The acquisition is largely influenced by available cash-at-hand of over $23billion and strategic plans of Google to organize world information.

Google launched its first phone (Nexus One) this January and will be launching Chrome laptop this year. This has set it against Apple and indeed, (as I think) is a very strategic step by Google; because 1. the future is mobile 2. Platform is key (hence android) 3. Data is awesome 4. Mobile ad will be the future of Adsense (Google Acquisition of AdMob) the cash machine for the company. Innovation in the mobile hardware industry is not fast enough, and Google known for software prowess.

Google Around the World

Google has a mantra, which is “Don’t be evil” this has been their guideline around the globe. Google’s presence is felt everywhere in the world. With offices in 35 countries and serves the whole world except countries with censorship and restrictions.

Google in Africa

Google have offices in Egypt, South Africa, Kenya and now Nigeria. Google is increasing its presence in Africa and hope to accelerate development in the continent.

Google’s mission for Africa is to make the Internet an integral part of everyday life.

Make the Internet relevant and useful to Africans through;

• Content
• Education
• Relevance

Eliminate access as a barrier to all potential users
* Internet affordability
* Devices – affordable devices
* Latency – drastically improve latency

These were highlighted in the on-going G-Nigeria Day holding in University of Lagos, Nigeria.

Google in Nigeria and the future

Some of the understanding of Google about Africa and Nigeria is that;

• More than 50% of 16yr olds who are familiar with the Internet don’t use it due to “lack of access to a PC” (SSA ICT Survey)
• Africa: 14% of the world’s population but 2% of Internet users.
• Nigeria has one of the highest mobile adoption rates.
• Local content for African countries is scarce.

Google is willing to enable local developers to collaborate on content generation, API integration and other Google products so as to accelerate the growth. It is wonderful to note that, Google has youth-like corporation and supports open source projects and other technology development around the world.

Impact on Local Developer and Internet Market in Nigeria

Well, in as much as we understand that Google is not an NGO, so for every investment made, there should be corresponding return on investment (which is great for every business), so Google’s entrance into the Nigerian internet market will get the attention of other internet giant who are still skeptical about the Nigeria. I see it stimulating the growth as it has in other countries.

Google projected to acquire a company per month, yeah! So for developers who thinks that funding is a problem, get started with something now, bootstrap it with a little fund you can, if you get Google’s attention you can become a good candidate for acquisition. Imaging joining the Google EconomyL!

For other Nigerian internet companies who are yet to get creative in there web business, I think the faster you do that the better, 1. You could be acquired or compete with Google 2. You will become a late comer to the party. Google brand capital is enormous and anything it touches turns to gold, so how will Google turn Nigerian internet market to gold now?

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