When analyzing progress in Africa’s startup scene, attention focuses on the startups solving user problems and the investors who fund them. But for the past decade, one of the ecosystem’s most active players have been tech hubs.
The earliest examples, like iHub in Kenya and Co-creation Hub in Nigeria, started as spaces for developer meets and hacker communities, to foster creativity and collaboration. But from 117 hubs in 2015 to 618 in 2019, the number and model of tech hubs in Africa have changed to a point where it is no longer enough for hubs to assist the birth of innovation by merely offering co-working spaces or so-called incubation programs. Hubs need to actively drive startups towards scale and success.
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Originally published on Quartz : Original article