…Offers one-month free SoftKloud subscription to participants, plans from ₦10,000 monthly
Nigerian technology company, SoftAlliance, has thrown its weight behind Nigeria’s emerging technology ecosystem by providing young innovators at the 6th edition of Thrive in Tech with free access to its locally hosted cloud platform, SoftKloud.
The sixth edition of Thrive in Tech, held in Lagos, brought together young technology enthusiasts, developers and innovators focused on using technology to develop solutions to real-world challenges.
As part of its support for the programme, SoftAlliance offered every attendee one month of free access to SoftKloud, giving participants an opportunity to build, test and develop their technology solutions without the immediate cost of cloud infrastructure.
Speaking with journalists at the event, Babatunde Ojumu, Director, Technical Solutions at SoftAlliance, said the company’s participation was driven by the need to give young Nigerians the tools required to turn their ideas into practical solutions.
“We need to empower young people to solve our problems. This programme is designed to check out their creativity, let them come out and see what they can do and how they can solve our problems,” Ojumu said.
He noted that with Africa’s large youthful population, providing young people with the right technology infrastructure could help unlock innovations capable of competing on the global stage.
According to Ojumu, the goal is not simply to encourage young people to develop ideas but to give them the infrastructure to transform those ideas into viable products.
“If they are good enough, those solutions can even go global. We can start to build our own local unicorns,” he said
Ojumu explained that SoftKloud was developed to make cloud infrastructure more accessible to individuals and businesses, particularly those looking to build and host technology solutions locally.
While SoftAlliance has traditionally provided locally hosted technology infrastructure as part of its enterprise solutions, he said SoftKloud represents a shift towards making these capabilities available through a self-service model.
“Over the years, we have been doing a lot of these types of projects. We usually do it enterprise to enterprise, but we are now trying to empower people to be able to use a self-service model, going online and being able to buy the solutions themselves,” he said.
SoftKloud allows users to access and purchase technology resources online for building and hosting their solutions locally, providing an alternative for innovators who may otherwise depend entirely on foreign cloud platforms and incur foreign exchange costs.
After the one-month free subscription offered through the Thrive in Tech initiative, users can continue with SoftKloud plans starting from ₦10,000 per month.
Ojumu said the affordability of the platform was deliberate, particularly for young developers and startups who may not have the financial capacity to sustain expensive cloud infrastructure while still developing their ideas.
Looking beyond the event, Ojumu said SoftAlliance expects to see young innovators move from ideas to solutions that can create meaningful impact.
“Our expectation is solutions. We expect creativity. We expect disruptions,” he said.
He described young people as a major source of unconventional thinking, noting that some of the technologies that have transformed the world emerged from ideas that initially appeared outside the mainstream.
Referencing the rapid growth of artificial intelligence, Ojumu said the next major technological breakthrough could emerge from an African innovator.
“Maybe the next one is going to start from here. Something after will take over from AI. Maybe this is where it is going to start from,” he said.
SoftAlliance’s participation at Thrive in Tech reinforces its broader commitment to supporting local innovation and creating opportunities for young Nigerians to develop technology solutions without being held back by infrastructure costs.
With initiatives such as the one-month free SoftKloud subscription and affordable monthly plans, the company is positioning its cloud infrastructure as a practical resource for innovators seeking to build locally, develop affordably and take their solutions to the world.