Tech and Innovation: Participation is Useful, Ownership is Powerful

Guest columnist By Peter Mbah

Welcome to Enugu – a state that has always stood at the intersection of history from Nigeria’s colonial era. This is not just another tech conference. It is a reinforcement of intent.

When we gathered here last year for the inaugural Enugu Tech Fest, we were driven by conviction. We believed Enugu could become a credible node in Nigeria’s growing innovation ecosystem. Today is not just a continuation – it is a validation.

Distinguished guests, the world has crossed a line. What we are witnessing in our lifetime is nothing short of an economic renaissance powered by technology. In just three decades, companies that began in garages and dorm rooms have grown into some of the most valuable institutions in human history.

Technology no longer supports our lives in the background. It is no longer a sector. It is the operating system of how our lives function. If you are building anything today – a service, a business, a hospital, a school, a government – you are building on technology. And what we build today will shape our world.

Enterprises like Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, and Meta platforms have reshaped commerce, communication, entertainment, finance, governance, and even human relationships. The rise of these companies tells us something profound: the world economy is no longer driven primarily by physical assets, but by ideas, code, data, and innovation.

We are witnessing the acceleration of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Here in Enugu, we have made a deliberate decision: we will not be spectators in this revolution. We will be participants. We will be producers.

A century ago, Enugu powered Europe, West Africa and beyond with coal. Coal left this ground.  By the early ‘60s, coal production in Enugu had peaked at nearly one million tonnes annually. It fuelled railways, ports and industry. It created value, but that value accumulated somewhere else, for someone else.

Today, the resource is different. It isn’t buried beneath our feet. It’s inside us. The question is simple: Will we ship out our raw potential again? Or will we build systems that keep value here and send finished ideas to the world?

The difference between extraction and ownership is this: invention creates ideas. Innovation creates lasting impact.

Innovation rarely begins with brilliance. It begins with irritation. Netflix didn’t start as a streaming empire. It started because late video fees were annoying and physical stores were inefficient. When its founders tried to sell to Blockbuster, they were dismissed.

Airbnb didn’t start as a hospitality giant. It started with two founders who couldn’t afford rent and noticed empty rooms during a conference. Uber didn’t invent transportation. It fixed the friction in getting a ride.

These companies didn’t begin with ambition to change the world. They began with a problem they refused to ignore. The digital economy is not about fancy clichés. So, let us not chase invention for its own sake. Find what is broken. Understand it deeply. Fix it properly. Technology is the tool. Clarity of purpose is the advantage.

Here is the harder conversation. For decades, we have used platforms built elsewhere. We search on them. We store data on them. We build businesses on top of them.

Participation is useful. But ownership is powerful. If the core digital infrastructure of your economy lives somewhere else, then the leverage lives somewhere else too. When Tesla entered the automotive industry, it approached the vehicle as a software platform with hardware wrapped around it. Traditional automakers relied heavily on external suppliers for core systems and treated software as a feature. Tesla treated it as the centre of the product. That distinction changed its competitive landscape. Because Tesla controlled the architecture, it could update vehicles remotely, improve performance after purchase and gather data that refined future design. The result was structural leverage. Tesla did not simply sell cars. It controlled the technological layer that defined how those cars functioned and evolved. Ownership altered the economics.

But the real limitation arises in our minds. In 2007, when Steve Jobs introduced the iPhone, there were no App stores, no cloud-native startups scaling in weeks, no AI copilots writing code alongside you. Mark Zuckerberg built Facebook from a dorm room at a time when global digital infrastructure was still primitive by today’s standards. They were not superhuman. They were early and they were willing to think beyond what existed.

Today, the conditions are far more powerful. Over five billion people are online. Cloud infrastructure allows a startup to deploy globally in days. AI infrastructure accelerates development. A single laptop now outperforms what once required a lab. There has never been a lower barrier to building something that can reach the world. The constraint is no longer access. It is imagination and the courage to act while the window is open.

There was a moment not long ago when a small group of us sat around a table and asked a difficult question: What would it take to redesign Enugu State for the future? To build a resilient state where infrastructure works, institutions are digitised, schools produce problem-solvers and technology runs quietly through everything.

It sounded ambitious. Yes, it was doubted. But vision always sounds excessive at the beginning.

In three years, we moved from concept to execution. We strengthened security not only through manpower, but through AI-embedded systems that allow faster response and better oversight.  We invested in roads, transport and essential services. We expanded the state’s digital backbone and are building the foundation for reliable electricity. We moved core government functions onto digital platforms. Processes became traceable. Delays reduced. Decision-making improved. Governance began to operate with greater clarity and efficiency.

We introduced Geographic Information Systems into land administration. This has reduced processing time, safeguarded land rights, and brought credibility to our real estate market, earning national recognition for excellence in geographic information services.

But the deeper change is generational. A child now enters a Smart Green School where learning is active. Students work in teams. They research, design and test, using digital tools as part of everyday learning.

In secondary school, they continue exposure to robotics, artificial intelligence and applied engineering. At tertiary level, technology is not confined to a single faculty. It is embedded across agriculture, medicine, engineering, business and governance. The university system is structured around cross-disciplinary thinking, with technology as the medium through which subjects connect and advanced modes of study are applied.

Beyond the classroom, we are building innovation hubs where founders can work without interruption, access stable power and high-speed internet and move from idea to prototype in an environment designed for focus and execution.

An example is the Enugu Tech and Innovation Hub, the state’s flagship innovation infrastructure and institutional backbone of its startup ecosystem. The Hub integrates co-working spaces, incubation and accelerator programmes, AI research, investor networks, corporate innovation partnerships, and export-oriented digital services.

You do not have to conceive and nurture that great idea in the unlikeliest places like parents’ garages and high school dormitories. Our statewide learning system encourages collaboration across fields rather than isolation, with technological systems embedded throughout.

So, there is no reason the next breakthrough in edtech, fintech, agritech, or healthtech cannot emerge from Enugu. The question is not whether the opportunity exists. It does. The question is whether we will prepare ourselves to seize it. This is not about producing coders. It is about producing thinkers who build code.

TechFest is a visible expression of the momentum surrounding this transformation. The ecosystem that hosts it is permanent. We are creating a place where you can sit in Enugu and build for the world, where a young developer can serve customers in London, Nairobi or São Paulo.

Therefore, I say this to our youth: Master artificial intelligence; study robotics; learn cybersecurity; explore semi-conductor design; build products that solve real problems. But as you do so, remember something important: Tech revolution does not mean abandoning the old economy. It means transforming it.

Agriculture needs precision farming and supply chain analytics. Manufacturing needs automation and smart logistics. Healthcare needs telemedicine and data management. Mining needs geospatial technology.

Last year, we declared an intention. This year, we demonstrate progress. Next year, we must showcase scale. On this note, I commend the men and women who have worked hard to make this moment a reality, especially our youth, innovators, public servants, private sector partners, global technology leaders and every organisation that believes in the transformative power of innovation.

Let me particularly commend the Commissioner for Innovation, Science and Technology, Prince Lawrence Ezeh, for his diligence and tireless work in growing tech communities across Enugu and fostering partnerships that make gatherings such as this possible.

Technology will shape the future. The question is: who will shape technology? In this room are people who will build the systems that define how we live, work, move, trade and learn.

Let us build for necessity. Study the friction in agriculture. Research the inefficiencies in healthcare. Explore the blind spots in finance, culture and education. Find the constraint. And fix it properly. A hundred years ago, Enugu was known for what it extracted. Let this generation be known for what it designs.

Our future will belong to those who build it. Together, we will position Enugu not merely as a consumer of technology, but as its creator – a hub of ideas, and a beacon of digital leadership in Nigeria and beyond.

The journey has begun. The momentum is building. But the responsibility is ours.

Tomorrow is Here

•Being an address presented by the Governor of Enugu State, Dr. Peter Mbah, during the opening of the second edition of Enugu Tech Festival