Waziup

WaziLab (powered by Waziup e.V.) is building Africa's first integrated AI and IoT training and innovation infrastructure and ecosystem, connecting digital labs, research institutions, and startups through a virtual learning and prototyping platform, 'Learning by doing'. Founded by Dr.-Ing Abdur Rahim, an innovator, engineer and ecosystem builder specializing in IoT capacity building and digital transformation, the organization addresses one of Africa's key challenges – the fragmented access to technical infrastructure, training, and innovation ecosystems needed to build sustainable digital economies. WaziLab's hybrid digital infrastructure integrates Edge AI & IoT hardware with a virtual laboratory, AI & IoT course library, hardware simulation tools, and remote collaboration modules, enabling digital innovation hubs (DIHs), technical universities, and startups to co-develop scalable, market-ready affordable solutions. The platform supports blended learning, hands-on prototyping, and certification programmes, bridging the gap between research, entrepreneurship, and applied AI training. Backed by partnerships with African & European DIHs, and national vocational education centers (VETs) in Kenya and Tanzania, WaziLab's roadmap includes the deployment of hybrid digital labs, AI & IoT upskilling pipelines, and Africa–Europe startup acceleration networks supporting over 30 DIHs across the continent. With its focus on AI capacity building, IoT integration, and sustainable innovation, WaziLab is building the digital backbone for Africa's next generation of innovators – ensuring inclusive, scalable access to AI education, infrastructure, and entrepreneurship. In partnership with AI HUB for Sustainable Development, Waziup would like to promote WaziLab across Africa to ensure the local accessibility and availability of AI and IoT skills and capacity. This will empower local innovation ecosystems and tech communities to create impactful and responsible IoT and AI applications that are locally owned.

Udu Technologies

Udu Technologies is democratizing access to high-performance GPU infrastructure across Africa, enabling researchers, startups, and governments to build and deploy AI systems locally. Founded by Alexander Tsado, a former NVIDIA PM who helped launch the company's global cloud AI business, UduTech is tackling one of the continent's deepest bottlenecks: the scarcity and high cost of compute power that limits Africa's participation in the global AI revolution. Through its GPU-as-a-Service (GPUaaS) platform, Udu Africa GPU Hub, and Udu-Rayda marketplace, the company provides affordable, right-sized GPU access up to 40% cheaper than global providers while integrating financing, consulting, and hardware sourcing to suit Africa's energy and connectivity realities. Active in Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, and South Africa, Udu Technologies partners with governments, donors, and universities to expand compute access for innovators and AI labs. Selected for both the AI Hub's Infrastructure Builder and Compute Ready programmes, UduTech will scale its GPU infrastructure while optimizing AI deployments that showcase how local compute unlocks innovation, embodying the virtuous cycle where infrastructure enablers become innovation leaders, laying the foundation for Africa's moment where breakthrough AI thrives because compute constraints were overcome.

RYDLR CLOUD SERVICES LTD

Rydlr Cloud Services Ltd is developing a Tier IV Green Data Centre and hybrid GPU cloud network in Kenya, designed to anchor Africa's digital transformation through sovereign, sustainable, and high-performance computing. Founded by Ted Iro Opiyo in 2020, the company unites expertise in cloud infrastructure, artificial intelligence, and renewable-energy systems to address one of the continent's most urgent challenges: access to affordable, sovereign cloud and GPU capacity for data-intensive industries. Rydlr's architecture integrates Tier IV data-centre design, GPU-as-a-Service platforms, and renewable-powered HPC clusters to deliver scalable compute resources for AI, aviation, defense, healthcare, financial services, and the creative economy. Its flagship project, the Kipeto Green Data Centre, a 50 MW wind- and solar-powered facility + 50MW cooling, networking and storage overhead, currently in the MOU and development phase, aims to set a new benchmark for sustainable, high-reliability digital infrastructure in Africa. Supported by strategic partnerships programs with NVIDIA Inception Program, Microsoft Founders' Hub, Google Cloud Startups Program, IATA Start-up Strategic Partnerships, Cloudmania ISV Program and Liquid C2 Falcon Program, Rydlr's roadmap includes multi-country expansion, digital-twin platforms, and GPU cloud access for advanced AI model training and simulation. With its focus on data sovereignty, energy efficiency, and Tier IV-grade reliability, Rydlr Cloud Services Ltd is positioning Kenya as a regional hub for secure, sustainable, and sovereign AI infrastructure, ensuring Africa leads, not follows, the next era of digital transformation.

Horus Lab

Horus Labs is building Africa's next-generation digital backbone through modular, renewable-powered edge data centers tailored for AI and sovereign cloud applications. Founded in 2022 by Raymond U. Ononiwu, an engineer and former Microsoft veteran, alongside co-founders Ludovic Bernad (COO) and Dennis (Chief of Staff), Horus Labs is tackling one of Africa's most pressing challenges: the absence of localized, sustainable compute infrastructure. Headquartered in Kigali, Horus Labs occupies a critical market position that is too technical for traditional colocation players yet too specialized for hyperscalers. The company transforms empty colocation facilities into what Raymond describes as a "fully-furnished hotel" for African AI, delivering end-to-end GPU compute that stays on the continent. Partnering with Schneider Electric as the principal design and delivery partner, along with Control Plane Corporation, the company integrates prefabricated, liquid-cooled Tier III-ready modular data centers built specifically for African climates. The infrastructure includes a self-serve cloud portal and API that enables customers to spin up GPUs locally through bare-metal, VMs, Kubernetes, and GPU-as-a-service options with pay-per-hour billing. Crucially, Horus has integrated local mobile-money and banking rails through PawaPay, unlocking access for the 80% of users without international cards and eliminating USD payment frictions. The company has secured financial letters of support for up to US$55 million on a phased basis, with the first phase of approximately US$19 million. Its flagship 1MW facility in Kigali, Rwanda, is scheduled for construction and commissioning around Q3-Q4 2026, featuring a 256-GPU inference cluster as a Year-1 milestone. The facility will scale to 8MW by 2029, with expansion plans across nine countries including Kenya, Ghana, and Nigeria. Beyond infrastructure, Horus Labs deploys forward-deployed AI engineers for co-development engagements with governments, banks, and SMEs, turning national health systems, local call centers, and satellite agriculture data into production AI models. This approach delivers operational outcomes, not just infrastructure, unlocking sovereign use cases across agriculture, energy, health, and education where data and workloads remain in Africa for compliance, lower latency, and local control. Selected for both the AI Hub's Infrastructure Builder and Compute Ready tracks, Horus Labs will scale its foundational infrastructure while optimizing AI solutions that demonstrate local compute's transformative power, proving that Africa's infrastructure builders can simultaneously be its most innovative users, creating a self-reinforcing ecosystem where building and deploying AI strengthen each other.

Flapmax

Flapmax is building Africa's sovereign AI backbone – a distributed, energy-efficient, and quantum-ready compute network spanning the African continent. Founded by Dr. Dave Ojika, an AI and quantum computing researcher with a PhD in computer engineering and two decades of experience in advanced computing and ecosystem development, the company addresses one of Africa's most critical challenges: the lack of sovereign AI infrastructure and localized compute capacity. Flapmax's architecture integrates cloud-scale modular datacenters, classical–quantum hybrid compute clusters (HQAC), and AfricaLM – a family of multilingual foundation models trained on curated African datasets. This combination enables governments, enterprises, startups, and universities to access optimized sovereign AI compute, train and deploy models in local languages, reduce dependence on foreign hyperscalers, and empower nations to steward their own AI futures. Backed by partnerships with Microsoft, AMD, IBM, Intel, Dell, and HPE, and aligned with national AI strategies in Ghana, Ethiopia, and Tunisia, Flapmax's roadmap includes Phase 1 sovereign datacenter deployment in Ghana, followed by expansions in East and North Africa, and the creation of a Pan-African, space-augmented sovereign compute fabric interlinking governments, universities, and industry by 2030. Flapmax's datacenters are designed to integrate renewable and low-carbon energy sources, supporting Africa's transition to sustainable compute infrastructure. With its focus on energy efficiency, quantum readiness, and multilingual AI sovereignty, Flapmax is laying the foundation for a self-sustaining African AI ecosystem – one capable of generating its own research, infrastructure, and innovation capacity from the ground up, from silicon to software. *Flapmax seeks partnerships that strengthen government facilitation, green-energy integration, and the cross-border deployment of sovereign AI infrastructure. We also welcome collaboration with global research institutions and development finance partners to accelerate AI-quantum HPC, multilingual AI, and workforce development across the continent.

EverseTech

EverseTech is democratizing AI adoption across Africa by delivering locally hosted, end-to-end AI-as-a-Service (AIaaS) solutions that combine infrastructure access with technical expertise. Founded in 2021 by Michael Michie, a cybersecurity and AI specialist, the company is addressing one of the biggest barriers to AI transformation–the high cost and complexity of infrastructure ownership and skilled talent. Through a pay-as-you-go or subscription model, EverseTech provides clients with on-demand GPU infrastructure, model hosting, and expert teams to build, fine-tune, and monitor AI systems. This approach allows businesses and governments to adopt AI without heavy upfront investments, significantly reducing failure rates for AI projects. Headquartered in Nairobi, with partnerships like Atlancis Technologies, EverseTech has already deployed 1.1 TB of GPUs and initiated seven proof-of-concept projects across industries from media and education to finance and food. Its vision is to become Africa's leading AI infrastructure provider–building a distributed, scalable compute network that empowers enterprises to innovate responsibly and affordably. By merging local hosting, open-source foundations, and human expertise, EverseTech is ensuring that AI in Africa is accessible, sustainable, and built for African realities. Eversetech would be seeking support in access to 30 GPUs (H100 and A100 Nvidia GPUs) to scale our infrastructure to meet our growing demand and/or funding of 400,000.00 Euros to support team expansion, operational overheads and run way for about 16 to 18 months.

Amini AI

Amini is Africa's first AI-native infrastructure company, building the compute, connectivity, and data backbone for the continent's digital economy. The company designs sovereign, distributed systems that allow nations and enterprises to own their data, run AI workloads locally, and collaborate securely across borders. Amini's architecture is built for true sovereignty, with 100% local deployment, sovereign ownership of data and compute, and API-first interoperability that accelerates adoption. Amini also partners with governments to deliver national platforms that prioritize local capability building, with clear handover plans, embedded experts, and upskilling programs. Countries can progress from infrastructure setup to live AI applications within weeks through integrated upskiling and rapid deployment cycles. Amini's mission is clear: to connect 3 billion people to the digital economy by powering the future of data-driven nations across the Global South. Amini is setting the standard for how emerging markets build, govern, and scale AI infrastructure, enabling billions to access and shape the future of the digital economy. By joining this program, Amini aims to refine its strategy to position itself for scale, expand government and DFI relationships to unlock deployment pathways, strengthen ecosystem partnerships to enhance its offering, and engage investors to secure capital

AI Grid Sol

Africa Compute Fund

Africa Compute Fund (ACF) is building a sovereign, GPU-powered compute network across Africa, designed to democratize access to high-performance AI infrastructure for startups, enterprises, governments and research institutions. Founded by Ian Wambai, an AI infrastructure specialist with deep experience in compute-as-a-service platforms, ACF addresses one of Africa's most urgent challenges: the limited access to affordable, localized GPU compute. Through its flagship platform Monarch, ACF provides GPU-as-a-Service, enabling clients to train, fine-tune, and deploy AI models at a fraction of the cost of global hyperscalers. Its architecture integrates localized GPU clusters, colocation in Tier III data centers, and energy-efficient power systems, delivering low-latency, sustainable compute to AI-driven industries such as fintech, healthcare, agriculture and research. Selected for both the AI Hub's Infrastructure Builder and Compute Ready programmes, ACF is expanding Nairobi's first large-scale GPU supercluster to Nigeria and South Africa, while already providing compute coverage in 20+ African countries. ACF is seeking partnerships that enable direct alignment with ministries and regulatory bodies, development banks, and private-sector leaders to deploy compute resources across Africa. ACF is designing and implementing the frameworks, operational systems, and strategic partnerships that will underpin Africa's AI ecosystem for the decades to come, systems that governments, businesses, and innovators across the continent will rely on to access AI at scale.

AfCEN

The Africa Climate and Energy Nexus (AfCEN) is building the continent's first integrated, AI-first platform connecting renewable energy infrastructure, green finance and AI-powered data ecosystems to drive sustainable and sovereign compute across Africa. As the Africa partner-platform within the UNDP AI Hub's infrastructure track, AfCEN is designed as a development operating system – a common rail on which governments, DFIs, investors and innovators can build and scale solutions. Founded by Joseph Nganga, who led the inaugural Africa Climate Summit in 2023, AfCEN tackles a foundational challenge for the continent: the lack of affordable, low-carbon energy and trusted digital infrastructure to power the next generation of AI and data-intensive services. AfCEN's architecture links clean energy generation, climate-aligned investment pipelines and AI-based mapping tools that identify optimal sites for green data corridors, renewables-powered data centres and compute hubs that safeguard African data sovereignty. Through programmable project-preparation rails, risk analytics and impact tracking, AfCEN works with governments, investors and regional blocs to align renewable deployment with digital expansion and local industrial strategies. Backed by its collaboration with the UNDP AI Hub for Sustainable Development, AfCEN's roadmap includes flagship initiatives such as the Lobito Corridor and an emerging programme with the Coalition of African Ministers of Finance and the African Green Climate Finance National Designated Authorities Network (AfDAN) to design AI-ready, green infrastructure country platforms in an initial set of pilot countries. Together, these initiatives showcase how clean energy, digital infrastructure and AI-enabled planning intersect in real project pipelines, and how data-driven, climate-smart infrastructure can be embedded in sovereign decision-making. With its focus on energy sovereignty, climate-smart compute and Africa-owned data infrastructure, AfCEN is laying the foundation for Africa's green AI and broader agentic economy – where data, power and prosperity evolve together, and where African institutions and communities co-design the tools built on top of the platform