The Innovation Africa Digital Summit previously held in Ghana, Egypt, Uganda, Kenya and South Africa, aims to provide a platform where stakeholders in the African ICT industry and international technology innovators come together and network.
Past summits have brought about positive results to the host countries, having pave the way for investments, business deals and ICt developments and changing the perception of the ICT industry in Africa, said Adrian Hall, sales and marketing director at Extensia, at a press conference held last week.
Companies like Google, IBM, Oracle and Cisco have give contributions in previous summits. Extensia plans on covering most of the expenses for the summit to be held in Addis Ababa next year.
"Ethiopia will attract international ICT that can increase the flow of Foreign Direct Investment into the country," said Peter Gatkuoth Gey, state minister of MCIT. "The event will also serve as a means to promote our IT Park, which is under construction by international IT companies, and shows our interest in working with international technology innovators."
The principle idea behind the park is to assemble businesses in the technology sector in one place so that they can share information and expertise. The Ethiopian government has invested two million Birr for the construction of the park, during the 2010/11 budget year and will continue to fund the construction for the next four years until the project is complete, according to the PR office of MCIT.
The IT Park being built on a piece of land, approximately 200 hectare, behind the Ethiopian Airlines Airport and will help launch e-government services in Ethiopia. It will have call and data centres, satellite links and broadband internet services.
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