London-based start-up eyes Nigerian tech ecosystem with chatbot for business networking

London based tech company, Africalinked is eyeing the Nigerian tech market as it seeks to become the point of contact for anyone seeking access to Nigerian business partners and due-diligence information on them on the internet.

One of the unique features of the offering is the AI powered chatbot that lets users discover business partners instantly by speaking to an artificially intelligent bot that makes suggestions of who to speak to.

The tech startup seeks to provide business networking tools for Nigerian business people. The site is an innovative business directory of people, companies and products with 50,000+ signed up members to date.

Revealing the problems that the offering seeks to solve, Bertrams Lukstins, Founder, CEO of the firm, said, it “gives people access to business partners and due-diligence information on them. This is so valuable to anyone looking to grow their business.

“We’ve had people urgently looking for sewing machines, for instance. I recall one user asking others for a farm to regularly pickup eggs at”.

He noted that the firm is designed to help people just like these.”

Lukstins also added that he is particularly eyeing the Nigerian market and hopes to set up in 2018 because tech and non-tech companies are being built every year in the Nigerian market unlike other climes where solutions are not put forward for economies in need.

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“There’s a lot of talk about Nigerian startups and how Africa will be massive and similar. This is not just talk – it’s happening now! There already are great tech and non-tech companies being built every year in this market. It’s amazing – there are hundreds of millions of Africans coming online in the next years. For me, as a non-Nigerian, I also find it a lot more exciting and interesting to do business in Nigeria than in the West. It’s boring in London, everyone is doing the same thing and not solving real problems for economies that need it the most.”

Lukstins who informed that the platform is gradually on its way to having a 200k user base, also revealed that when they set up shop in Nigeria, they hope to collaborate with telecoms companies in the country to make AfricaLinked a part of their content packages.

Lukstins said; “Of course we are talking with telecoms to make AfricaLinked a part of their content packages and similar, the usual things you would see. But a lot of it is just talk. There’s no one concrete strategy for a startup of our stage. As a team, we value experimenting a lot – every week we brainstorm ideas and ways to engage, re-engage and acquire users, features to add and similar. So that’s our strategy – experiment, find different ways, learn what works and what doesn’t. This process never stops, even for big tech corporates.”

 

 

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