(Hong Kong, 17 August 2018) NetDragon Websoft Holdings Limited (“NetDragon” or “the Company”) (Hong Kong Stock Code: 777), a global leader in building internet communities, is excited to announce its newly established footprint in Africa.
NetDragon’s senior management team recently visited Nigeria to explore the opportunity to support the country’s digitalization in education with the help of NetDragon’s cutting-edge learning technologies. Nigeria’s senior government officials, including Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, Minister of State for Education Anthony Onwuka and Minster of Communications Abdur-Raheem Adebayo Shittu were the representatives for the country in this event.
During the visit, NetDragon and the Nigerian government have agreed to jointly release the “African Digital Education Initiative” in the near future. In addition, NetDragon has committed to assisting in Nigeria’s construction of “Three Platforms and One Centre” – national education resources public service platform, national teaching community network platform, national digital talent training platform and national future education experience centre, in order to support the country’s basic education, lifelong education and future education initiatives. Dejian Liu, Founder and Chairman of NetDragon, was also awarded “Nigerian Sustainable Development Goals Ambassador”.
Prior to this visit, Nigeria’s senior government officials had previously visited NetDragon’s headquarter located in Fuzhou, China to understand and experience the company’s education products and their integration with VR, AR and AI technologies. A memorandum of cooperation was signed by the two parties during the visit. The two parties are now moving forward to sign the official cooperation agreements, namely “Agreement of Cooperation between Nigeria and NetDragon” and “The Framework Agreement for Initiative of Digital Education in Africa”.
The unveiling ceremony of “N-Power Junior Smart Classroom Project” was also held this week. Headed by the National Social Investment Office of Nigeria, the project aims to improve the technical knowledge and skills of elementary and junior high school students, including programming, computer graphics design, robotics applications, networking and basic engineering applications. In support of this project, NetDragon decided to donate a smart classroom to the Nigerian capital Abuja. Equipped with NetDragon’s flagship products, including Promethean interactive panel, Edmodo, 101 Student Pad and VR Mysticraft, this smart classroom will serve as a use-case demonstration classroom for UNICEF and UNESCO.
On the back of the success of this visit, NetDragon plans to promote the construction of smart classrooms in over 100 districts outside of capital city Abuja in Nigeria. The Company also expects to explore similar partnerships within Africa with Kenya being the next destination.
Dejian Liu commented, “There are imbalances in educational resources around the world, not only in hardware investments, but also in allocation of “soft” resources. NetDragon, together with the Nigerian government, released the “African Digital Education Initiative”, hoping that the wisdom of Chinese Internet companies can help African students, and enable children from more regions to experience the fun of learning from advanced technologies.”
Dr. Xiong Li, CEO of NetDragon, added, “Through this China-Africa government-enterprise cooperation, NetDragon hopes to promote United Nations’ vision under its Sustainable Development Goals to “ensure inclusiveness and fairness in quality education and provide opportunities for lifelong learning for everyone”. Such vision perfectly echoes with NetDragon’s intention of expanding its education business on a global scale.”
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