Products and ServicesIt is official: Vice President Yemi Osinbajo inaugurates Omeife, Africa’s first...

It is official: Vice President Yemi Osinbajo inaugurates Omeife, Africa’s first humanoid Robot

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By MyEngineers

On Friday in Abuja the Nigerian Government officially unveiled Omeife, Africa’s first humanoid Robot to boost Artificial Intelligence (AI) and technological development in Nigeria and Africa.The event hend at Transcorps Hilton Hotel, Abuja, FCT.

My Engineers previously reported that Omeife, the first African humanoid robot was developed by the Uniccon Group. Omrife is with near-human resemblance, language competency, movement, navigation, and behavioural intelligence using AI and computer vision capabilities.

The Vice President Yemi Osinbajo who unveiled Omeife, in Abuja, noted that the domestication of artificial intelligence would help serve the needs of citizens.

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Osinbajo, represented by the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Prof. Isa Ali Pantami, who was in turn represented by the Director General National Information Technology Development Agency NITDA Kashifu Inuwa said; “We are living in an exciting time of advanced technological advancement, where the science fiction of yesterday are becoming the reality in products and services of today.”

The Vice President also said that the federal government has the responsibility to ensure the success of the project and urged other stakeholders to key in to ensure the success of the Omeife project and develop new ones.

“We are ready to support you and commercialize this technology. We want to see it deployed in our farms, road construction and in our classrooms.I have directed the National information technology development agency, NITDA to partner with Uniccon Group for the commercialization of the Omeife technology.“

He affirmed the support of the Federal Government for the domestication of the technology urging the tech community to find measures that would ensure that Artificial Intelligence systems are built according to policies, regulations, laws and also domesticate such innovation in line with the Nigerian culture

The Vice President also allayed fears that technology or artificial intelligence would take over human jobs and render people jobless.

Speaking at the event, the CEO, Uniccon Group of Companies, Mr Chucks Ekwueme, said that Africa has been recognised for its contribution to the global tech ecosystem.

Ekwueme said that Omeife had the ability to speak eight different languages, which include: English, Yoruba, Hausa, Igbo, French, Arabic, Kiswahili, Pidgin, Wazobia and Afrikaans.

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“Through Omeife and our projects we are happy to play a part in helping businesses and people all over Africa to achieve their fullest potential by providing access to the most innovative technologies for efficiency.”

He said the six-foot-tall female African humanoid provides language as a service for businesses that need to integrate native African audiences, adding that it is a multipurpose and assistance robot.




“We are happy to play a part in helping businesses and people all over Africa to achieve their fullest potential by providing access to the most innovative technologies for efficiency.

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“It identifies and tags humans through face and facial expressions, paying attention to a specific item when required.

“It identifies objects, knows their characteristics and also calculates positions and distances of objects it sees,” he said.

He said that it is also child friendly as all vulgar words have been removed from her diction adding that the robot has an estimated revenue projection of 11.6 billion dollars in 3 years.




He appealed to the federal government and other stakeholders, to commercialize the technology which was built for the African setting.

In his words, “The challenge now is the commercialization of the technology, we need support from stakeholders not just to commercialize it but also patronage and usage. I’m calling on the government, investors, public sector and industries to see how they can partner with us.”

The High Commissioner of Rwanda to Nigeria, Stanislas Kamanzi, commended the innovation and called for the commercialization of Omeife the humanoid to boost Africa’s economy. “I challenge you to use this milestone to commercialize this innovation. Once we do that then we shall use this knowledge to transform the people to grow the economy of Nigeria which will develop the economy of Africa.“

Also, the Vice Chancellor of Summit University, Offa in Kwara State, Prod Musa Abiodun Aibinu, while delivering the keynote address stressed the need to promote Artificial Intelligence and Robotics in Nigeria saying; “Nigeria and Africa must democratize academic culture to bridge the digital divide by producing 21st Century thinkers, this will have huge positive effect on socio-economic growth of any nation.”

Also in attendance to represent the engineering community is President of Nigerian Society of Engineers, NSE, Engr Tasiu Saad Gidari Wudil along with representatives of Young Engineers Forum of Nigeria, YEFON, a body established by the Nigerian Society of Engineers.

Compiled by Isqil Najim

omeife 2

Africa’s First Humanoid Robot “Omeife” Set To Be Officially Unveiled In Nigeria

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