It’s no gain saying, Segun Fakuade is a trailblazing figure in Africa’s tech landscape, harnessing the power of Artificial Intelligence (AI) to transform various sectors across Africa. With a keen vision for transformative change and a passion for innovation, he is harnessing the power of AI to drive innovation and revolutionize key sectors across the African continent.
Through cutting-edge solutions and pioneering applications, the 21st Techno-Centurist and a software engineer with a specialization in AI is pushing the boundaries of what technology can achieve in Africa.
At first glance, Fakuade looks like your everyday software engineer; calm, soft spoken, maybe even a little camera-shy but give him few minutes and ask him about machine learning, and he lights up like a server room during a power surge.
As a leading voice in the tech community, his work embodies the fusion of technology and societal impact. By leveraging AI, he aims to address pressing challenges and unlock new opportunities for growth, efficiency, and progress in various industries in Nigeria and across Africa.
From predicting Premier League outcomes to pioneering life-saving solutions, Fakuade’s journey showcases the limitless potential of technology in shaping a smarter, brighter future for Nigeria and the African continent.
In 2013, the tech enthusiast made waves by winning the Microsoft Nigeria App Challenge. Since then, his journey has been defined by innovation that bridges the technical and the human. In 2021, while working with ARM, one of Nigeria’s leading investment management firms Fakuade was honoured with the firm’s highest internal award: “Most Creative & Innovative Staff”.
The recognition wasn’t just about clever code; it was about real impact, the kind of transformation that modern businesses need in a fast-moving digital world.
A Football Fan With Futurist Brain
While most football fans screamed at their TVs, Fakuade was busy crunching the numbers behind each goal. His side project, EPL Predict, is not your average match predictor. It’s a machine learning system that doesn’t just look at team history; it analyses a player’s health, match-day weather, fan sentiment, off-field drama (yes, even a player’s marriage or past transfers), and global trading data to predict outcomes.
“It wasn’t just about guessing the score; it was about understanding behaviour, stress, form, motivation then letting the data teach the model,” Fakuade explains.
That side project turned heads in the AI community, not because of the sport but because of the sophistication of the model. It showed that Fakuade was not just an engineer; he was an applied machine learning thinker.
In 2020, Fakuade’s football predictor took a backseat when an old mentor, Chime Chimezie-Uche, reached out with a challenge: “Could Segun lead a team to build West Africa’s first AI-powered contextual health risk prediction system?”
With a team of five engineers, he led the design of a system that analysed everything from medical records and biometrics to lifestyle and social factors, predicting chronic conditions like hypertension and diabetes before they became crises.
According to Fakuade what started as a theoretical idea became a production-grade mobile health assistant now in use across clinics in Nigeria. The app offers real-time health scoring, early alerts, and personalized lifestyle nudges and continues to improve. Thanks to his foresight in building feedback loops into the model from day one.
More Than Just Code: Systems That Serve
What makes Fakuade stand out is not just his ability to build, it’s his vision. At ARM, he led innovations in payment processing and user onboarding, helping streamline investment access for thousands.
Beyond fintech and healthcare, Fakuade has worked on a wide range of side projects: BizGuruh Chatbot, an AI-powered advisor for African entrepreneurs, A multi-lingual mobile bible app with support for Nigeria’s three major languages, Image Steganography, an open-source image encryption tool on GitHub, and technical blog articles like “Developing a Programming Logic for Human Signature Comparison” on Medium.
He is also a volunteer with AbilityNet UK, where he helps make tech more accessible to disabled individuals reminding us that his code often comes with a conscience. His contributions are poised to make a lasting impact on the continent, inspiring a new generation of innovators and entrepreneurs to explore the vast potential of AI in solving Africa’s unique challenges.
With expertise in software engineering and AI, Fakuade is well-positioned to spearhead initiatives that can reshape the future of Africa’s economic, social, and technological development.
