Telecommunications Solutions - Kaduna, Nigeria

Sep 26, 9:00 AM – 3:00 PM (UTC)

Africa’s Talking Open Community | West Africa Hub

Telecom is the backbone of African digital life. This hackathon challenges builders to create subscriber-facing and operator-grade tools for self-service, top-ups, support, and onboarding, using the same telco rails that power Africa’s Talking.

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About this event

Telecom is the backbone of African digital life. This hackathon challenges builders to create subscriber-facing and operator-grade tools for self-service, top-ups, support, and onboarding, using the same telco rails that power Africa’s Talking.

Telcos are the backbone of African digital life, serving enormous, mostly prepaid subscriber bases who interact through USSD menus, SMS, and airtime far more than through data. Customer care, self-service, and value-added services are constant battlegrounds for loyalty.

Participants can build self-service flows, balance and bundle management, value-added services, network-fault reporting, and subscriber engagement. The brief invites fresh thinking on how a subscriber experiences their operator, on any phone, in any language.

Objectives

  • Deliver subscriber self-service on any handset.

  • Streamline top-ups, bundles, and account self-service.
  • Improve support and onboarding with voice and USSD.

Addressable Challenges and API Links

    1.  USSD self-service menus: Balance checks, bundle purchases, and support from one code. 
    2.  Service notifications & OTP: Transactional alerts and one-time passwords.
    3.   Airtime distribution & top-ups: Build reseller and bulk top-up platforms.
    4.  IVR customer support: Self-service voice menus that resolve common issues.
    5.  Bundle management & sales: Let subscribers buy and manage data bundles.
    6.  Subscriber onboarding & KYC: Guided flows for registration and KYC capture.



    What Participants Should Expect

    •  Hands-on technical apprenticeship and API integration sessions.
    •  Networking with industry experts, founders, and tech innovators.
    •  Support from mentors and a community of peers to refine your ideas.
    •  Exclusive prizes, swag, and on-the-spot gig opportunities.


    New to Africa's Talking? Get started here.

    Developer Documentation (We welcome feedback)

    THEME: Telecommunications Solutions

    The winning solution will receive cash prizes as follows:

    • Winner - ₦80,000
    • 1st Runners Up - ₦60,000
    • 2nd Runners Up - ₦40,000

    Africa's Talking powers communications solutions across Africa with simplified access to telco infrastructure, developers use our powerful SMS, USSD, Voice, Airtime, and Mobile Data APIs to bring their ideas to life, as they build and sustain scalable businesses.


    Take It Further: Make It Marketplace-Ready

    Winning the hackathon is just the start. Turn your build into a packaged, reusable product that any business on the Africa’s Talking Marketplace can subscribe to and deploy as their own running instance.


    What Makes a Solution Marketplace-Ready

    A marketplace-ready solution isn’t just a working app. It’s a packaged, reusable, deployable product. Think of it less as “my project” and more as “a plugin other businesses can pay to deploy.” To qualify, your submission should meet the following:

    •  Containerized and pushed to the registry. Built into a Docker image and pushed to the AT-Container registry (manual push or a CI/CD pipeline via GitHub, GitLab, or Bitbucket).
    •  Built on at least one AT product. Integrate with one or more of USSD, Voice, Airtime, Insights, Bulk SMS, Premium SMS, or Mobile Data.
    •  Reusable by many. Unlike a private callback, a marketplace plugin is publicly listed and deployable by any customer, and each gets their own isolated instance with its own URL (e.g. https://your-app.africastalking.marketplace.dev).
    •  Clearly presented. It needs a name, slug, short and long descriptions, and a logo (required; a missing logo blocks submission).
    •  Configurable. Expose any environment variables customers should set at deploy time, and declare your database needs (default: none).
    •  Monetizable. At least one pricing plan is required, each specifying currency, amount, billing frequency, and a description.
    •  Categorized and compliant. Tag it with at least one AT product and industry (Gaming, Education, Clean Energy, Fintech, Government, or Other), and accept the Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.

    In short: if a stranger could find your plugin, pick a pricing plan, click Deploy, and get a live working instance, then it’s marketplace-ready.


    How to Submit Your Marketplace Solution

    1.  Sign in to the Marketplace at marketplace.africastalking.dev (create an account first if needed).
    2.  Build and push your image. Containerize your app and push it to the AT-Container registry using the credentials and instructions in the submission form.
    3.  From the homepage, click “Create Your Own Plugin.”
    4.  Complete the submission form, section by section: container registry credentials; basic plugin info (name, slug, short + long description, logo); technical details (image URL, optional Git repo, database); environment variables (optional); categorization (AT product + industry, at least one); pricing plans (at least one with currency, amount, frequency, description); and accept the Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.
    5.  Submit. A confetti animation confirms success; an error toast means something needs fixing (most often a missing logo or required field).
    6.  Track approval under “Manage Plugins” in the side menu, where you can view review status, see admin feedback, edit, archive, or publish your plugin.


    Agenda:

    1. Warm-Up

    • Introductions
    • Form teams where need be.
    • Feedback
    • Feature requests

    2. Building/hacking: Code in GitHub/GitLab/BitBucket and deploy in Docker/Automated CI/Travis CI/Bamboo

    Note: This section needs additional setup.

    Upon commit, the repository is built and deployed to an accessible web server or an S3 bucket.

    • Technology used.

    3. Demonstration and Wrap-up

    Opportunities:

    • Network
    • Innovate
    • Access to our Talent bench (You can get a job or a gig on the spot)

    4. Publish on the Marketplace: publish your solution on the Africa’s Talking Marketplace to be considered a winner.

    Submit your Idea:

    Hackathon idea submission form (This form should be filled by all hackathon attendees planning to present it will be used to reach out to them later)

    Gigs:

    We would love to reach out to you so that you can build for our customers, please fill out this form with details to ensure we have your details:

    GIG/HACK DEVELOPER PORTFOLIO FORM (Anyone open to take Gigs should fill this form and it can be shared with developer attendees of AT events)

    Join the community channels:


    Africa's Talking community allows developers to learn skills for the modern-day African Developer. We are language and framework agnostic. All developers are welcome. This is where Africa's Talking developers community meets to build, learn and exchange knowledge.

    Mentors

    • Abubakar Saleh

      Africas Talking

      Community Lead

    • Sanusi Abdulkadir

      Africa's Talking Community Lead

      Software Engineer

    • Muhammad Abdulkadir

      Stonetech Innovation Hub

      Head of Startups

    • Shuaib Lawal Khalifa

      Soft School

      Co-founder & Product Designer

    • Maryam Muhammed

      Quantum Heart & Droneforge

      MD & Co-founder

    • Nasiru Mustapha

      iT Central

      CEO & Founder

    When

    When

    Saturday, September 26, 2026
    9:00 AM – 3:00 PM (UTC)

    Agenda

    9:00 AMWarm-Up
    9:30 AMBuilding/Hacking
    1:00 PMLunch
    2:00 PMDemonstration and Wrap-Up

    Organizers

    • Sanusi Abdulkadir

      Community Lead Kaduna, Nigeria 🇳🇬

    • Jeremy Acquaah

      Africa's Talking

      Community Lead Ghana 🇬🇭

    • Husseini Mudi

      Software Developer/Community Manager

    • Faith Ono

      Abuja Community Co-Lead

    • Abdulsalam Muhammad Abubakar

      Community Lead Kano

    • David Adegbite

      Abuja Community Co-Lead

    • Sheriffo Jarju

      Gambia Community Lead

    • Ibrahima Sylla

      YeleGroup

      Ivory Coast Community Lead

    • Yusuf Saheed

      Community Lead Lagos, Nigeria

    Global sponsor

    Africa's Talking logo

    Africa's Talking

    Partner

    IT Central Limited logo

    IT Central Limited

    CONTACT US