Microsoft’s Africa Transformation Office (ATO) is announcing a two-day Xbox Game Studios Game Camp in Africa. To empower African creators to realize their potential in the gaming industry through unique learning experiences from industry leaders. The conference will run from July 15th – 16th, 2023.
The two full days events are themed “The Journey of a Game” and will offer multiple perspectives on the complex craft of game development. In addition, there will be online learning components to the camp, which will allow participants to engage with focused training modules on topics that align closely with their skills and interests, before and after the event.
While the camp is available online for all registered campers, Game Camp will also host in-person viewing events for 100 selected campers at the Microsoft campuses in Cairo, Johannesburg, Lagos, and Nairobi. These sites will offer viewing parties on-site panel sessions and opportunities to meet with Microsoft and Xbox personnel. Furthermore, teams or individuals with games to pitch are encouraged to do so.
To participate, individuals must be of legal age, reside in any country on the African continent, and be studying or working part or full-time in the field of software development, visual arts, 3D, music and audio, web design, narrative design, or professional project management. See the complete list of participation requirements at Xbox.com.
“At Xbox, we’re on a mission to bring the joy and community of gaming to the world’s 3 billion gamers and we recognize that Africa is home to the largest population of youth in the world, many who love to play. In 2019 I attended the opening of our Africa Development Centre and met with tech leaders, educators, and developers from across the region to understand their vision for the future of game creation. Through the inaugural Xbox Game Studios Camp Africa, in collaboration with Microsoft’s Africa Transformation Office, we have an opportunity to continue to deepen our relationships with talented developers in region and help African games studios realize their vision and role in the global gaming industry,” said Phil Spencer, CEO, Gaming at Microsoft.
The Xbox Game Studios Game Camp program is an initiative that unifies various Xbox initiatives under one umbrella where talent is celebrated and game developers are empowered to pursue their dreams.
“At Microsoft, we are excited to enable African game developers and creators to build faster through access to tools and resources, and to help their games be discovered by players in Africa and around the world. We want to grow strong roots in this significant market for gaming and game development. The ATO and Xbox personnel will also combine efforts to identify game studios to invest in through our Startups acceleration program and venture capital investment partners. I’m looking forward to seeing what innovative concepts this Game Camp produces,” says Wael Elkabbany, Strategic Initiatives Lead for Microsoft CEMA.
Global AI Bootcamp is here in Ghana. Interested in learning about artificial intelligence(AI), and Microsoft Azure? Then the Global AI Bootcamp presents that opportunity. Join others learners worldwide in the one day, free event at a local meetup near you.
The Global AI Bootcamp is a free one-day event. Organized by local communities all over the world that are passionate about Artificial Intelligence on the Microsoft stack. The next event takes place on the 14th of December 2019 on venues all over the world, supported by Microsoft.
There are three meetups taking place in Accra. Know of others we haven’t included? Share them with us.
Don’t forget to join the communities for updates on future events.
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Accra .Net user group community invites you to join them for the August meetup. The meeting themed INTRO TO MICROSOFT AZURE, will focus on Microsoft cloud platform Azure.
The invitation reads;
“Come join us as we demystify Microsoft Azure and learn how to develop modern cloud applications. from our seasoned and experienced speakers. Come connect, network, learn and share you love and passion for technology”
Visual Studio 2019 general availability is 2nd April 2019. Microsoft is hosting a virtual launch event with global local meetups.
Watch Livestream
Visual Studio 2019 will become generally available on 2nd April 2019 and Microsoft is hosting a virtual launch event. The event will stream live with local launch meetups across the globe between April 2nd and June 30th. A virtual attendee party called #CodeParty will also take place after the launch event with prizes up for grabs.
Microsoft’s launch event invitation reads:
“The Visual Studio 2019 Launch Event is Coming April 2nd, 9:00am PT(4pm GMT). Whether you’re a C#, C++ or Python dev & target the web, desktop or cloud, we’ll have demos & sessions for all the new goodies coming to Visual Studio 2019. Join us on April 2 at 4 PM PT (11pm GMT) for the virtual attendee party after #VS2019 launch and win prizes like a Surface Go, an Xbox, and gift cards from MobilizeNet, Telerik, Docker, & more! #CodeParty“.
Microsoft Partner Program Manager Scott Hanselman will be leading the Keynote session and promises “it’s something really special“.
“The #VS2019 launch is coming up next Tues April 2nd, and I’m deeply proud of the keynote. I hope it’s not like ANYTHING you’ve seen before. I’ve worked with @ch9 for weeks & while it’s just an hour, it’s something really special.” – Scott Hanselman
How can you join the Visual Studio 2019 Launch event?
You can watch the live events on Visual Studio’s Twitch, YouTube, or Channel 9 pages. (You can bookmark this page and refer to the launch date for links, we might just embed it here.)
Microsoft meets with Partners in Ghana at Partner CEO Forum to share Vision and Strategy
Microsoft hosts Partner CEO Forum event to show support and commitment to its business ecosystem in Ghana. This was evident with the high level representation of the Microsoft team in the room. From the General Manger Middle East and Africa Regional Multi Country Cluster, Ghana Country Manager and Partner Technical managers. As shared by Damola Solanke, Public Sector Sales Lead, it had been a long time since Microsoft spent time with partners in the country.
MCC CMO Enterprise Lead, Edmond Idoko getting the sessions underway said “We are here to show Support and commitment to our partners“.
Microsoft is committed to the success of our partner ecosystem. – Ibrahim Youssry
Our Success is to make you successful. It is a different mindset. – Ibrahim Youssry
For Ibrahim it was a pleasure to be in Ghana meeting with partners. Microsoft’s new subsidiary MCC covers 67 countries across Africa and the Middle East with a focus on enterprise business. Microsoft doesn’t have presence in all these 67 countries. He said our focus directionally behind the MCC is to leverage our partner ecosystem to drive their businesses so we scale our purpose.
“Microsoft wants to provide partners with much more assistance and support. With the new model Microsoft is committed to the success of our partner ecosystem. Our success comes with success to our partner ecosystem. To make you successful driving Microsoft business or your business on our technologies. It is a different mindset.” – Ibrahim Youssry
Ibrahim also shared that for the first time in Microsoft’s history in Africa it recorded an 18% growth.
Partners meet Ghana Country Manager at Partner CEO Forum
It is the value we can add to your organization. – Akin Banuso, Country manager Nigeria and Ghana
Partners were introduced to new Country Manager under the new MCC model Akin Banuso. Akin Banuso, Country manager for Nigeria and Ghana told partners “The future is bright”.
“In Ghana we want partners that are committed. Partners that will talk to customers about the solutions that really matter to them”. For Microsoft he said “it is the value we can add to your organization. The idea is we are going to scale through partners.”
Partners are the growth engine for Microsoft and Microsoft is the engine for partners.
– Ola Williams, Partner Technology Manager MCC
Microsoft MCC Partner Technology Manager Ola Williams told partners without you our partners, we can’t be successful. The new model is a desire to scale through partners across most of our markets. She mentioned Microsoft has made significant investments in new resources with capabilities to help partners achieve aim. The aim to jointly help customers in their digital transformation journey.
She iterated partners are the growth engine for Microsoft and Microsoft is the engine for partners. We want to scale through partners. We are investing to help partners and customers.
The whole conversation from speaker to speaker was on how Microsoft together with partners can achieve growth together.
