Nigerian Students Win Grand Prize in Huawei’s Global ICT Competition in China

Emma Okonji in Schenzhen, China

Two groups of Nigerian students from the Federal University of Technology, Minna, who participated in the Huawei ICT Competition 2024-2025 Global Final yesterday, won two grand prizes in the competition, which commenced on Tuesday and ended on Saturday with an awards ceremony in Schenzhen, China.

The two teams participated in the final contest in the Computing and Network technology tracks and won the grand prize, alongside other teams from different universities of the world.

Other teams that also won the grand prize came from different universities in China, Morocco, the Philippines, Brazil, Tanzania, Algeria, Singapore and Serbia.     

The competition, which had four categories in the areas of Network, Cloud, Computing and AI Innovation, was keenly contested by students from different parts of the world that made it to the final stage.   

The Huawei ICT Competition is an annual global event designed for students and teachers from colleges and universities. It offers an international platform for competition and exchange, enabling participants to strengthen their ICT knowledge, improve practical skills, and foster innovation using the latest technologies and platforms. Since its launch in 2015, the competition has been gaining significant momentum, with more countries and students joining each year. In China, it has been listed as a national competition for university students, while globally, it has been recognised as a key partner flagship programme by UNESCO’s Global Skills Academy.

Aside from winning the grand prize, other Nigerian teams, from the University of Ibadan and Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, also won first prize in the global competition. While the team from the University of Ibadan won in the Cloud technology contest, the team from Ahmadu Bello University won in the AI Innovation contest. In all, 36 teams from various universities won in the first prize category, which included teams from various universities from China, Nigeria, Algeria, Cameroon, Kenya, Malaysia, Brazil, Egypt, Poland, Madagascar, Vietnam, and Jordan. For the second prize category, 54 teams won, which include universities from Uganda, Ghana, Kenya, among others, while some universities were also named for the third prize category.

The winners were presented with trophies and medals, among other items.        

Victor Olamide Akande from the Federal University of Technology, Minna, who spoke with THISDAY Newspaper about their victory in winning the grand prize in the competition, said: “My team competed in the Computing track, and by God’s grace, we got the grand prize. It was an amazing experience for the team to go this far to clinch the grand prize, and I want to thank my team for the collaboration and also our instructors who nurtured us all through the preparation period and the competition period.

Tersoo Ushana Ezekiel and Manuwa Bala, members of the Network team from Federal University of Technology, Minna, who also won the grand prize in the global ICT competition, told THISADY that it was a keenly contested competition, followed by months of preparation. They said they were happy to make Nigeria proud in the global ICT competition.

One of the instructors from Huawei Academy, Mr. Knimi Bakna Musa, who was part of the instructors who mentored the students from the Federal University of Technology, Minna, said he was happy to see his students win the grand prize of the global ICT competition.

“Winning at that highest level is actually an achievement, and this is something remarkable. As instructors, we have done our best to guide the students, and the students did extremely well to win the grand prize category in the global contest,” Musa said.

Highlights of the award ceremony were the special awards for Women in Technology, Green Development, and the Most Valuable Instructor (MVI) award.

The Women in Technology award was presented to female teams from universities in Brazil, Kenya, Germany and Saudi Arabia, while the Green Development award was given to a team from the University of Ghana. The MVI award was given to instructors from China, Nigeria, Algeria, Brazil, Egypt and Bangladesh.