Nigerian Kids Are Learning to Build the Future With Robots

In a workshop in Lagos, a child as youngas eight can begin to explore a question that has occupied scientists for generations: How does a machine work, and what would it take to build one?

The answer may begin with a few lines of code, an electronic component or a small robot responding to an instruction. But for the children taking part in programmes run by the SMAIR Foundation, a grassroots initiative focused on artificial intelligence and robotics education, the exercise is intended to lead somewhere larger: the possibility that they could one day design technologies of their own.

Faithful Ajah, who helped bring the foundation’s mission to life, recognizes something familiar in their curiosity. Before he became a physicist, data scientist and robotics innovator, he was a child who was rarely satisfied with an explanation.

“I was the kind of person who would not let most things slide,” recalls Ajah, “If you said, for example, the sun sets at six pm, I would ask why it wasn’t six-thirty pm. I was that kind of child.”

That instinct to question things took him from tinkering with electronics as a child to building websites in secondary school. He later earned a degree in physics, pursued research in particle physics, deepened his knowledge of quantum physics and studied data science to explore the intersection of quantum computing and quantum information technology.

His path illustrates one of the challenges facing countries seeking to develop their own artificial intelligence industries: technical innovation requires more than access to software. It depends on people who understand how technology works, can adapt it to local problems and have opportunities to experiment long before they enter the workforce.

For Ajah, that education should begin early.

From curiosity to invention

His search for practical ways to apply his interests led him to complete a data science programme through ALX Africa, an organization that trains technology professionals and entrepreneurs across the continent.

The programme gave his curiosity a more structured direction, he said, helping him translate an interest in science into projects with tangible results. He subsequently competed in a pan-African artificial intelligence hackathon hosted by Explore AI Academy and won.

“Finishing at the top of the hackathon was confirmation for me that the work I was doing was real,” recalls Ajah, “giving me the clarity and impetus to accelerate that work into something meaningful and measurable.”

The experience helped turn an individual pursuit into a broader undertaking. Ajah went on to help establish AI & Robotics Innovation Technologies, known as AIR, where he serves as head of innovations, and the SMAIR Foundation.

The two organizations operate in related but distinct areas. AIR is a robotics-engineering partnership offering training, consulting, robotics kits and laboratory setups for schools. The foundation focuses on children and young people, providing practical instruction in artificial intelligence, robotics, coding and other technology skills.

Together, they aim to introduce young people to technologies that can otherwise seem distant from their everyday lives.

The organizations say their educational outreach has exposed more than 1,000 children and young people to artificial intelligence. Their activities include partnerships with schools, curriculum-aligned programmes, robotics clubs and youth-focused events.

The ambition is not simply to teach children how to operate existing technology. It is to encourage them to understand the principles behind it and to imagine what they might build themselves.

That distinction matters as artificial intelligence spreads into industries ranging from agriculture and manufacturing to finance and health care. Countries that can develop technical talent locally may be better positioned to create businesses around the technology rather than relying exclusively on products developed elsewhere.

Nigeria has made developing that talent a national priority. Its Three Million Technical Talent programme, launched in 2023, aims to train three million technical professionals by 2027. The initiative reflects a wider effort to expand the supply of digital skills in a country with a large young population and an expanding technology sector.

But the distance between national ambitions and the opportunities available to individual students can be substantial.

A child needs more than an announcement of a training programme. Access to equipment, instructors, reliable electricity, internet connectivity and sustained opportunities to practise can determine whether an interest in technology becomes a career.

The International Telecommunication Union has identified unequal access to digital infrastructure and education as significant barriers to developing artificial intelligence skills across Africa. In September 2025, the agency announced a partnership with Google and the I Am Angel Foundation to expand AI and robotics education in African schools, including in Nigeria. The initiative was designed to combine practical training, robotics kits, localized curricula and teacher development.

The involvement of international organizations underscores the scale of the challenge. It also places initiatives such as SMAIR within a broader debate about who will have the skills to participate in the AI economy, and who will remain primarily a consumer of its products.

A generation looking beyond the present

Ajah sees the question in generational terms. He rejects the notion that young Africans are preoccupied only with immediate concerns, arguing that many want to build institutions and technologies that will outlast them.

“The common discourse is that my generation is filled with people who do not think five steps beyond their immediate future,” he says. “I believe that my generation wants to leave a legacy. We are aware of the potential that today’s technological tools have to materially change our communities right now.”

For Ajah, that legacy must be demonstrated through practical work.

AIR has been developing robotics applications intended to address problems in African environments, including agriculture. Earlier this year, according to the organization, its team won the Lagos qualifier and placed third in the Nigerian finals of the Robotics for Good Youth Challenge, an international competition organized through the International Telecommunication Union’s AI for Good initiative.

Its entry was an autonomous agricultural robot designed to help combat food insecurity. AIR says the product is now being prepared for market, with venture-capital funding supporting its development.

The company is also building computer-vision systems and developing robotics solutions tailored to local conditions.

Agriculture offers a particularly relevant test of whether robotics can move beyond demonstrations and into productive use. Automated systems can potentially help with monitoring crops, identifying problems and performing repetitive tasks. But turning a prototype into a commercially viable product requires testing, maintenance, financing and evidence that farmers can afford and benefit from the technology.

For African innovators, the challenge is not merely to produce a working machine. It is to develop one that can function in the environments where it is needed.

AIR’s agricultural prototype represents one attempt to make that transition. Its commercial prospects will depend on whether the technology can deliver reliable results outside the competition setting.

Building a market for robotics education

Another milestone for Ajah has been AIR’s appointment as the sole partner for Mechatron Robotics in Nigeria.

Mechatron Robotics is a franchise-based STEM education company offering robotics, coding and artificial intelligence classes to school-age students. The company says it has trained more than 50,000 students across nine countries.

The partnership gives AIR a route to expand its educational activities while connecting local schools with an established robotics-training model.

“If you had told me at the start of the year where I’d be today, I might not have believed you. Becoming the sole partner for Mechatron Robotics in Nigeria has been an incredible journey, providing me with valuable lessons about leadership and people, as well as robotics,” says Ajah.

The arrangement also points to a commercial dimension of the work. Robotics education requires equipment, instructors and suitable learning spaces, all of which cost money. Partnerships can help extend access, but their reach ultimately depends on the ability of schools and families to pay, or on sustained institutional support for students who cannot.

For a foundation seeking to make technology education accessible, that question is central. The children most likely to benefit from early exposure to robotics may not necessarily attend schools equipped with laboratories or have families able to purchase kits and private lessons.

Expanding access therefore involves more than increasing enrolment. It requires finding ways to reach students who would otherwise be excluded and ensuring that a first encounter with coding or robotics is followed by opportunities to develop those skills.

The broader industry has a similar problem. Nigeria’s growing interest in artificial intelligence has brought new training programmes, investment and policy initiatives, but the availability of advanced technical skills remains a concern. In a 2025 survey commissioned by SAP, 99 percent of surveyed mid-sized and large companies in Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa considered AI skills either very or extremely important. The findings indicate strong employer interest, though they do not establish how many qualified workers are available or how many jobs will ultimately be created.

The question facing educators and technology companies is how to turn that demand into a durable pipeline of talent.

For Ajah, the answer begins with children learning that they do not have to wait until adulthood to experiment, solve problems or build something useful.

The future, built locally

The SMAIR Foundation and AIR are still developing their programmes and commercial activities. Their reported reach is modest compared with the scale of Nigeria’s education system, and their long-term impact will depend on whether they can sustain their work, measure learning outcomes and help students progress from introductory classes to advanced study or employment.

Yet their approach reflects an important idea: technological capacity is not created only in research laboratories, universities or major technology companies. It also develops when young people are given the tools to ask questions, test ideas and learn from failure.

Ajah wants Nigerian and African innovators to become visible examples of what can be achieved with resources already available to them. His goal is not to suggest that local ingenuity can eliminate the need for investment, infrastructure or international collaboration. It is to challenge the assumption that meaningful innovation must begin elsewhere.

Through AIR and the SMAIR Foundation, he hopes to leave behind more than a company or a curriculum. He wants to help nurture a generation of young Africans who see technology not simply as something to consume, but as something they can create.

For a child encountering a robot for the first time, that change may begin with a simple question about how it works. What matters is whether someone gives the child the chance to find out, and the means to build the next version.

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