As a passionate Pan-Africanist with a front row seat to global change in media and entertainment consumption, production and investment, I have long believed that those who have not been heading towards the African subcontinent for investment opportunities in the field of media technology and entertainment will ultimately miss the next big change in global economic growth and the associated returns.
For social entrepreneurs like me who have invested deeply in social mobility and have had the impact of improving society’s most marginalized economic outcomes, this issue goes beyond obvious macroeconomic changes, or even the magnets decorated with capital set to seize opportunities. Instead, a better question is: Who will benefit from climbing in Africa? It is now accelerated by advances in artificial intelligence, virtual and immersive media, and reduced brick and mortar infrastructure requirements for the growth of multiple sectors of media, technology and entertainment Nexus.
This dizzying pace of transformation blends well with the rapidly dispersed global media environment that moves away from US-centric domination as content production budgets move to migrate to plague global domination, as economic slowdowns, wages rise, and global political tensions compete for China’s formerly unchanging and unchanging potential. It promoted the “remaining rise” that critics have long predicted. In this changing landscape, the emergence of Africa as a global powerhouse of manufacturing, technology and creation is no longer merely a possibility and inevitable.
This raises the following obvious question: Which infrastructure and skilled talent pool will drive so many well-known economic renaissances? The answer lies in the combination of factors. There is primarily Africa’s well-documented proficiency to leapfrog the gaps in Africa’s traditional infrastructure, adopting the most efficient solutions of the day, and to be at the forefront of transformation.
While the major western economies are still working on CDMA, from adopting the GSM revolution in telecommunications to achieving one of the world’s fastest adoption rates for mobile financial services in both urban and rural areas, the continent has set a strong precedent to harness advances to shape future tregents.
Extending the same sensibility across mediatech, entertainment and creative economies can accelerate the pace of increasing visible, measurable impact within an ecosystem with well-documented global appeal and market demand.
With proven growth potential across the global and local markets, this Nexus will be the most strategic area for the continent of manufacturers to utilize for sustainable growth.
AI & Immersive Media for Virtual Production: A Creative Leap in Africa
Today, Africa’s media and entertainment sector generates around $4.2 billion a year, growing growth rates above other sectors on the continent. The forecast shows that if a tailored deployment of certain key factors is implemented, more than $250 billion in global film and entertainment revenues will be generated from Africa, over the next five years, over $250 billion.
Moves primarily fast, deploying large numbers of luxury initiatives across the sector, adopting advances in AI-driven, immersive media, strengthening capabilities in skilled workplaces with skilled skill sets to bypass infrastructure gaps, becoming the leading economy of India’s production in Africa, leading economy of creative and media production. The outsourcing market, its competitiveness.
Africa was Africa as a global mecca for virtual production, and 20 years ago, it was not so much a concept as it could be predicted that India would become the backbone of global software engineering and could not predict fluid dominance of the API market. India won with a combination of favourable tax policies regarding employee training, cheap labor and technology imports.
Today, the African subcontinent shares many of India’s advantages, and they do the same for a creative economy as the world of music, fashion, film, games, art, advertising, design and events. With the rise of AI and virtual media, Augmented and Augmented Reality (XR) and (AR) are changing the way audiences experience and consume entertainment globally.
What once seemed like a clear creative sector is fused into a singular, immersive ecosystem that seamlessly blends digital and physical reality. This provides the opportunity to build cheaper, technology-centric infrastructure that will disrupt these sectors in one cohesive park that will drive growth while expanding Africa’s impact on AI and virtual media over the next decade.
The growing relevance of attendance and its influence will bring Africa to Metaverse Table seats, and at a minimum, American space designers can stop passing Nairobi as Nigerian Lagos in games and blockbusters.
Nigeria is set up to present a formidable starting point for AI-powered transitions as a continent’s tested creative neurological centre, and to drive future progress. Therefore, it must lead to the existing benefits of globally thriving cultural relevance and the opportunities it presents, to a massive amount of skill initiative that ignites policy, infrastructure, and transformation. As we embark on this trajectory, it is worth exploring Nigeria’s undeveloped knock-on perks.
The nature of immersive media can help with consistent high-class skills that do not require previous degrees. This helps to strengthen the majority of the large NEET population of creatively oriented members (not educational employment or training). Demographic Advantages – A lot has been written about Nigeria’s 240 million population and its median age of 18.1 is similar to the entire continent. Aside from nuclear events and shocking Earth with asteroids, there is nothing to save much of the global North, Western Europe and East Asia from the ongoing demographic time bombs.
The opportunities for AI, virtual design, immersive skills, and the possibility of giving Africa a metaverse table seating is very important. Due to our absence at our table, Metaverse, like other platforms before it, is coded with a bias that ultimately undermines Africans. The biases built into today’s technology already cost billions of revenues. In Metaverse, the interests are even higher, not just money, but the elimination of cultural identity for 1000 years and the loss of national autonomy. Building a generation of young Africans skilled in virtual design and metaverse architecture is just as crucial to today’s sovereignty as maintaining the standing army.
Forex revenue: The biggest opportunity lies in the West in search of being cheaper and cheaper in emerging markets where talent-rich, low-cost and immersive media infrastructure investments could bring exponential returns. Africa has a deep, young, tech-savvy population and a deep, storytelling tradition, making it the perfect incubator for this shift.
Purchasing power: The economy is built by people, the potential as a producer in Africa, and the consumer market is upward in itself, with intracontinental trade policies and new infrastructure set to promote the free movement of people, goods and services. Socio-Political Perception: Data is clear about the changing trends in leadership that will undoubtedly arrive fully within the next decade. The ignore of Genz, Millennials, and everything trapped in the 2010s means accelerating AI adoption rates. If history teaches us anything, it will always be monumental rewards for innovators and investors taking the boldest steps to pioneering ventures that have shifted the entire ecosystem to new levels of efficiency and profitability, when the dust of doubt settles. Seeing my entire career as a useful exercise to create my own luck, I am fully given to this trajectory and sincerely invite like-minded experts and investors to the bonds of media, technology and creative economy to join my lucky list for the next decade.
Our to-do list?
Champion investments in AI, immersive infrastructure and virtual volumes.
Build public-private partnerships aimed at Mediatech’s growth and sustainability
We will drive capacity building initiatives expanding the talent pool of AI & Metaverse-Skills in Africa.
Integrate cross-sector collaboration. The tech, film, gaming, music, fashion, art and AI industries come together to create a unified ecosystem that accelerates the pace of impact.
Africa’s creative economy is at an inflection point, with AI-powered immersive media being the gateway to global breakthroughs, power to democratize knowledge and revenues from multiple sectors, creating valuable jobs that meet the needs of global markets.
This will help redefine Africa’s role in global entertainment, metaverse architecture and storytelling. As the global North moves aggressively to Web3 and becomes a metaverse-led future that Africa cannot escape, the ignorance of its transformative power will not protect us from the costs left in the cold.
About Delmwa Deshi-Kura
Delmwa Deshi-Kura is an impact filmmaker and media executive with extensive experience working with some of the world’s most renowned global media brands, including Viacom, Warner Bros. Discovery Communications, and Multichoice’s M-Net Africa.
A story change leader and development communication (DEVCOMM) strategist, DDK is CEO of Delmedia Productions and founder of Velocity Studios, the founder of Velocity Studios, which leverages advances in game engine technology and AI to use AI to address media infrastructure gaps across the continent.
A passionate Pan-Africanist, her expertise ranges from government relations and interdisciplinary partnerships. She has held multiple technical roles with the state government and discusses impact assessments of various national institutions.
DDK is also a board advisor, global speaker and moderator who has spoken for the 10th year at the UN General Assembly.
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