The Solution Innovation District (SID) has been announced as the official headline sponsor of SMFest Awka 2025, marking a strategic partnership aimed at accelerating innovation, digital adoption, and entrepreneurship among young people in Anambra State and the broader Southeast region.
SMFest Awka, now in its second year, is Southeast Nigeria’s premier platform for empowering young people with digital/creative skills, entrepreneurial insight, and transformative ideas. The 2025 edition, themed “Disrupt and Evolve,”is a rallying call for youth to challenge the status quo, innovate boldly, and build scalable solutions for the future.
This partnership aligns strongly with the Anambra State Government’s mission to unlock the vast potential of its youthful population. Under the visionary leadership of Governor Chukwuma Charles Soludo, the Solution Innovation District was established as a catalyst for digital transformation, job creation, and to position Anambra as Africa’s Silicon Valley.
“The Anambra State Government, through the Solution Innovation District, is proud to support SMFest Awka 2025 because it embodies our commitment to nurturing a smart, creative, and digital tribe of young creators and innovators,” said Ms. Chinwe Okoli, Special Adviser to the Governor on Innovation and Business Incubation and CEO of SID.
“Through SID, we are building pathways for Anambra’s youth -the Anambra Digital Tribe-to thrive in the global digital economy. SMFest Awka 2025 is a natural extension of that vision.”
SID is currently training one million young people in digital skills through the 1 Million Anambra Digital Tribe Program. Other ongoing initiatives include upcoming Cohort 2 of the Code Anambra Program, practical training in Robotics with Circum Technologies and Internet Exchange Point (IXP) Network Engineering with Connekt Broadband.
SID also runs a startup incubation program, nurturing early-stage founders and accelerating homegrown innovation. In a bold and symbolic move, the 13.7-hectare Old Government House site -now officially repurposed -is being transformed into the permanent headquarters of SID. Once completed, it will host tech companies, research institutes, innovation hubs, and startup offices, cementing its status as Anambra’s own Silicon Valley.
This partnership with SMFest Awka’s is aimed to ignite the Southeast’s innovation ecosystem and empower a generation of bold thinkers and builders.
WHAT TO EXPECT AT SMFEST AWKA 2025
1. Free 1-Week Digital & Social Media Bootcamp
Date: June 22 – 29, 2025
Time 8:00 PM – 10:30 PM Venue: (Virtual)
This intensive Bootcamp is targeting to train 2000 young and innovative Anambra Youths and beyond by providing hands-on training in Social Media Strategy, Canva design, video editing with CapCut, content creation, AI Tools Usage, Remote Work Set Up, and growth hacking—equipping youth with tools to build digital careers and businesses.
2. The Founders Mixer
Date: July 4, 2025 |
Venue: Radisson Onyx Hotel, Agu Awka
Time: 12:00 PM
The Founders Mixer is an event that will strategically bring together the Digital Ecosystem Leaders that cuts across the entire South East. This includes: Start Up Founders, impact Initiative Leaders, Incubation Hub Leaders, Co Creators, Change makers, Investors, Policy Makers etc, that operates across the south East states, to have a handshake across themselves, network with one another, and start off conversations that will ignite cross state collaborations, partnerships and others within the South East.
3. SMFest Awka 2025 – Main Conference
Date: July 5, 2025 Venue: Hollywood Event Center, Awka
Time: 8:00 AM
The main event will bring together over 1,000 attendees for inspiring keynotes, practical workshops, panel sessions, product activations and exhibitions, fun activities and live showcases led by some of the most disruptive voices in tech, business, and innovation.
The driving force behind SMFest Awka is Mr. Ifeanyi Ochije (Sirwyte), Licensee and Lead Organizer of the event. Speaking on the new partnership, he stated:
"We are incredibly excited to welcome the Solution Innovation District as our headline sponsor. Their involvement elevates the mission of SMFest Awka and underscores the state’s serious commitment to youth empowerment through innovation. This collaboration will not only inspire, but activate, a new wave of tech-savvy, future-ready entrepreneurs in Anambra.”
