On May 5, 2003, Reed Hoffman launched LinkedIn in his living room and got his friends and colleagues to join.
After 10 years the social network for professionals has more than 200 million users, 3,700 employees and 26 offices around the world. LinkedIn was founded when the biggest social networks were Friendster and MySpace. LinkedIn is about a year older than Facebook, three years older than Twitter and eight years older than Google+
“Ten years ago, I co-founded LinkedIn in my living room with the mission of connecting the world’s professionals to make them more productive and successful. Inspired by the invaluable role relationships played in our own careers, we launched LinkedIn with the tagline “Relationships matter. At the end of our first month, we had 4,500 members in the network. 10 years later, we’re honored and humbled that so many of you have made LinkedIn a part of your daily professional lives.
Today, hundreds of millions of professionals around the world are turning to LinkedIn to connect with each other, manage their identities, get insights they need to be great at what they do, and find their dream jobs. I’m continually inspired by our members’ career aspirations and achievements. Our vision at LinkedIn is to create economic opportunity for every professional in the world. We look forward to helping you accomplish much more in the years to come and growing the relationships that matter most. Thank you for being a part of our journey.” Reed Hoffman, founder of linkedin said in a blog post to mark a decade of existence.
Zoomsphere, a global social statistics website recently released LinkedIn user numbers with South Africa, Nigeria and Egypt are leaders on the professional social network on the African continent, with the statistics showing that there is a lot of opportunities for the growth of LinkedIn in Africa, with at least one country from each region making the top ten on the list.
Top 10 ranking of African countries on LinkedIn – Zoomsphere
1. South Africa – 1,700,672
2. Nigeria – 656,528
3. Egypt – 543,699
4. Kenya – 399,178
5.Morocco – 351,780
6. Algeria – 285,170
7. Ghana – 227,793
8. Tunisia – 188,796
9. Uganda – 134,435
10. Tanzania – 112,042
