Google has revealed that about 10 million Nigerians used the internet for the first time last year 2014. Speaking in Lagos, Caesar Sengupta, vice president, Product Management at Google, said that globally, there are 3 billion people connected online and the number is expected to surpass 4 billion by 2017.
He said: “Nigerians are not left out in the internet revolution as finding by Google showed that 10million Nigerians came online, for the first time, in 2014.”
He revealed that Google sees Nigeria’s internet economy as real with enticing, data-friendly and life-impacting applications such as Trupper, Okada Books, Gidimo, Afrinolly, among others changing social lives in the country.
“Google is simply helping the world organize information and make it accessible in different languages, even when it comes from different regions. The information we are talking about exists in books, libraries of different universities, mines; ours is to provide opportunity for the massage of the knowledge, no matter where you are in the world, but let it impact what you do,” he said.
Also speaking, Juliet Ehimuan-Chiazor, country manager of Google, said with 140 million active mobile lines; 35% of the 19 million phones sold in 2014 were smartphone implying a 100% year-on-year growth, Nigeria will benefit more from the global internet economy.
She reechoed that, in the African most populous nation, 65% of the local search volume happens on mobile and over 50 million internet users with 800% more Nigerians are online since 2005, even as 10 million Nigerians came online for the first time in 2014.
