The American company Holberton School, which recently raised $20 million, is establishing itself as a global player in the training of high-level computer engineers. In the current context of the arms race for new Tech talent, African economies can get ahead of the rest of the world.
Interview with Julien Barbier, CEO of Holberton, which aims to train tomorrow’s African IT talent.
Hello Julien Barbier, can you tell us more about Holberton School and the particularity of your universities?
Julien Barbier: Holberton School is a network of in-person schools, which train high-level engineers for the IT industry. The group was born in the United States, in Silicon Valley, and we have now 30 campuses around the world, with an everyday growing community. The particularity of our schools is that we develop our own programs, thanks to what we call our “education operating system”. These are world-class training programs in fintech, blockchain, artificial intelligence, etc. in the form of software with automated grading tools. Tailor-made programs, whose level of quality and complexity are equivalent to international standards and which are identical for all our schools. Our software is also used by other universities, by training organizations and even by companies. These entities use them internally to enrich their own teaching curriculum according to the needs of their students, or the requirements of the job market in the case of companies.
In your opinion, what are the particularities in terms of training for the African continent, compared to other regions where your schools are located?
The problem that affects the IT education sector in Africa is similar to what happens in the rest of the world. Today, all traditional computer schools are facing a lack of quality teachers. In many countries, whether in Morocco, France, or the United States, there are not enough teachers in “Computer scientists”, because they are all poached by GAFAM or other multinationals that offer them salaries three or even four times higher than what they can earn in teaching. Result: there is no one left to teach computer science. To address this problem, we have developed a teaching model that does not depend only on the quality of the teacher and that makes it very easy to open new schools, because we are not affected by this shortage of trainers.
How do you explain this shortage and how does it affect the market?
We are in a world where all companies are becoming IT companies in order to remain competitive in the global market. In such a context, there is a huge demand for IT professionals, and it is estimated that this demand will grow double digits annually for the next 10 years. Many countries are investing massively in IT R&D to catch up with nations like the US or even China.
But the reality is that regions and countries are not able to train enough highly skilled talent to fight this economic war, so they have to look elsewhere. The race is on for IT talent and Africa is not an exception. Everyone is looking for engineers at the same level as those in Silicon Valley, and today with solutions like our training, this quest is possible.
How can Africa take part in this economic revolution and what are its assets?
I think Africa has a huge potential in this new industrial revolution, for many different reasons. There is a willingness to work that is very different from an old-fashioned economy, like Europe. Europe or even the United States have created all the layers of modernity over time. In Africa, there is not necessarily all that, especially in terms of infrastructure. This has long been a disadvantage but today it has led to huge technological leaps, which can give Africa an actual, big advantage. For instance, Africa is mobile-first, everyone has a phone, so no one has to go through a computer. Even banks are on the phone, and there is a boom of innovation in fintech in Africa. What the continent still lacks is a pool of technological talent. At our level, we are already seeing the effects of this awareness on the African continent. For example in Tunisia, our first cohort in 2019 had 30 students. A year later, we had reached 100 students. We started with 40 students in January 2016, and this year alone our partners have enrolled more than 3 000 students all around the globe!
And how do you help students integrate into the global tech market?
Many of the students trained by our program, which lasts a maximum of 18 months, will become tech entrepreneurs, and will participate in creating a local startup ecosystem. This has tremendous potential for the development of agriculture tech, fintech and cryptocurrencies.
Then, for those who are not interested in the entrepreneurial adventure, they are for the vast majority recruited by the largest local companies with salaries equivalent or higher than students trained in the best universities of the country. But since the race for talent is global, many African students are recruited by European or American companies from afar. In Tunisia, for example, some students have gone to Spain and are working for the Satander bank, one of the biggest banks in Spain and Europe. This shows the level of quality. This bank came to look for our students in Tunisia to fill its needs in high level computer scientists.
In this context of race to train computer engineers, what is your development strategy on the African continent?
For Africa, we are talking about a region where the needs and contexts are very different between countries. In general, we target countries with strong growth, where we will have the best chance of developing and meeting the needs of our local partners. We are in a logic of co-creation with our african partners. We do not want to develop at all costs in all African countries, but to do so with solid partners. Tunisia was our first step in Africa, we opened in September 2019 and we already had to increase the capacity of the facilities, because there were too many requests. 100% of the first students were placed in either local companies or abroad, which shows that the system works. From there, we started talking with Egypt and Madagascar. Depending on the partners, things move more or less quickly, depending on whether they are partnerships with private actors or governments that move more slowly. Today, we are studying the possibilities with Ghana, the DRC and South Africa. Given our discussions, and the important demand, I think we will have thousands of students in Africa by the end of the year, and probably more than 10 thousands by the end of next year. Our goal is to train half a million African students by 2030.
