Ghana’s social events startup Suba wins #MWA2015 app competition

Social events startup Suba emerged as winner of the Mobile West Africa 2015 App Developer Competition recently. Out of five finalists Suba was voted the top app by delegates to the Mobile West Africa 2015 conference held in Lagos, Nigeria.

The winning startup got an iPad Air courtesy of appsafrica.com, high-end smartphone from Innjoo and gift card from SureGifts.

Read more: SureGifts is Nigeria’s premier gift card startup targeting the corporate world

In all, five startups emerged as finalists — four from Nigeria and one (Suba) from Ghana.

Suba pitched first at the final. Founded by Nelson Klutse and Eric Hackman, Suba was developed at Ghana-based Meltwater Entrepreneurial School of Technology incubator, which has also recently announced a partnership with Samsung.

The Suba app is an event-based iOS and Android mobile app that allows everyone at fun social gatherings (from concerts to weddings) to see and share photos together in one central photo stream. Suba goes beyond the constraints of a Friends List common to other social platforms, and allows event attendees to see, save, and share everyone’s photos – including photos of people they aren’t already connected to. After 6 months of launch, the app has managed about 1 million pictures.

WhizApp was up next. It’s an Android app that was developed by Akinde-Peters Joseph an undergraduate student of the University of Lagos. Joseph said the app trains the brain via mental calculations, increasing response speed, concentration and memory power.

He told conference attendees the app could reduce the over-dependence of Nigerian students on electronic calculator to compute math assignments. iOS device users can also use the mobile web version on whizapp.com.ng.

For Taja, founder, Olabode Adedoyin, said the solution will significantly reduce the cost of technology for all retail businesses regardless of their size. He said they are already getting much traction in the market even without much marketing — this he said is as a result of Taja’s ability to make retail easy.

One of the selling points of the app is its ability allow busy shop owners who employ workers to be in their shops to monitor sales without being physically in the shop.

Dr. Emmanuel Owobu presented MOBicure on behalf of the team. According to him, the app seeks to tackle the menace of maternal mortality on the continent. According to him, Africa still remains the continent with the worst vaccination record in the world.

But the ỌMỌMI mobile application from MOBicure combines health innovation with mobile technology in Africa. ỌMỌMI which is based on the WHO/UNICEF Childhood Survival Strategies has a unique range of features helps parents keep their children healthy by enabling them easily monitor their children’s health.

The last startup that participated in the challenge is Genii Games’ Asa, a company that is driven by the declining interest and knowledge of indigenous African cultures especially among kids of African descent.