Cameroonian startup CODAM Technologies, which promotes cyber safety among young people, has so far impacted over 10,000 people in its home market, and is now expanding its efforts to Togo, Ghana, Ivory Coast, and Benin.
CODAM Technologies was founded in 2020 to equip children, especially those in underprivileged communities, with practical tech skills and an understanding of how to stay safe online.
“In Cameroon, 80 per cent of schools do not offer structured coding or robotics education, and ICT classes are mainly theoretical. Many children finish school without ever writing a line of code or understanding basic cybersecurity principles. Rural areas are even more affected, with less than 10 per cent of students having access to hands-on digital skills training,” CODAM founder Kevin Mbieleu told Disrupt Africa.
While international ed-tech platforms in theory fill this gap, most of them are not adapted to the local reality.
“They are expensive, require high-speed internet, and do not offer hands-on learning in local languages,” Mbieleu said.
CODAM fills this gap by offering affordable, practical, and community-centered tech education. It runs weekend training programmes, has established a number of key school partnerships, and sells coding and robotics training kits. So far, Mbieleu claims it has impacted over 10,000 children across urban and rural Cameroon.
Though 40 per cent of the startup’s income comes from grants and sponsorships, it is also monetising via fees from its weekend coding and robotics programmes, its ed-tech consultancy for more than 15 Cameroonian schools that are integrating tech into their curriculum, and sales of its beginner-friendly coding kits.
“The demand for our programmes has grown by 150 per cent since we launched. Enrollment in our weekend training centre has tripled, from 50 kids per session in 2021 to over 150 per session in 2024. Our school partnerships have expanded from 5 schools in 2021 to over 15 today. Additionally, our cyber safety awareness campaigns have reached over 20,000 youths through workshops and online sessions,” Mbieleu said.
All of this has prompted CODAM to look at expanding. Currently operating in Cameroon, with a focus on cities like Yaoundé, Douala, and Buea, as well as rural areas in the Northwest, Southwest, and West regions, the startup has regional goals.
“By 2026, we aim to expand into Central and West Africa, targeting Gabon, Ghana, Togo and Ivory Coast. Our goal is to establish five new training centres in Cameroon and expand our school partnerships to more than 50 institutions,” said Mbieleu.
