Decagon & Sterling Bank Wants Train Software Engineers With Pay-After-Learning Model

Macaddy Gad

3 years ago

For the promise that Nigeria’s growing youth population offers, more companies are joining the ranks of Andela to cater to the training and development of software and tech talent in general. And since Andela changed course, in providing outsourced tech talent to foreign software companies, Decagon is trying again to reinvent an area Andela has had challenges with their new funding structure, the Pay-After-Learning model – sustaining the training of young African talents in tech.

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According to Decagon’s CEO, Chika Nwobi, Decagon has sealed a $1.5 million seed round offer to help run and expand the company. Also, a student loan financing facility of $25 million from Sterling Bank, a Nigerian financial institution, will lift the pressure of being able to afford the training fees until the trainees have secured employment. Nwobi, who has years of experience building tech solutions since the early 2000s, also claims that the company aims to address the underrepresentation of black people in tech globally, starting with Nigeria. He said:

“Microsoft, Facebook and Google have all invested in building engineering offices in Nigeria, but most other companies can’t afford to do that, so we help them access top talent to work as remote engineers.” -Chika Nwobi

The company employs an income-sharing plan where the graduating engineer’s payback in installments after they have gotten jobs and started earning. The student loan financing option takes care of the need for trainees who cannot afford self-funding for the program.

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Decagon’s training is a 6 month paid software engineering training program. Trainee software engineers are expected to pay about N2 million (approximately $4,000) tuition to enrol while those who opt for the student loan option are expected to repay N3 million (approximately $6,000) within 3 years of their graduation. The company is also looking at improving female tech talent absorption into the digital economic space by working on increasing female participation in its cohorts from 25% to 50% in the next three years. Decagon claims it has recorded a 100% placement and a 100% loan repayment rates as well as a 410% salary increment on earnings software engineers graduates after getting placement. However, with a 0.55% acceptance rate (440 candidates) out of about 80,000 people who have applied to partake in its program in the past, Decagon cannot boast of closing the tech talent gap just yet as Decagon’s CEO, Chika Nwobi claims. Source: TechCrunch Featured image source: Decagon

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