Holberton Partners with SAYNA in Madagascar

The partnership will create online tech education programs to meet the country’s growing demand for software engineers


SAN FRANCISCO, April 22, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Holberton, the software engineering education company, announced today that it has partnered with SAYNA, an online education company in Madagascar, to offer affordable, high-quality tech education in the country.

Holberton will work with SAYNA to create three, tailored, full-stack web curricula using Holberton’s OS of education, a set of tools that enable organizations to quickly create courses or curricula on their own.

“We are delighted to work with such an innovative education company in deploying our OS of education to create opportunities for students to join the digital revolution that is sweeping the world,” said Julien Barbier, Holberton’s CEO.

The Republic of Madagascar is the world’s second-largest island country, located in the Indian Ocean about 250 miles West of Africa. With a population of nearly 30 million, per capita annual income of $450 and GDP of $13 billion, Madagascar has been a surprising hotbed of recent technology innovations, with high local demand for software engineering talent. The world’s first 3D-printed school is being built in Madagascar.

The Holberton-SAYNA curricula in Madagascar include:

  • The Fighter program: a 12-month, flexible, part-time program to become a web developer;
  • The Student program: a 24-month, full-time program to become a software engineer;
  • The Executive program: a 9-month program for developers to specialize in new technologies.

SAYNA gives its students the opportunity for real-world work experience through micro projects sponsored by companies such as Capgemini (global systems integration firm), Generali Group (finanial services), Societe Generale (banking) and Orange (telecommunications). Students not only learn through these projects but earn money as well. The better students perform in their studies, the more access they have to these micro projects and future employment.

As elsewhere in 2020, online education boomed In Madagascar as many people lost their jobs during the Covid-19 pandemic and sought retraining. Meanwhile, Madagascar’s demand for software developers has exploded.

With this partnership, Sayna expects to train 500 new software developers this year alone and hopes for exponential growth from there.

“Giving everyone in Madagascar access to high-quality software engineering training will help Madagascar’s economy,” says Matina Razafimahefa, CEO of SAYNA. “That growth will also develop the local startup ecosystem.”

Are you in Madagascar and interested in becoming a software developer and participating in creating the future? Apply here!

About Holberton
Founded in Silicon Valley in 2015, Holberton’s innovative and flexible delivery of the “OS of Education” provides a unique portfolio of tools, auto-graded tailored curricula and teaching methods to help its customers - education institutions, universities, corporations and franchisees - successfully train the next generation of digital talent at scale.

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About SAYNA

Founded in Madagascar in 2018, SAYNA, which means ‘intelligence’ in Malagasy, is Africa’s first technology education and micro job platform. SAYNA links a community of developers it has trained with IT projects that have been broken down into micro tasks. SAYNA has already trained more than 200 students, and works with more than 150 qualified freelancers and more than 60 companies, including Groupe AXIAN, Orange Madagascar, World Bank, Access Bank and others.

Editorial Contact
Lonn Johnston for Holberton
lonn@flak42.com
+1 650.219.7764