Silicon Mountain is a nickname coined to represent the technology ecosystem (cluster) in the Mountain area of

Cameroon Cameroon (; french: Cameroun, ff, Kamerun), officially the Republic of Cameroon (french: République du Cameroun, links=no), is a country in west-central Africa. It is bordered by Nigeria to the west and north; Chad to the northeast; the C ...

, with epicenter in

Buea Buea is the capital of the Southwest Region of Cameroon. The city is located in Fako Division, on the eastern slopes of Mount Cameroon, and has a population of 300,000 (at the 2013 Census). It has two Government Hotels, the Mountain Hotel and ...

. The name refers to Mount Fako. Silicon Mountain is currently home to tech startups and a growing community of developers, designers, business professionals as well as

universities A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, ...

such as the

University of Buea University of Buea (UB) is found in Molyko, Buea, in the southwest region of Cameroon. It was founded as a university centre in 1985 and became a full-fledged university in 1992, following a government decree that re-organized state universities ...

, Catholic University Institute of Buea,

Saint Monica University Saint Monica University or Saint Monica University: The American International University (SMU) is an accredited private independent Catholic university with operations in Cameroon. It is an American-style university offering career-focused progra ...

and many others. This region occupies the entire Fako Division of the South West Region of

. The phrase originally was the de facto reference to the Buea Tech Community popularized during local tech community meetups such as BarCamp Cameroon 2013, Google I/O Extended Buea 2015 and the Kamer Design Meetups; but has eventually come to refer to the community of developers, creatives, organizers, business professionals, universities in the area.

Origin of term

The Silicon Mountain is a term used to refer to the tech ecosystem (cluster) in Fako division of Cameroon with epicenter Buea. The term is a play ( phrasal portmanteau ) on Silicon Valley and Mount Fako (which is the most dominant feature of Cameroon's topography and the highest geographical point in West and Central Africa). It was first used publicly by Rebecca Enonchong at the BarCamp

conference which took place at Catholic University Institute Of Buea,

in 2013.

History

Silicon Mountain as seen in Buea, Cameroon on 26-06-2019

Silicon Mountain is located in and around the city of Buea, which according to social scientists was founded by a hunter in search of game. Eye Njie Tama Lifanje came from the Bomboko clan behind the Buea Mountain (Mount Cameroon or Mount Fako). On that fateful day he founded Buea, he had set out in search of animals but there were no game to be hunted only a vast peace of hospitable land that could harbor his family. Eyé Njie named it “Mwea”, meaning, hospitable land for farming. The settlement soon grew into a clan but made tardy progress until the later part of the 19th century, when there was an influx of Europeans into Africa for exploration and colonialism purposes.

Tea Tea is an aromatic beverage prepared by pouring hot or boiling water over cured or fresh leaves of ''Camellia sinensis'', an evergreen shrub native to East Asia which probably originated in the borderlands of southwestern China and north ...

growing is an important local industry, especially in Tole.

was the colonial capital of the German

Kamerun Kamerun was an African colony of the German Empire from 1884 to 1916 in the region of today's Republic of Cameroon. Kamerun also included northern parts of Gabon and the Congo with western parts of the Central African Republic, southwestern ...

from 1901 to 1919, and the capital of the Southern Cameroons from 1949 until 1961. The German colonial administration in Buea was temporarily suspended during the eruption of Mount Cameroon from 28 April – June 1909. Originally, Buea's population consisted mainly of the Bakweri people. However, due to its position as the defunct capital of the Federated State Of West Cameroon, regional capital of the South West and university town, it has attracted a significant number of other ethnic groups. Bismarck Fountain, Buea

The epicenter of the Silicon Mountain, Buea, hosts the

, the first Anglo-Saxon-styled university of Cameroon, alongside the Catholic University Institute Of Buea, the Pan African Institute Of Development, just to name a few. The city still has a handful of colonial era buildings, notably the palatial former residence of the

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) ** Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ge ...

governor,

Jesko von Puttkamer Jesko Albert Eugen von Puttkamer (2 July 1855 in Berlin – 23 July 1917 in Berlin) was a German colonial military chief, and nine times governor of Kamerun: *13 May 1887 – 4 October 1887 *14 August 1890 – 2 December 1890 *31 December 18 ...

. Other German colonial buildings especially the Prime Minister's Lodge (Schloss) and the Bismarks' fountain are still standing, albeit some of them suffer from lack of maintenance and old age. As of 2010, a study showed that about 3000,000 people live in Buea ( including Bokwaongo, Muea, Bomaka, Tole, Mile 16 (Bolifamba), Mile 17, Mile 15, Mile 14 (Dibanda), Bova, Bonjongo, Likombe, Buasa, and surrounding villages). It also hosts the Nigerian Consulate in

Anglophone Cameroon Cameroon is home to at least 250 languages. However, some accounts report around 600 languages. These include 55 Afro-Asiatic languages, two Nilo-Saharan languages, four Ubangian languages, and 169 Niger–Congo languages. This latter group c ...

and is the main operational hub of the Naigahelp medical aid organisation. In 2017, businesses in Silicon Mountain were negatively affected by several

internet shutdown An Internet outage or Internet blackout or Internet shutdown is the complete or partial failure of the internet services. It can occur due to censorship, cyberattacks, disasters, police or security services actions or errors. Disruptions of subma ...

s that authorities enacted in the English-speaking areas of Cameroon in an effort to clamp down on criticism of the government.

Silicon Mountain Annual Conference

The Buea Tech ecosystem starting from 2015 organizes the annual Silicon Mountain conference popularly referred to as #SMConf which brings together over 500+ like-minded creatives and hackers from the Mountain Area and around Africa for two days of sessions, labs, speakers. It features tech talks, design and code labs. The Silicon Mountain Conference has the following; SESSION Categories

Universities, Colleges, Professional Schools

HIBMAT University Institute of Buea - HUIB
University of Buea campus

Technology Startups

There is a growing number of

high technology High technology (high tech), also known as advanced technology (advanced tech) or exotechnology, is technology that is at the cutting edge: the highest form of technology available. It can be defined as either the most complex or the newest te ...

startups/companies headquartered in Silicon Mountain as is listed below;

Startup Incubators

Tech Blogs

Technology Communities

There exist local developer communities aimed at promoting Computer Science, programming, Startups and developer technologies. These local tech communities organize large gatherings with demos and tech talks, to events like code sprints and hackathons.

Non-Tech Communities

References

{{Coord, 4.1527, N, 9.241, E, region:CM-SWR, display=title Information technology places Information technology in Africa