Africa-Press – Uganda. MTN Uganda is extending its digital skilling initiative beyond Kampala with the launch of a new innovation hub in Kabale, as part of a wider strategy to expand access to ICT training and entrepreneurship opportunities across the country.
The Kabale MTN Spark Hub, which will be officially handed over on Wednesday, April 23, 2026, to Kabale University, is the first of four regional hubs under Phase 2 of the MTN ACE Tech Programme.
The facility was built and delivered by Cente-Tech in partnership with the Ministry of ICT and National Guidance and will serve both students and the surrounding community.
According to MTN, the expansion builds on Phase 1 of the programme, which has trained more than 32,000 people at the National ICT Innovation Hub in Nakawa since 2022, with about 90 percent of advanced trainees either employed or running businesses within six months of completion.
“The model works. Now MTN Uganda is taking it beyond Kampala,” the statement said, highlighting what the company described as proven outcomes from the first phase.
Phase 2 of the programme aims to train 8,000 young people and support the creation of new start-ups by rolling out similar hubs to universities across Uganda.
MTN said the initiative is intended to address a persistent challenge for young people outside Kampala.
“Ask any young person in Kabale what stands between them and a meaningful career in the digital economy, and the answer is rarely ability. It is access. Access to a reliable computer. Access to high-speed internet. Access to a creative space where ideas can be tested and built — not just imagined,” the statement reads.
It adds that “for young Ugandans outside Kampala, the absence of that infrastructure has not been a minor inconvenience. It has been a wall.”
The Kabale hub, according to MTN, is designed to remove that barrier by providing shared digital infrastructure accessible to both university students and the wider community.
“The Kabale MTN Spark Hub removes that wall. It is open not just to Kabale University students but to the surrounding community,” the statement says. “A young person in Kabale now has the same starting point as a young person in Nakawa. That is the point.”
MTN further noted that Phase 2 is not a pilot project but an expansion of an existing model.
“Phase 1 of the MTN ACE Tech Programme… demonstrated, at scale, that when young Ugandans are given the right environment and the right tools, they do not need charity. They need a chance,” it said.
The programme will next roll out to Busitema University, followed by hubs in Gulu and Soroti as MTN expands its national footprint.
The handover ceremony at Kabale University is expected to bring together government officials, private sector partners and students as Uganda intensifies efforts to bridge the digital divide between Kampala and the rest of the country.
For More News And Analysis About Uganda Follow Africa-Press
