From 1760 to 1840, the Industrial Revolution marked one of history's most significant transformations. Europe experienced groundbreaking innovations such as James Watt's steam engine in 1769, while West Africa saw the rise of the Sokoto Caliphate in 1804, becoming a prominent empire in present-day Nigeria. The global landscape further shifted with the discovery of oil at Pennsylvania's Drake Well in 1859, fueling advancements in transportation and industrialization.
Long before oil was discovered in Nigeria in 1956, African societies actively engaged in trade, agriculture, textile production, industrial fishing and other innovative industrial practices, contributing notably to global economic networks. With the discovery of coal and oil, industries were transformed, oil-fueled transportation and human skill and adaptability sparked innovation, empowered emerging industries, and reshaped the global economy.
Fast forward to 2025! Today, we stand at the brink of another transformative era, “the AI revolution.” Much like coal and oil-fueled industries in history, data is now the pivotal resource powering the modern digital economy. Alongside data, interconnected devices (IoT) and human ingenuity remain critical. However, data increasingly drives competitive advantage, innovation, and strategic decision-making.
I map data to oil because, much like crude oil, its true value emerges only after careful refinement. Raw data, accumulated from billions of daily interactions across multiple digital platforms, IoT devices, and transactional systems, has limited intrinsic value. However, data becomes immensely valuable when strategically processed, analyzed, and leveraged through tailored cloud services and AI.
Cloud technologies like AWS SageMaker enable effective data utilization to predict customer behaviour, optimize supply chains, detect fraud, and personalize user experiences. Harnessing data's full potential goes beyond mere storage in AWS services like S3, DynamoDB, or RDS. It requires advanced analytics capabilities through data lakes, data warehouses, serverless architectures, and integrated AI systems like AWS Bedrock to transform raw data into actionable intelligence.
Even as technology advances, human potential remains indispensable. Data, IoT devices, computer chips, robots, and AI alone cannot generate innovation or creativity. Skilled individuals who responsibly collect, secure, and interpret data and understand how to leverage cloud technology to build and effectively train AI models, avoiding common pitfalls like underfitting, overfitting, or bias, are and will remain indispensable.
Adopting a growth mindset, investing in continuous education, earning certifications like the AWS AI Practitioner, and joining community initiatives like AWS Community Builders help foster collaboration, knowledge-sharing, and collective growth within our new data-driven economy.
Just as coal and oil once defined the pace and possibilities of the industrial age, data, cloud computing, and AI now define our digital era. Individuals who harness this "new oil" effectively will shape markets, transform industries, and lead the next wave of innovation. It’s 2025! Let's build something great together for now and for the future.
References
Falola, T., & Heaton, M. M. (2008). A History of Nigeria. Cambridge University Press.
Last, M. (1967). The Sokoto Caliphate. Longman Publishing Group.
Yergin, D. (1991). The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money & Power. Simon & Schuster.
Top comments (0)