MTN puts 526,000 Skills Academy enrolments behind a new AI job board
The platform now matches learners in 11 African markets to vacancies and the courses that close their skills gaps.
MTN Group has launched an AI-enabled job board on its Skills Academy, turning a learning platform with nearly 526,000 enrolments into a route to actual vacancies across 11 African markets.
The company announced the feature on 12 August 2026, timed to International Youth Day, and published the details on its own site.
The board lists vacancies from employers across the continent and recommends roles to each learner based on their skills, their location and their stated career goals. Learners can filter opportunities, read the requirements, save vacancies and track where they stand through application, interview and offer stages.
The part that differs from a listings site
What separates this from a conventional job portal is what happens when a learner does not yet qualify for a role. The platform recommends free courses on the Skills Academy that address the specific gap, so the answer to a rejected application is a course rather than a closed door.
That matters in a market where the demand for digital skills is rising faster than the supply of people who have them. The International Finance Corporation, part of the World Bank Group, estimates that more than 230 million jobs in sub-Saharan Africa will require digital skills by 2030, a figure MTN cites in the announcement.
Africa is the world’s youngest continent, with more than 60% of its population under 25. The gap between that young workforce and the roles being created is the problem the board is aimed at.
What the Academy has already done
MTN launched the Skills Academy in 2022. It teaches digital literacy, coding, data analytics, artificial intelligence, cybersecurity and entrepreneurship, among other disciplines, and it has recorded 192,000 course completions and 1,122 specialisations across its 11 markets.
The platform was built with accessibility features so that people with visual, cognitive, neurological, mobility and age-related needs can navigate and complete its learning pathways. Learners who finish receive certified digital certificates they can present to employers.
“Digital and financial inclusion becomes more economically meaningful when it helps people participate in the economy,” said Marina Madale, MTN Group Executive: Sustainability and Shared Value.
Madale linked the launch to this year’s International Youth Day theme, “Different Contexts, Common Aspirations”, saying young people across MTN’s markets start from different circumstances but share the need for relevant skills and clearer routes to opportunity. She said strengthening the path from skills to work requires action across business, government and education.
What it means for a young person with a phone
For a learner in one of the 11 markets, the practical change is that the search for work and the search for training now sit on one screen. A matriculant in Soweto or a graduate in Accra can see a vacancy, see exactly which of its requirements they do not meet, and enrol in the free course that closes the gap without leaving the platform.
The board is available through the Skills Academy at skillsacademy.mtn.com in each market where the Academy operates.
The test of a platform like this is not the launch but the placement. MTN has published enrolment and completion figures. It has not yet published how many learners the board places in jobs, and that is the number worth watching when the first cohort moves through it.
