Gamifying the classroom: How Lena is turning Nigeria’s curriculum into immersive games
This Nigerian startup is turning school curriculum into immersive games designed to hold children’s attention for hours.
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In the early days of COVID-19, as the world retreated indoors and work moved online, two young Nigerians began a partnership that would eventually lead them into one of the most challenging sectors in African tech: education. <br />
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Danny Ombeh and Faruk Bilesanmi did not set out to build an edtech company. Their journey began with freelance projects on Fiverr, the kind common among young builders testing their skills against real-world problems. But a mix of personal history, professional failure, and a shared desire to solve meaningful problems eventually crystallised into Lena, a curriculum-aligned gaming platform designed to help children master foundational subjects like maths, literacy, and science.<br />
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Today, their startup, Lena, is betting that the future of learning for African children does not lie in longer videos or more quizzes, but in games, so engaging that children forget they are studying.<br />
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What makes Lena different, the founders argue, is not just that it is “gamified,” but that it is built as a game from the ground up. In a market crowded with video lessons and quiz apps, Lena’s founders believe attention is the most valuable currency in education. <br />
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How the founders met <br />
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The partnership between Ombeh and Bilesanmi dates back to 2020. They met through mutual connections when Bilesanmi secured freelance work and needed a designer.<br />
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“Faruk and I have been building together since 2020 when we started working on freelance projects for clients in Nigeria and abroad,” Ombeh recalls. “And over time, we became a lot more interested in startups and actually solving real problems.” <br />
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That professional collaboration quickly turned into friendship and a shared ambition. Beyond work and solving problems, they realised they had a lot in common.<br />
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The idea for Lena came during a casual conversation about their mothers, when they realised that both were teachers. This shared background gave them a first-hand understanding of the limitations of current education...
