YAKUB ABDULRASHEED – Nigeria’s Minister of Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy, Dr Bosun Tijani, has commended Nigerian geospatial technology company, Milsat Technologies, for its role in developing the technology powering the country’s new National Digital Postcode System.
The Minister described the company’s work as evidence of the depth of technical talent available in Nigeria.
In a LinkedIn post, Tijani celebrated Milsat and its founders, Taslim Salaudeen and Adedamola Baderinwa, for helping transform location data into national digital infrastructure.
“Built in Nigeria. Ready for the world,” the minister wrote, noting that Milsat moved from delivering a pilot in 2023 to supporting the development of a national system.
He also highlighted the company’s contribution to the mapping of more than 65 million properties for Nigeria’s first digital census and its deployment of enumeration-area demarcation technology in Sierra Leone.
What to know about Milsat Technologies
Milsat Technologies is a Nigerian geospatial technology company focused on helping governments and businesses collect, process, analyse and use location-based data to solve practical problems.
Its operations cover data collection, address verification, data analysis, data integration and extract-transform-load services, with the company combining geospatial platforms and proprietary tools to provide what it describes as accurate and rapidly delivered data solutions across Africa.
Its technology enables field tasks to be assigned digitally, data collectors to be geofenced, information to be captured and insights to be visualised in real time.
The company has also developed capabilities for verifying customer addresses and processing large datasets for government and commercial decision-making.
Its growing footprint demonstrates how specialised Nigerian technology firms can build solutions around local challenges while developing expertise with relevance beyond the country.
Tijani described this trajectory as the kind of ambition Nigeria should nurture:
“Nigerian companies building solutions for our needs, proving their capabilities at home and taking that expertise to the world.”
The new National Digital Postcode and why it matters
The National Digital Alphanumeric Postcode System is designed to give every addressable building in Nigeria a unique digital location identity linked to its geographical position.
According to the official postcode platform, each building receives an 11-character code structured through five levels, these include state, local government area, district, area and building.
The system, launched nationally through NIPOST on October 1, is intended to address a long-standing challenge in Nigeria: accurately identifying where people, businesses, properties and public facilities are located.
Its importance extends beyond conventional postal delivery, with potential applications in logistics, e-commerce, emergency response, financial services, security and public-service delivery.
For businesses, precise location information can reduce failed deliveries and improve customer verification, while government agencies can use reliable geospatial information for planning and service delivery.
Tijani captured the broader ambition when he said:
“Every Nigerian deserves to be found. Every business deserves the chance to reach its customers. And every community deserves to be within reach of opportunity.”
Who is Taslim Salaudeen?
Taslim Salaudeen is a geospatial innovator whose career has centred on applying geographic information systems to some of Africa’s most complex data and development challenges.
With experience spanning agriculture, real estate, energy and census surveys, Salaudeen has emerged as one of the technical figures behind Milsat’s contribution to Nigeria’s geospatial transformation.
He currently leads innovation at Milsat and is pursuing a master’s degree in military signal and geospatial intelligence at the University of Maryland.
His work with the National Population Commission and the United Nations Population Fund involved developing and deploying technical solutions for Nigeria’s first digital census and post-enumeration survey.
Salaudeen has also led innovations that dramatically reduced the time required to produce maps and vector data, from as much as 90 days to less than 15 minutes.
Reflecting on his journey, he said:
“As teenagers, we were all told to ‘follow your passion.’ Mine was geography”.
He added that combining geography with technology in 2019 changed the direction of his career.
Who is Adedamola Baderinwa?
Adedamola Baderinwa represents the business-growth and partnership dimension of Milsat’s evolution, having been part of the company from its early stages.
He joined its marketing and communications team in 2020 as a creative copywriter and founding team member, at a time when the team consisted of just two people.
In those formative years, Baderinwa contributed to proposals, social media communication, sales materials and the development of the company’s voice and creative operations.
As Milsat expanded, his responsibilities evolved from producing day-to-day communications to supervising partnerships, developing growth strategies and generating business opportunities.
By 2023, he was managing three business-to-government partnerships and contributing to high-level documentation and revenue models. He now works as Growth and Partnership Manager, helping the company expand its markets and provide businesses entering Nigeria with accurate hyperlocal information.
His progression mirrors Milsat’s broader journey from a small technology company into a growing geospatial business with ambitions across Africa.
Why the Minister’s commendation matters
Tijani’s recognition of Milsat is significant because it places a Nigerian technology company at the centre of a national digital infrastructure project while highlighting a model of innovation that goes beyond the country’s better-known technology sectors.
Milsat’s journey demonstrates how investment in specialised fields such as geospatial technology can produce solutions with applications across government, commerce, security, logistics and public services.
The company’s involvement in mapping more than 65 million properties for preparations for Nigeria’s first digital census, alongside its work on the National Digital Postcode and deployment of enumeration-area demarcation technology in Sierra Leone, illustrates how expertise developed around Nigerian challenges can become relevant to other African markets.
Dr Tijani also acknowledged the contributions of NIPOST, Meeds Network Limited and the National Population Commission, but made clear that the spotlight belonged to the Milsat team.
“Today’s spotlight belongs to the Milsat team,” he said, expressing hope that the company would help “many more countries turn location and field data into better services for their people.”
Talking Point
Checking critically, it is not too hard to note that this recognition goes beyond a ministerial commendation of a technology company.
It points to a wider argument about Nigeria’s capacity to build critical digital infrastructure locally, particularly infrastructure that connects the physical realities of communities and businesses with the country’s increasingly digital economy.
The National Digital Postcode itself is expected to become more valuable as businesses, government agencies and developers integrate it into their platforms and services.
The official system already provides avenues for organisations to build on the postcode through APIs, SDKs and bulk access.
For Milsat, therefore the journey from a 2023 pilot to technology supporting a national system, combined with its census mapping and international work, offers a compelling example of what locally developed technical expertise can achieve.
For the larger Nigerian talent pools, it reinforces the possibility that home-grown companies can do more than participate in the digital economy; they can help building the infrastructure on which that economy operates.
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