Nigeria’s Abiola Olaniran, Founder of Gamsole is Dominating Africa’s Mobile Gaming Industry

Abiola Olaniran developed interest for software at age 15 when he developed his first code, he proceeded to study Computer Science and Mathematics at Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile ife, Nigeria, where he must have broadened his knowledge and contributed to his access to information that he had in becoming a software expert.

He was the winner of the Microsoft Imagine Cup Software competition 2010 in Nigeria, earning a place on the team that represented Nigeria at the World finals at Warsaw, Poland. This was also the place where Microsoft announced the release of the Windows Phone platform, the platform which eventually gave birth to his mobile gaming company; Gamsole, which was founded in 2012. That same year, he was the winner of Samsung Nigeria Developer Challenge in the games and entertainment category.

After winning two prestigious software competitions in 2010, Abiola made his first move in the gaming industry with one of his games, Road Blazer, reaching an impressive 40,000 downloads in a few weeks.

Following the success and popularity of his independent games, he was able to get a funding to launch Gamsole – the mobile production company set to take Africa’s mobile game industry to the world. It did not come as a surprise that, barely six months after the launch on the Windows Phone store, over three million people from all over the world had played Gamsole’s games.

As at February 2015, the games had been downloaded over 10 million times across 25 countries in Africa, Asia, Europe and South America. The platform has created more than 35 games and releases new titles every month.

Some of Gamsole’s games include; Gidi Run, Temple Run, Monster Ninja, Sweet Candy among others.

In 2015, Abiola was listed as one of Africa’s most promising entrepreneurs and over the years, he gained more focus as a programmer; from developing just about any kind of application, to focusing on mobile gaming.

Gamsole has been developing games solely for the Windows Phone store since April 2013 and Abiola is currently Nigeria’s highest paid Windows game developer on the Windows Phones and PC platforms in terms of games and downloads and gross revenues.