The 5 winners of the Google Africa Connected were announced yesterday at an event hosted in the city of Nairobi in Kenya.

The Africa Connected competition was launched in August last year in search of Africans from different countries who had inspirational stories of how they used the internet and Google products to make their businesses a success and change their lives.

Sitawa Wafula from Kenya, Eseoghene Odiete  from Nigeria, Christopher Panford from Ghana, Eric Obuh from Nigeria and Eunice Namirembe from Uganda, were chosen as top 10 finalists from over 2 200 submissions from 35 countries across Sub-Saharan Africa. All 5 of them each walked away with a cash prize of  $25 000 towards their business.

The remaining 5 finalists, one of them being South African Timothy McGuire, didn’t walk away empty-handed, they received $10 000 each towards their businesses.

Although the Africa Connected competition is over, the site will continue to run and promote African businesses with similar success stories, so Google is calling on anyone who would like to have their story featured on the site to submit their stories to Africa Connected.

[Image: Africa Connected]