Four Graduates Build AI Dubbing Tool for African Films

When Apotierioluwa Owoade worked at a Lagos dubbing firm, he watched translators butcher Yoruba so badly that "I am pregnant" became "I have a ball." The $500,000 cost of dubbing a single film meant most African stories never crossed language barriers.

He called his friend David Mac-Asore with an idea: use AI to make dubbing affordable and culturally accurate. Mac-Asore, a software developer, was immediately on board.

They knew they needed machine learning expertise, so they recruited Maryann Nnaji and Emmanuel Ibiang, two recent Covenant University graduates. All four were under 25 and fresh out of school.

Nnaji brought critical experience from building a Nigerian sign language recognition model for her thesis. She had seen how most AI tools were built for Western contexts, missing the nuances of African languages and cultures.

Ibiang focused on making the complex technology simple enough for anyone to use. "Can the average Joe use your product without having to be walked through?" he asked, knowing that brilliant technology means nothing if creators can't access it.

Their startup Reedapt launched in 2025, transforming from a broad translation idea into a focused dubbing platform for Nollywood filmmakers and churches. The team has already signed two enterprise contracts with a gospel film producer, with projects completing in 2026.

Today, Reedapt serves over 200 active users across Nigeria. While 94% are individual creators on the consumer tier, the 6% of enterprise clients generate most of the revenue through subscription plans ranging from free to $99 monthly.

The Ripple Effect

The impact goes beyond business metrics. African filmmakers can now reach audiences across the continent's 2,000 languages without prohibitive costs. Churches are connecting English and French-speaking congregations in real time.

For Nnaji, it echoes her earlier work bridging communication gaps for Nigeria's hard-of-hearing community. The data challenges are similar, but the mission remains: using technology to connect people across barriers that once seemed impossible to cross.

Four young graduates saw African stories trapped by language and cost. They built a bridge, and now those stories can travel.