One of the biggest (and nicest) surprises for us over the last two years has been the Raspberry Pi project’s popularity outside the UK. Over three quarters of our sales are now to overseas customers, and while the US and mainland Europe are our largest markets (with honorable mentions to Australia, New Zealand and Japan), there’s also been a lot of interest from the developing world.
We’ve already posted about Frederik and Ernest’s epic Pi-powered journey from the UK to South Africa. Alongside this, over the last six months Graham Schwikkard has been working to get supplies of Raspberry Pis into hackspaces across sub-Saharan Africa.
It’s a testament to the rapid pace of development in countries like Kenya and Nigeria that most of these engagements are commercial rather than charitable. While the first batch of Raspberry Pis sent to each location are free, the end goal is to enable local entrepreneurs to set themselves up as value-added resellers (VARs) and to build profitable businesses around the Pi.
It’s early days yet, but as you can see from these photos and videos we’re finding boundless enthusiasm for our little computer a long way from home.
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