Andela, the global talent network that helps companies build remote engineering teams, will now accept engineers from all African countries, expanding its presence from six countries to the entire continent.

In doing so, the company will double its existing talent pool to more than 500,000 engineers and significantly increase the variety of skills and experience levels available to companies all over the world.

Andela helps its customers, who include Cloudflare, Wellio, ViacomCBS, and Women Who Code, gain access to high-quality software engineers who work as long-term, embedded team members. This news will further enable companies that work with Andela to source the talent they need, when they need it, by providing access to additional talent pools across the continent with an even greater diversity of skills and backgrounds.

Jeremy Johnson, Andela co-founder and CEO says, “Over the past five years, we have become experts at identifying engineering excellence from nontraditional backgrounds. We know that there are extremely talented engineers across Africa and we believe that opportunity should not be limited by proximity to a major tech hub. Being a remote-first engineering organization allows us to open up access to Andela for engineers across the continent.”

“By removing restrictions on location, we will double our pool of potential talent to the roughly 500,000 engineers in Africa who can now leverage Andela to work with top international engineering teams. Ultimately, our goal is to break down the barriers that prevent talent and opportunity from connecting by providing an easier, more efficient way for companies to scale global engineering teams.”

In the US, despite the economic downturn, high growth companies continue to need more engineering talent, and as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, they are more open than ever to that talent being remote. Johnson concludes, “The world is beginning to realize that remote work is going to be a major catalyst for the democratization of opportunity. Luckily, engineering leaders already know that remote work works if you have the right processes and systems in place, and are at the forefront of this change. By doubling our talent pool, we’re proud to help accelerate their critical work of building the future.”