African Union partners Ghana firm on finance AI masterclass

As the African Union steps up its digital transformation agenda, a two-day masterclass in Accra has signaled a decisive shift in how the bloc plans, tracks and explains its finances, culminating in a hands-on program hosted at the new Training and Innovation Centre operated by Africon AI. For the AU, the format put applied learning ahead of theory and suggested a move from experimentation toward execution.

Formed in partnership with the African Union Commission (AUC), the training ran from 24 to 25 October 2025 and gathered senior finance and policy staff from multiple AU departments for sessions on budgeting, reporting and institutional workflows, and it represented the first multi-country, in-person course and the first major program at the new facility for Africon AI. The stated aim was to build institutional capacity for digital transformation that can be replicated across the continent.

Founder Gideon Asare and a facilitation team led practical modules on how to apply ChatGPT, Gamma, Read AI, Comet (Perplexity) and NotebookLM to everyday tasks, framing the tools as a way to improve report drafting, scenario planning and data-driven decision making within the AU’s finance function, with Africon AI positioned as a technical partner for skill transfer. By rooting the curriculum in day-to-day responsibilities, the organizers sought to lower adoption friction inside complex public-sector workflows.

Participants learned a proprietary prompting framework called CRIT and used real financial datasets in group assignments that mirrored their daily work, testing how AI could streamline financial analysis, strengthen audit reporting and structure policy drafts while visualizations built in Gamma turned complex figures into digestible charts, a workflow the organizers presented as repeatable through Africon AI. The exercises also explored how compliance documentation can improve when routine reporting is automated and reviewed with consistent standards.

Executives emphasized responsible deployment and concrete benefits, with Asare stating that the collaboration aims to help institutions harness AI effectively and that financial innovation is about 'insight, speed, and clarity' that the tools can deliver at scale, while Training Coordinator Rhodaline Animah praised the 'remarkable' enthusiasm that emerged when use cases matched job needs, a response that reinforced the practical ethos of Africon AI. Their comments underscored a pragmatic objective to link emerging tools to measurable outcomes rather than abstract promise.

Beyond the AU engagement, the East Legon centre is being built as a regional hub that offers in-person and virtual corporate programs to banks, insurers, public bodies, NGOs and development organisations, and during the same week the team completed a separate corporate training with DKT International Ghana, marking the firm’s first dual institutional engagement since inception for Africon AI. The centre is designed to serve as a hub for AI learning and collaboration across Africa, and the consultancy also known as Africa AI Consult develops customized masterclasses, digital transformation workshops and capacity-building programs across industries.

Placed in a wider market context, the initiative aligns with a phase in enterprise technology where adoption depends less on headline features and more on training, governance and measurable outcomes, a pattern likely to steer global capital toward training-led deployments. In effect, it hints that the next competitive edge in public finance will flow to institutions that train their people as rigorously as they buy their software, a direction embodied by Africon AI.