Emre
Varol
Founder & CEO of A2SV, a Google-backed nonprofit transforming Africa's tech ecosystem. 8+ years at Google · Palantir · Liftoff. On a mission to bridge talent and opportunity.
Builder. Teacher. Changemaker.
I grew up in Ankara, Turkey, earned a B.S. & M.S. in Computer Engineering from Bilkent University, and competed at the International Olympiad in Informatics before spending 8+ years building production systems at Palantir, Google, and Liftoff.
But a promise I made to myself in my master's thesis, dedicating it to the children of Africa, never faded. In 2019, I flew to Addis Ababa with one idea: Africa's engineers can compete with anyone in the world. They just needed the right structure.
That idea became A2SV. Today, 1,200+ engineers from 22 African countries have gone through our program. Students who had never heard of Google are now at Google. That never gets old.
Where I've Built
From academic research to Silicon Valley to building Africa's tech future.
- Founded and scaled a nonprofit training 1,200+ elite African engineers from 20+ countries
- Secured 120+ job offers at Google, Amazon, Bloomberg, LinkedIn, Databricks, Palantir
- 70% Google SWE interview success rate in 2021 (vs. ~2% global average)
- Organized Africa's largest AI hackathon: 8,500+ participants from 48 countries
- Secured backing from Google, Jeff Dean (Google Chief Scientist), Karim Beguir (InstaDeep)
- Co-founded Eskalate (eskalate.io), an IT outsourcing company connecting A2SV-trained engineers with global companies
- Architected core ML pipelines for mobile ad targeting: re-engagement & view-through optimization
- Automated feature selection with Gradient Boosted Decision Trees (GBDT)
- Delivered ~15% revenue uplift on a $100M+ business line
- Enhanced search ad relevance & quality using advanced NLP
- Built automated system for generating ad callouts
- Developed negation & conditional statement detectors to improve ad content accuracy
- Migrated document persister from file-based to Git-based system, improving scalability
- Reduced database processing from hours to seconds via diff-based updates
- Research on query forwarding in distributed web search engines
- Pipelined strategies reducing latency in large-scale distributed systems
Africa to Silicon Valley
A2SV is a Google-backed nonprofit I founded in 2019. I started with 22 students in Addis Ababa. I watched them earn Google interviews. I watched them pass. The talent was always there.
We run a rigorous 1,000+ hour annual curriculum: data structures, algorithms, system design, soft skills, completely free for every student. Then we connect them to the world's top companies.
Our program now spans 22 African countries. Our incubator launched 20+ digital products tackling healthcare, education, and financial inclusion. Our hackathon is the largest student tech competition in Africa.
Featured in: Financial Times · Yahoo Finance · Business Insider Africa
A2SV Products
Digital solutions built by A2SV engineers, tackling Africa's most pressing challenges in healthcare, education, finance, and AI access.
What I Know
Academic Roots
Teaching Experience
Nov 2019 – Sep 2022 · Data Structures, Algorithms, Problem-Solving, Digital Logic Design
2005 – 2011 · Advanced algorithms, national team coaching, contest design & selection
Feb 2010 – Jun 2012 · CS351, CS102 (Algorithms), CS473, CS223 (Digital Design)
Honors & Awards
Publications
Galatasaray
Born in Ankara, heart yellow and red. Football and code have been with me equally long.
When I'm not building
You'll find me with a guitar in hand, on a hiking trail, watching Galatasaray dominate, or deep in a book on psychology, leadership, or strategy. I believe the best engineers are also curious humans, and I try to embody that.
Moments & Memories
From the Newsletter
Insights on African tech talent, A2SV's journey, and the engineers shaping the future.
Partner with Us to Cultivate the Next Generation of African Innovators
From training 5 students to 800+ across 20 countries - the full A2SV origin story, our expansion to Ghana, and how you can join the mission.
Read articleBringing African Tech Talent Together through the AI for Impact Hackathon
How A2SV's 3-month hackathon reached 3,700+ participants across 47 African countries, with mentors from Google, Meta, and LinkedIn.
Read articleMahlet Dereje Haile: Working at Google and Databricks
From a small town 200km from Addis Ababa to internships at Google London and Databricks Amsterdam - an A2SV first-cohort success story.
Read articleLet's Connect
Interested in partnering with A2SV, hiring world-class African engineers through Eskalate, outsourcing your next IT project, or just want to say hello? I'd love to hear from you.