The group is inviting developers to "come forward with innovative apps which are inspired by the realities of Africa and the Middle East."

Christian de Faria, the MTN Group chief commercial officer, said that with this competition, the company is reaching out to the broad developer community. MTN also intends to speed up the adoption of data-enabled technologies that feature digital content developed with the African and Middle Eastern user in mind.

"The more user-friendly and relevant the app, the more differentiated it will be, thus increasing the likelihood of its adoption on a wide scale in two vast markets that are hungry for local solutions -- not least of which is digital content with an African and Middle Eastern flair," said de Faria in a statement.

Budding app developers have been invited to upload their apps to .

The apps competition, which began Aug. 5, will run for five months and focus initially on the Android OS. All apps must be built in English and should be relevant for the African and Middle Eastern markets.