2015 has been a wonderful year for startups looking for assistance and organisations providing the opportunities for these startups.
Here are some of the notable Nigerian startup stories for 2015.
1. The $100 million Tony Elumelu Entrepreneurship Programme.
Though it was launched in December 2014, applications for the inaugural programmme kicked off on the 1st of January 2015. The Tony Elumelu Foundation Entrepreneurship Programme, a $100m Pan-African entrepreneurship initiative, is a multi-year programme of training, funding, and mentoring, designed to empower the next generation of Africanentrepreneurs. The programme seeks to identify and help grow an initial 10,000 start-ups and young businesses from across Africa over the next 10 years, targeting the creation of 1,000,000 new jobs and $10 billion in annual revenues. The list of the first 1000 finalists was released in March 2015 and the finalists had a bootcamp in Ota, Ogun State. The Tony Elumelu Foundation invested a total of $4,860,000, including $1,405,000 in agriculture; $410,000 in education and training; and $365,000 in manufacturing. The sector-agnostic programme funded start-ups across a further 20 industries, all based in Africa. The application for the second edition of the programme will open on the 1st of January, 2016
2. The 1 billion Naira Social Innovation Fund by CcHub, Omidyar Network, Venture Garden and Bank of Industry.
This fund for Social Innovation was launched in December 2015 and it is the first of its ind in Nigeria. Though full details have not been released, the goal is to deepen support for early stage social enterprises solving local problems across various sectors of the Nigerian economy. It is expected that applications will open in January, with individual startups to be offered funding of between US$50,000 and US$150,000.
3. $6M Fund Raised For Startups In Nigeria.
Startups and SMEs in Nigeria can access a $6 million fund arranged by the Bank of Industry (BoI) as investment commitment. The BoI said the money could be accessed through the Venture Capital Fund being raised by Grow Africa Equity Partners Limited.
4. Airtel’s Catapult-A-Startup.
Airtel Nigeria partnered with Intel, Microsoft, others to launch “Catapult-A-Startup”, an initiative to support Startups in Nigeria. Each chosen startup was entitled to N1 million cash. Six startups, Pass.Ng, Yuzah, PushCV, Sonbim Games, MatchUP, Blubird and ChopUp emerged as winners.
5. Demo Africa 2015.
This startup event took place in Lagos Nigeria. Out of the 30 startups that pitched at the event, 8 are from Nigeria. Mavis Computel, Oga Venue, TalkingBookz, CarpartsNigeria, Zuvaa, SmartEdu, PoshRite, and iKon Tracker.
SaiSai of Zimbabwe took home the first prize of the night, winning the SWELL Award, which includes an all expenses paid trip to Silicon Valley, courtesy of SWELL and supported by the African Technology Foundation. The US State Department also awarded 5 entrepreneurs will an all expenses paid trip to pitch their businesses at DEMO Fall in Silicon Valley. This was done through the LIONS@FRICA Partnership. Winners were, from left, Chura (Kenya), Space Pointe (Nigeria), Jifunza (Rwanda), Paysail (Ghana) and Nerve Mobile (Nigeria).
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