Iyinoluwa Aboyeji: Building The Future In Africa

Happy Black History Month! We're thrilled to invite Iyinoluwa Aboyeji to sit in the genius chair for our first episode of Black Genius, season 2. Aboyeji's interview opens the Harambeans 10×10 series through which we'd be highlighting the stories of 10 Harambeans building Africa's future through visionary, market-creating, global enterprises. Aboyeji says: "personal success cannot insulate from the failures of your society. I don't see entrepreneurship as a way to personally enrich myself but as a tool for social change. It must be done not just for profit or personal interest but most importantly as a service in the public interest." The first Black Genius to be featured in the Harambe series, Iyinoluwa Aboyeji, made history when the startup he co-founded, Andela, received a $24 Million investment from Mark Zuckerberg & Priscilla Chan’s CZI fund for African Engineers. Zuckerberg’s surprise visit to Lagos in 2016 sent shockwaves across the African tech community, and awakened those unaware of the exploding African tech economy. The Andela-CZI partnership spurned a new era in African entrepreneurship catalyzing billions of dollars in investment interest in African startups, with investments surpassing $1 billion in both 2019 and 2020.

Aboyeji has since gone on to found two more startups–Flutterwave and Future Africa–and invested in many impact-focused enterprises. Future Africa returned $3.7M to investors at the end of 2020, experiencing explosive growth across their portfolio in the midst of the pandemic. Aboyeji regularly writes and speaks on the urgency of inclusive African development, and the need for African elites to do more for the plight of the common man.

Black Genius is hosted by Lolade Siyonbola, Founder of NOIR Labs, noirpress and NOIR FEST. Lolade is a Gates Scholar and Harambean pursuing a PhD in Sociology at Cambridge University

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