The world has changed and continues to change rapidly. Female founders leveraging technology have more opportunities to build sustainable businesses like never before. Today, more women are rising upnot just as entrepreneurs but also as angel investors. This is true if you look closely at the number of female founders emerging in the ecosystem todays.
Founder Institute is working hard to support more female founders across the world through its female founders initiative. This has led to a rise in the number of female founders at FI Lagos and the accelerator looks forward to welcoming more women entrepreneurs as application for Cohort IV closes in a few weeks. More details can be found here.
That said, meet 3 female founder that have emerged from Founder Institute Lagos and the exciting things they are doing:
Titi Adewusi, Co-Founder 9ija kids
9ija kids leverages the power of effortless learning to significantly improve the academic outcomes of primary and secondary school students. A tech-enabled platform that uses games designed to help students learn in a fun and exciting way. This, in turn, makes students learn faster and retain the information longer. It also helps them develop an entrepreneurial mindset from a young age.
Titi got this idea when she realized that as a child, playing Monopoly taught her so much about the streets of London though she had never visited the country at the time.
She has steadily been breaking barriers and impacting the young generation since she started the startup about two years ago and launched the app. She recently won a five million naira grant from the Lagos State Science Research and Innovation Council (LASRIC).
According to Titi, she plans to make the game available to public schools all over the six districts of Lagos in a bid to open their mind to using technology to learn in a fun and engaging way. So much so that they look forward to it, and at the end of the day, they have learned something new and want more.
To her fellow female tech entrepreneurs, she has this to say: “First—make that move! Don’t overthink or over analyze the idea. Just make a move! It’s okay if it doesn’t work out, but it gives you the needed boost to venture deeper and know what works and what doesn’t next time.”
About FI and her experience during the Cohort II session, she had this to say:
“Once you make that decision to be an entrepreneur, you need only one thing – join FI. An awesome program to ensure success on your entrepreneurial journey. I wish I had gone through it earlier.”
Irene Bangwell, Co-Founder, The KNOSK N100-a-day School
Irene Bangwell is an educator, author, parent coach, and the co-founder of the KNOSK N100-a-day school.
She has a strong passion for helping young minds grow and helping parents learn the best way to handle their children as well as help them navigate life. This passion is what gave birth to the idea behind the N100-a-day initiative.
Knosk is a public-private school system. Through a crowdfunding process, individuals and organizations contribute to supplementing students’ outstanding costs in the system. Students get a full education at the expense of as little as 100 naira per day.
Irene got into the Founder Institute Lagos program in 2020 as a member of the recently concluded Cohort III class. She got a scholarship from Stanbic IBTC to enter into the FI program due to her excellent performance during her application.
She had this to say about her time at FI: “I recommend the FI experience strictly for people who want to build corporations that will outlive them. You want to build something with enduring structures, systems, and one day get listed on the stock exchange, then the Founders Institute is for you.”
UjuObuekwe, Founder, Smarta Work
Uju came up with the idea of Smarta Work when she was asked to resign from her full-time job at a bank because she was pregnant. After giving birth and she wanted to get back to work she realized that there were a lot of women in her shoes who were trying to get employment but were finding it difficult because of family and other responsibilities.
Smarta work is a platform that connects companies with equipped remote workers or virtual assistants that will fill up positions that are vacant and deliver value. She is currently working with 176 remote workers in her system that are trained before they are matched with companies.
She has this to say to other female tech entrepreneurs:
“You definitely have to start with Founder Institute because it is conveniently programmed in a way that it takes you from idea to finished product in four months. There is no program like it. We do a lot of trial and error in Nigeria, we don’t have best practices. We just have an idea and we start, then make so many mistakes along the way. FI will change the trajectory for anyone who has any idea, come here and validate it. If you have a solid idea, in four months you’re off to the races. The opportunity is one that can’t be missed because it doesn’t exist anywhere else.”
If you have an idea and you are struggling to take it to the market. Or you already have a business, and you want to scale it, register now for the next Founder Institute Lagos session, Cohort IV Lagos Virtual 2021.
