Search Giants Google has released a statement saying Nigeria’s Tech Startups are part of the reason the country is drawing in huge number of foreign investors.
This comes as Folarin Aiyegbusi, head of startup ecosystem for Africa at Google, said Nigerian technology (tech) companies are one of the reasons Nigeria is attracting foreign direct investment (FDI).
Folarin Aiyegbusi made this statement while speaking at the Founder conversations event organised by Google on Thursday, saying Nigerian Tech Startups and their counterparts in other African countries that have participated in various Google accelerator.
“There are certain numbers that you see as press. You see us talk about the number of jobs created, the funding raised, how many cohorts we’ve run, and a number of other statistics,” he said.
“Those are very abstract. If you’re a part of the press and you hear that every time it’s time for a program, it becomes very abstract and you don’t understand the implications of these numbers. So what I want to do today is help explain what these startups are doing before they come on stage, and explain what these numbers actually mean.
“Funding raised. When you think about it, funding raised, jobs created, and then sort of like what are they doing?
“Let’s start with the funding raised number. Today, these startups, if we actually include the African or Nigerian startups that participate in our programmes, we have startups that have raised over $1.3 billion. Brought in $1.3 billion onto the continent. Again, the numbers sound very abstract.”
Aiyegbusi said Nigerian founders are not just creating solutions and raising funds, their impact on the Nigerian economy comprises much more, including job creation, improving skills and living conditions of the communities around them and far away.
“This is one other, one major, one other avenue that FDI is coming onto the continent and then onto the country,” he said.
“It’s a very big deal. Our dollar is stabilising because of many different verticals, but it’s also because of the startups. That’s one. It’s jobs created. These startups are creating jobs. And it’s more than just a team of – they’re creating jobs and solving problems with this funding.
“It’s more than just the founders that you will see today. There are machines behind these founders of five, 10, 20, 50 people that are building aggressively and scaling these solutions themselves that the founders are building.
“Now, what it also looks like, what that funding looks like, is paying people well enough to go out and further impact their different communities. Think of it as a pyramid; when you think about the numbers. It’s a pyramid.”
Also Speaking at the event was Olajuwon Abayomi, the general manager (GM) for Termii operations in Nigeria. He said the importance of tech startups in the lives of Nigerians is very massive, reiterating that his company Termii, is solving some stringent issues faced during digital transactions through the deployment of one-time password (OTP) or transaction notifications.
