Stanford Seed Alumni Partner for West Africa's Growth

The West African delegates at the recently concluded Global Entrepreneurship Summit held an investors and delegates breakfast session in the McClelland Building of Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business on Saturday with the theme ‘Partnering for Growth in the West African sub-region’.

Organized in conjunction with Stanford Seed, the purpose of the meeting according to the conveners, Afolabi Abiodun, MD/CEO of Stanford Seed and Abimbola Okubena MD/CEO of Health Forever Product Nigeria, both alumni of Stanford Seed West Africa, was to emphasize the significance of collaboration as the first stage of business growth in the sub-region as participants who run businesses in West Africa sought to leverage each other’s competencies.

The speakers, including Xavier Helgesen, Femi Oye and Ehizogie Binitie, who are beneficiaries of venture capital themselves, advised participants that to attract funds for the expansion of their operations, they must have a clear definition of what they are seeking money for, and the financing profile must be broken down into tranches with clear-cut milestones.

They maintained that of critical importance is the long-term relevance of their product or service offering. In other words, prospective investors need assurances that the offering has strong potential to sell well into the future and not just the present. This is essential because investors who are attracted to high returns want to have clarity about the big picture with regard to their investment, against the backdrop of the entrepreneur’s protection strategy to ward off competition.

The facilitators stated categorically that the investment seeking entrepreneur must of necessity understand the technicalities of fundraising and make diligent use of timesheets and be abreast with the unit economics of their offerings as regards the return on investment.

American-born Xavier Helgesen, a serial social entrepreneur is the Co-founder and CEO of Off-Grid Electric based in San Francisco and Tanzania. Femi Oye is the Co-founder and CEO of SMEFUNDS and recipient of the World Youth Leader’s Award, while Ehizogie Binitie is the Co-founder and CTO of Rancard Solutions.

The breakfast meeting was coordinated by Ms Karen of Stanford SEED and Ms. Tijen Aybar of the US State department, organizer of the Global Entrepreneurs Summit and co-hosted by Afolabi Abiodun, an award-winning Nigerian entrepreneur who serves as CEO and chief ideas evangelist of SB Telecoms Limited, based in Lagos, Nigeria.