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BoI, CcHUB partner on $1m social innovation fund for start-ups

By Femi Adekoya
24 December 2015   |   12:25 am
To support start-ups in their technological innovation drive, the Bank of Industry (BoI) and Lagos-based incubator hub, the Co-Creation Hub (CcHUB), have partnered to raise a $1 million seed investment fund to help small businesses to create social impact in the technology ecosystem.     Under the arrangement, the bank has made an investment commitment…
MD-of-BoI--20-2-15

Managing Director of BOI, Rasheed Olaoluwa

To support start-ups in their technological innovation drive, the Bank of Industry (BoI) and Lagos-based incubator hub, the Co-Creation Hub (CcHUB), have partnered to raise a $1 million seed investment fund to help small businesses to create social impact in the technology ecosystem.
   
Under the arrangement, the bank has made an investment commitment of $200,000 to aid provision of equity capital for emerging businesses.
 
Indeed, the social innovation fund aims to provide equity capital, along with strategic and operational support to early stage and fast growing businesses involved in technology and services sectors.
  
BoI’s Managing Director, Rasheed Olaoluwa explained that the bank’s involvement in the scheme is geared towards assisting small businesses to leverage technology to achieve desired development.

According to him, the focus of the bank is to ensure that social impact is delivered through the bank’s investment in the fund.

“Nigerian businesses cannot be built on debt alone. It has long been part of the bank’s vision to find ways to provide sorely needed equity capital and business advice to promising Nigerian
businesses. Our partnership with CcHUB is one of the avenues for realising this vision and we remain committed to the pursuit of our core mandate of providing long-term financial support to small, medium and large companies/projects in Nigeria’s key sectors’.
 
Olaoluwa added that the investment commitment was informed by the developmental impact of their existing portfolio and their strong pipeline for potential new investments.

Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and co-founder of CcHUB, Bosun Tijani said: “CcHUB incubation office was launched in response to the need to provide business development, mentoring and funding support to start-ups that showed traction from our impactful pre-incubation programme. Our seed investment ensures start-ups have a sure footing post-incubation to concentrate on rapidly executing their plans and learning from the market.

“CcHUB is also Nigeria’s first open living lab and pre-incubation space designed to be a multi-functional, multi-purpose space where work to catalyze creative social tech ventures take place. The HUB is a place for technologists, social entrepreneurs, government, tech companies, impact investors and hackers in and around Lagos to co-create new solutions to the many social problems in Nigeria.

“We need to build infrastructure in a smarter manner than what we are used to. The Hub acts as a cushy nest designed to accelerate the successful development of social tech ventures through an array of business support resources and services, developed and orchestrated by the hub management and offered both in the space and through our network of partners. In addition, the hub leads co-creation initiatives aimed at creating novel technologically driven solutions to the myriad social challenges facing the average Nigerian”.

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