THE Tony Elumelu Foundation (TEF), an institution dedicated to the promotion and celebration of excellence in business leadership and entrepreneurship across Africa, is partnering with Co-Creation Hub Nigeria (CcHub), the country’s first open living laboratory and pre-incubation space dedicated to catalysing creative social technology ventures. The effort is aimed at encouraging innovative ideas that could help transform social technology space in the country.

Through the partnership, TEF will contribute to the growth and development of the country’s emerging technology industry from the “Silicon Lagoon” by providing managed seed-funding to 20 technological ideas/ventures targeted at typical challenges faced by an average Nigerian. The fund will support new use of technology in several key areas of the economy such as healthcare, education, agriculture, governance, inclusive technology, small business development, and finance.

By focusing on the early stages of high-impact, results-oriented ideas/ventures, the seed funding will support experimentation and prototype development in order to accelerate the adoption of the solutions. Each venture will then have the potential to become a self-sustaining profitable social enterprise.

CcHub will act as an incubator designed to accelerate the successful development of the funded social technology ventures through an array of business support resources and services the management. The group will lead co-creation initiatives and facilitate multiple stakeholders to work together to create technologically-driven solutions to address social challenges.

CEO of TEF, said: “The partnership is part of our broader effort to develop an integrated venture pipeline development process in Nigeria.”

Source: The Guardian