Startups in Nigeria will be pleased to know that the Unreasonable Lab is set to launch soon in their country. The incubation center will run a pitch event running from June 6-10, 2016 where 25 promising startups from across Nigeria will be given the stage to showcase their products/ideas to world-class investors and business mentors.
The event will entail a 5-days intensive training for the startups in a bid to prepare them to best leverage on opportunities accorded to them by investors. All in the hope they will walk home having secured capital funding for their startup ventures. Also expected to be in attendance will be seasoned entrepreneurs and investors from all over Nigeria, who will also double-up as mentors.
The founding team members that have made Unreasonable Lab Nigeria possible include Michael Olorunninwo, Tito Philips, and Olufemi Omotayo. When asked why they brought Unreasonable Lab to Nigeria, the team had the following to say:
“For the first time in history, we have adopted a market economy. Our ongoing development cannot continue through aid and donation. There’s no other way to address our challenges but through entrepreneurship, innovation, and the private sector. And Unreasonable Labs might be the best avenue to addressing these needs.”
Other Startups, whose ventures have taken off thanks to Unreasonable Lab, include:
Eneza – a mobile education app that has gained unprecedented traction within the education sector across Africa. In Kenya alone, Eneza has enabled about 650,000 students gain access to educational materials and test preparation papers even on $10 phones.
MANA Nutrition – this startup boasts of having cured over one million children with severe acute malnutrition by giving them nutrient-enriched peanut butter.
Mosaic – a solar bank startup that was started at the Unreasonable Lab and has since grown to become the biggest lender for homes powered by solar in the United States of America.
Startups that go through the Unreasonable Lab program get impressive results; of the 150 startups that have gone through its program, 93% have raised funding totaling more than $100 million. Moreover, when combined, these startups have changed the lives of about eight million people.
The co-founder and CEO of Unreasonable Institute Teju Raviliochan said, “It’s amazing to see entrepreneurs creating companies that can really help a lot of people. We started Unreasonable Institute because we thought the best way to address billion-person problems was by helping entrepreneurs find solutions.”
To further enhance Unreasonable Lab positive influence, the organization needs to nurture and grow more startup entrepreneurs who can then come up with solutions to problems impacting their socio-economic environment.
Raviliochan added, “Entrepreneurs get a lot of attention from mentors who come through the program. That’s what makes Unreasonable Institute so valuable for them. So we weren’t going to be able to maintain the quality of our support and work with a whole lot more entrepreneurs. So we figured, hey, what if we could just teach other people to do what we do?”
