Ventures Platform holds demo day for start-ups

Ventures Platform (VP), an incubation hub, hosted its first demo day last month, where six companies made presentations in front of investors after sixteen weeks of incubation as part of the early stage accelerator programme.

The six tech start-ups were selected from hundreds of companies that applied for the accelerator programme, to gain the interest and financial support of top African investors and entrepreneurs that attended.

“VP Demo Day was very well organised, kudos to the VP team for providing a great opportunity for start-ups in Nigeria to build exciting products and grow their business,” said Rimini Makama, corporate and government affairs, Microsoft, after the event.

The first batch of cohorts from the programme included Jalo, an on-demand logistics company that empowers small businesses by offering them affordable delivery services; Payconnect, a financial technology company providing an online platform for quick collateral-free micro loans to people within just twenty-four hours of applying, and Protech, which uses technology to determine learning patterns of students to match them with the perfect tutors.

Other tech start-ups at the presentation were Lizzie’s Creations, which uses technology to teach kids about Africa, its languages and rich culture through fun interactive mobile apps like Teseem – First Words; Mobile Forms Africa, a data collection platform that connects mobile agents to organisations that need data, enabling the easy collection and analysis of online and offline data, Another start-up WeSabi was equally there, a firm that allows people find skills, reliable and affordable workers for domestic and commercial work.

These six companies under the direction of Fola Olatunji-David, manager, accelerator programme,   were paired with mentors from the selection team and offered a unique mix of workplace, business support, business strategy and building capacity, short term residency, and seed funding for their innovative ideas.

After the presentations, each start-up welcomed guests and prospective investors at their booths.

Other investors who attended the event were Yemi Keri  of Rising Tide Africa; Dotun Suleiman, chairman, Interswitch &iDEA Nigeria; Frank Nweke, II former minister of Information and DG at Nigerian Economic Summit; Abuchi Ezekwugo of JP Morgan Chase; Jay Alaraba, co-founder, PAGATech), and Jonas Schwarz Lausten.