FSDH Women In Business Initiative
FSDH-WIBI FEMALE FOUNDERS GROWTH PROGRAMME
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ABOUT FSDH WIBI FEMALE FOUNDERS GROWTH PROGRAM

FSDH Women in Business Initiative is our value-added initiative for women in business in Nigeria. As part of our commitment to support and grow the female economy, we are partnering with a venture capital fund to host the inaugural Female Founders Growth Program.

This program is an annual capacity & leadership initiative focused on seeking out scalable and growth-oriented female- led businesses across industries. Our focus industry for this edition is Technology and its application as a leverage for growth, competitiveness, and scale.

We are calling on founders in female-founded, female-owned, or female-led technology startups across to apply for the maiden cohort of this initiative.

Programme Design


The Founders’ Growth Programme will be held for a total period of 8 weeks and will consist of Mentorship sessions, Masterclasses, and an Investor Pitch Day.

The Growth Program will provide Participants access to the following:
• Access to a qualified, experienced faculty via the Masterclasses and Mentoring Sessions
• Non-equity grant of $10,000
• Access to Community and Support from peer founders.
• Access to a community of leading entrepreneurs.
• Access to Funding and Investment opportunities.

Interested in being part of the Growth programme?

Apply Now

Meet Our Speakers

Bukola Smith

Chief Host
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Mrs. Funke Opeke

Keynote Speaker
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Panel 1

Positioning Your Business For Global Funding Opportunities.

Solape Akinpelu

Founder, HerVest
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Ashim Egunjobi

Founder, Octerra Capital
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Yanmo Omoregbe

Co-Founder/COO, Bamboo
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Olu Akanmu

President & Co-CEO, OPay Nigeria
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Panel 2

Women Winning Together: The Rise of Women-Empowered Communities

Damilola Olokesusi

Co-Founder & CEO, Shuttlers
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Tosin Olaseinde

Founder, MoneyAfrica
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Debola Deji-Kurunmi

Founder, Immerse Coaching Company
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Olive Emodi

Event Host
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Our Focus

Technology

Highlighting the role of technology as an enabler for business growth and development.

Capital

Highlighting the immense importance of capital in the hands of an empowered woman.

Community

Highlighting the role of thriving communities in the rise of women, their businesses and life.

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Bukola Smith

Chief Host
MD, FSDH Merchant Bank

Background

Bukola Smith holds an MBA from Alliance Manchester Business School, University of Manchester, U.K, and a B.Sc. Economics from the University of Lagos. She is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accounts of Nigeria (ICAN), Honorary Member of the Chartered Institute of Bankers and an Associate Member, Certified Institute of Pensions (Nigeria).
She became the Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer of FSDH Merchant Bank in April 2021. She brings 29 years of progressive experience in the banking industry with a track record of strategic execution and leadership. Before her appointment as Managing Director, she was the Executive Director, Business Development at First City Monument Bank and held several other leadership positions since joining in 2006.

She was responsible for the banks over 200 branches across the country, Public Sector, Business Banking, Agriculture and Transaction Banking Divisions. Under her, the bank’s SME focused team in 3 years moved from 5th position in the industry to 1st position in 2019 (KPMG Customer Service Report 2020). In addition, she established the FCMB Women in Business Desk (branded SheVentures) which supports female entrepreneurs; and set up FCMB Trustees and FCMB Custody. She was at some point the Divisional Head Treasury, Divisional Head Internal Audit and has also had responsibility for the Investment Banking and Registrar Subsidiaries of the Bank. Bukola also sat on the board on Legacy (now FCMB) Pension Funds Ltd., CSL Stockbrokers Ltd and FCMB Trustees Ltd. Prior to joining FCMB in 2006, she worked with FSB International Bank from 1992 to 2000 and Fidelity Bank plc from 2000 to 2006 gaining experiences in several areas of banking including treasury operations, international trade services, foreign and local currency trading, bond trading, Correspondent Banking and relationship management of Non-Bank Financial Institutions and Private Banking Clients. Bukola currently sits on the boards of Women in Successful Careers (WISCAR), and the Toyin Oni Foundation (NGO for cancer awareness). She serves as a mentor to several young women within and outside these networks.

Funke Opeke

Keynote Speaker
Founder, MainOne

Background

Funke Opeke, is founder and CEO of MainOne, formerly Main One Cable Company. MainOne is West Africa’s leading communications services and network solutions provider that built West Africa’s first privately owned, open access 7,000 kilometer undersea high-capacity cable submarine, a $240-million-dollar project that was completed in time and on budget in 2010. She is an experienced telecommunications executive who returned to Nigeria in 2005 as the Chief Technical Officer of MTN after a twenty-year career in the United States. Prior to her return, she was the Executive Director of Verizon Communications Wholesale Division. Subsequent to MTN, Ms. Opeke advised Transcorp on the acquisition of NITEL and briefly served as the interim Chief Operating Officer, post-acquisition of NITEL. She obtained a first degree in Electrical Engineering from Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife Nigeria and a master’s degree in Electrical Engineering from Columbia University, New York.

Solape Akinpelu

Panelist 1
Founder, HerVest

Background

Solape Akinpelu is the Chief Executive Officer and Co-founder at HerVest, a fintech pioneering inclusive finance for African women through goal-oriented savings, impact investing and credit for smallholder women farmers and Women-owned and led SMEs. With a thriving community of over 30,000 members, HerVest is on a mission to improve women’s lives through greater access to and use of financial services.

She doubles as the Chapter Director for Women in Tech Nigeria, an international organization with a double mission: to close the gender gap and to help women embrace technology as well as Chairman, Technology, Nigerian-British Chamber of Commerce.

Solape is a Certified Financial Education Instructor and a member of the Personal Finance Speakers Association (USA). She is also a member of the Chartered Institute of Marketing and has demonstrated excellence in financial marketing in her former role as Marketing head, Meristem, a top investment and wealth management conglomerate in Nigeria. A global and sought-after speaker, she continues to lead gender finance conversations online, offline, in print and across leading media publications

Ashim Egunjobi

Panelist 2
Founder, Octerra Capital

Background

Ashim Egunjobi is the Managing Partner at Octerra Capital, a pan-African early stage venture capital fund focused on unlocking funding and growth opportunities for African founders and startups. Octerra Capital invests in impact driven founders looking to disrupt and change the narrative on the continent.

Ashim has over 15 years of experience working in tech, banking, and finance, leading multinational teams and organizations across Africa, Germany, the Middle East, and Asia, giving her a global perspective and local insight into the opportunities and risks organizations face in today’s quickly moving world.

Yanmo Omoregbe

Panelist 3
Co-Founder/COO, Bamboo

Background

Yanmo Omorogbe is the co-founder and COO of Bamboo. She leads growth and operations as the COO of Bamboo. Bamboo is a digital investment platform that gives Nigerians real-time access to buy, sell or hold assets traded on the US stock exchange from their mobile phones or computers.

She is the operational backbone of a business turning ordinary Nigerians into global investors. With Bamboo, the average Nigerian can become a shareholder in the technology companies they use every day like Twitter, Google, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft and Facebook.

Olu Akanmu

Panelist 4
President & Co-CEO, OPay Nigeria

Background

Olu Akanmu is a seasoned commercial executive with over 20 years of corporate leadership experience. He has a wide range of expertise at high levels in consumer products, manufacturing, healthcare, telecommunications, financial services and technology. He is currently the President and Co-CEO of OPay Nigeria. Before Opay, he worked as executive director, Retail Banking at FCMB. As Chief Marketing Officer at Airtel Nigeria where he was responsible for leading commercial strategy and achieving yearly revenue targets of more than USD 1.5 billion.

Prior to working at Airtel, Akanmu operated as Managing Director for Retail and Consumer Banking at the now-defunct Bank PHB. He also worked in MTN Nigeria as General Manager, Consumer Marketing and was the chief architect of MTN’s unique brand and consumer marketing strategy in Nigeria.

Akanmu has a diverse educational background within and outside Nigeria. He graduated from Obafemi Awolowo University in Ile-Ife with a bachelor’s degree in Pharmacy. He also holds a Master’s degree in Business Administration from the Lagos State University. He also studied at the University of Witwatersrand and Edinburgh Business School, earning a distinction in the Management Advancement Program and a post-graduate certificate in Business Research.

Damilola Olokusesi

Panelist 1
Co-Founder & CEO, Shuttlers

Background

Damilola Olokesusi is the Co-Founder and CEO of Shuttlers, a transport & tech company startup currently revolutionizing the way professionals and organizations commute in metropolitan cities like Lagos. In 2021, Shuttlers announced a $1.6m seed round to scale its operations in other cities across Africa.

Damilola holds a bachelor’s degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Lagos. She is a part of the Harambean Team for 2018 cohort; an Alliance for highly educated young African social, business and political entrepreneurs, attending leading universities in Asia, Europe and North America. In 2019, she was named in Forbes Africa’s 30 Under 30 list (Technology category).

Tosin Oluseinde

Panelist 2
Founder, MoneyAfrica

Background

Oluwatosin is a professional accountant with over 10 years of experience spanning across accounting, audit, financial management and taxation. She is the Founder/CEO of Money Africa, an edtech platform that enhances financial literacy and investments leveraging on technology with a community of over 200,000 people.

Oluwatosin is Washington Mandela Fellow, a LinkedIn Top Voice Finance and Economy 2020.

She was a finalist for The Future Awards In 2019, she was selected as one the top 100 women by The Leading Ladies Africa, she was one of the top 8 traders by CNBC Africa in 2012, a member of the Golden Key International Honour Society. Oluwatosin has spoken at TedX, Featured on BBC UK, Al Jazeera, CNN, Guardian and several others.

Debola Deji-Kurunmi

Panelist 3
Founder, Immerse Coaching Company

Background

Debola Deji-Kurunmi is a transformational catalyst, equipping a new breed of African visionaries to rise and enthrone the continent into global prominence, through her work of coaching, consulting, and capacity building.

She is Founder of IMMERSE Coaching Company (a personal transformation coaching practice), Executive Director at Ideation Hub Africa (a public policy and impact advisory firm) and President at Kingdom Women Global Alliance and FIREBRAND Movement (both faith-based organizations)

Olive Emodi

Host

Background