Oluwasoga Oni, Founder of Mdaas and 9 Others Emerged Top 10 in the 2020 Africa’s Business Heroes Grand Finale
The 2020 Africa’s Business Heroes (ABH) prize, a leading philanthropic program created by the Jack Ma Foundation’s Africa Netpreneur Prize Initiative (ANPI) has selected the top 10 finalists to pitch at the competition’s grand finale scheduled to hold in November. The finalists will compete for a chance to win a share of a $1.5 million prize.
The show will air from November 21 to December 19, 2020.
The 10 outstanding finalists were selected from over 22,000 applications across 54 African countries after several rigorous assessments. The selected entrepreneurs include 5 males and females from eight African countries – Oluwasoga oni, Nigeria; Abdulai Dasana, Ghana; Chebet Lesan, Kenya; Diarra Bousso, Senegal; Cyrille Nkontchou, Cameroon; Aboubakar Karim, Cote D’ivoire; Axel Emmanuel Gbaou, Cote D’ivoire; Ethel Mupambwa, Zimbabwe; Naluyima Emma, Uganda and Joan Nalubega, Uganda.
Oluwasoga Oni alongside nine other entrepreneurs was selected from different key sectors like agriculture, fashion, education, healthcare, renewable energy, and financial services.
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The panel of judges at the finale will include Jack Ma, Founder of the Jack Ma Foundation and the Alibaba Group; Ibukun Awosika, Chairman of First Bank of Nigeria and Founder of the Chair Centre Group; Strive Masiyiwa, Founder and Executive Chairman of Econet Group; and Joe Tsai, Executive Vice Chairman of the Alibaba Group.
Speaking on the selection, Jack Ma, founder of the Jack Ma Foundation and Alibaba Group said,
“I continue to be amazed by the passion, resilience and vision of Africa’s entrepreneurs and I look forward to meeting these ten extraordinary businesswomen and businessmen at the finale. I am excited to learn more about how they are driving positive change and progress across the continent.”
Jack Ma further noted that the passion, excellence and diversity of the finalists reflect the vision of the competition. The Africa Business Heroes program will recognize 100 African entrepreneurs and grant them $100 million over a ten-year period in grant funding, training, mentoring, learning initiatives, access to networks and to develop an active entrepreneur community to support Africa’s future business leaders.
These coming weeks will have contestants leverage the in-depth training, Learnings and insights that they have gathered along their ABH journey, most of which will be part of the ABH brand-new business
entertainment televised show which will be aired in five episodes from November to December across Africa. The show will provide access to the real-world stories of the entrepreneurs selected for the 2020 edition as they progress in the competition.
The Jack Ma Foundation was founded in 2014 with a focus on education, entrepreneurship, women’s leadership and the environment. The foundation is on a mission to become a reliable, participative and sustainable philanthropic organization.
To learn more about the event, visit: africabusinessheroes.org