The Grinders Table

I thought to share a conversation I recorded in 2016 with Yusufa Sey, founder of Northern Industries. In this BONUS episode, our guest shares his incredible entrepreneurial journey from Gambia, the United States, London, and finally Denmark, where he co-founded Athene, a personal genetics company that unlocks the secrets of sports and diet genes. He discusses the importance of taking calculated ri...

In this insightful episode, we speak with Dayo Odutale-Ademola, Managing Director for Nigeria at Branch International Financial Services, about her professional journey driven by the desire to create an impact through her work. Dayo shares her experiences, emphasizing the importance of growth, risk management, and building a sustainable business for long-term success. We also discuss the transform...

In this episode I sat down with fast-rising Filmmaker and Creative Director, Diji Aderogba, where he shared his creative journey, experiences working with big brands and achieving success despite the odds. Diji talks about his love for cultural storytelling, his background as an actor, handling criticism and the lessons he's learned from various projects that have shaped his career. This conve...

I had the pleasure of talking with Hafsa Jomari, CEO of CoAmana, an Agtech startup operating in Nigeria and Kenya. We discussed her inspiring journey from academia to entrepreneurship and how her obsession with solving the issue of market access for smallholder farmers led her to create CoAmana. In this episode, Hafsa shares invaluable advice she received during her entrepreneurial journey and how...

We spent time with Desigan Chinniah aka Dees or Cyberdees, a successful technology entrepreneur and investor in under-represented minority founders.  In this episode, we explore his journey through the dotcom era (his time at Mozilla and deprecating Flash), taking risks, building diverse teams, the rise of AI, and much more. This episode is full of insights into succeeding as a technology entrepre...

This week we had a chat with the amazing Ashley Immanuel, the Co-founder and COO of Semicolon. Semicolon's goal is to turn Africa's vibrant youth population into an army of technologists, software developers, enterprise architects and project managers. Ashley shares her journey with us, how she followed her passion and experiences, as well as one of the coolest intros you'll ever hear!...

This week I had a chat with Oyinkansola Fawehinmi, a 'fast rising' entertainment business leader and lawyer from Nigeria, also known as FozaDoza. She has years of experience in entertainment and media law, a path not many female lawyers tend to tow in Nigeria. She has brokered deals worth over $10,000,000 working with top talents across various nationalities, as well as advising several government...

I am excited to start 2023 buzzing with Caleb Maru, Managing Partner at Proximity ventures, on the Grinders Table. Caleb also writes an amazing newsletter that tracks the African tech ecosystem called Tech Safari. Caleb shares why he invests in startups, his approach to managing teams and insights on his journey so far. 

This week we had the pleasure of chatting with Snehar Shah, the CEO of Moringa school. Snehar is passionate about spearheading the development of Africa's young people through learning tech skills and this is evidenced in his leadership at Moringa school. Snehar has over 25 years of diverse experience in building and running businesses in multiple industries and geographies (UK, Europe and Africa)...

This week we had Mouna Akefli, Marketing Manager CU West Africa & Morocco at Ericsson. Muna discusses her journey of finding purpose in life and her deep-rooted love for Africa. She talks about purpose-led marketing and impacting initiatives through her work, and why young professionals should focus on growing their talents, taking risks, and experimenting. 

Last weekend we spent time on the Grinders Table with Solape Akinpelu, CEO of Hervest. Hervest is pioneering inclusive finance for the African woman! Solape took time to share her experience and wisdom about fundraising, why businesses and the world are not as inclusive to women, what holds them back, and how the behaviour of finance needs to be part of the conversation in order to change.

This week's featured conversation is with a 'true son of the soil' and Co-founder of Impact Hub Accra - Will Senyo. Will shares tips for founders, his thoughts on the over-fixation on Fintech,  revitalising dying industries, his recent fund targeting the creative space in Accra, Ghana and future plans. One of our hottest episodes yet!

Martin is a technologist and PanAfricanist who believes in technology's ability to put Africa on the map as the most significant workforce in the world. He has been working on delivering programs and aggregating relevant programs to empower Africans with 21st-century skills and bringing remote workers from around the world to Africa to realise the continent's beauty. Martin talks about his motivat...

Folake Owodunni is the Co-founder and CEO of Emergency Response Africa (ERA), a health-tech company dedicated to saving lives one emergency at a time. Folake shares her inspiration for building the company, lessons she learned along the way and tips for aspiring founders.

I had the pleasure of speaking with Damilare Ogunleye, the co-founder at FoodLama . FoodLama is a personalized genie that helps you find the best food for you, based on your preferences and your lifestyle choices. Damilare shared how being an entrepreneur requires work-life balance, communication, and discipline.  He talked about building distribution into your products and having a clear vis...

This week I caught up with the founder of Nigeria Agritech, ThriveAgric, while playing football. ThriveAgric provides access to finance, technology-based advice, extension services, and global and local markets to smallholder farmers in Africa. They noticed that smaller farmers faced a lot of problems, and they wanted to provide them with solutions so that they could increase their yield and also...

Yvonne Bajela spent time with us on the Grinders Table sharing her experience building a career, following her intuition, taking risks and pivoting throughout her career.  Yvonne invests in startups across the UK & Africa. She is a founding member at Impact X a UK-based venture capital fund founded to invest in companies led by underrepresented entrepreneurs. Over the last five years, Yvo...

This week's episode features a conversation with Sam Sturm, Chief Venture Architect at Founders Factory Africa (FFA). FFA is the go-to innovation partner for startups, investors, governments, and corporates — throughout Africa and beyond. Sam shares insights on the value of relationships, his journey into the venture space, his thoughts on the Venture ecosystem, the myth of talent scarcity and his...

This week I had the opportunity of having a chat with Zouheir Lakhdissi, a Moroccan entrepreneur and founder with more than 22 years of experience in the digital industry and more than 15 years in C-Level positions. Zouheir shares his journey, how he has built his career and why he thinks AI is the future of human existence.

It's officially season 2 of The Grinders Table and to kick off this 'summer' episode is Kristin Wilson. Kristin designs solutions at the confluence of business, culture, and politics in emerging markets. Kriston talks about veering from her medical career to her foray into Princeton, Oxford and Stanford. We deep dive into what success means and her company - Spurt!

I spoke with Joseph Agunbiade, Co-founder of BudgIT and founder of Univelcity . Joseph explains his love for physics and how it has influenced his life. He also shared key insights on how he has built a successful career (even if he doesn't regard himself as successful). Finally, Joseph capped our conversation with some amazing book recommendations that you should definitely take a look at.

On the Grinders Table was Prasanth Kumar.  Prasanth has held leadership roles in India, Dubai, Morocco to Ghana with a career spanning over 20 years. He shares his lessons learned, failures and key insights from his journey.

Today we had Kanini Mutooni on the Grinders Table and I was awed. Kanini has held leadership and board level positions in East Africa, Europe and the US. She shares with us her 'behind the scene' story as well as lessons she learned along the way. Grab a cup of coffee, tea or whatever you like, plug in your headphones and join the conversation.

Today I had the pleasure of chatting with Olawale Adegoke, a serial entrepreneur, who runs two interesting businesses - an outdoor advertising agency and a fantasy sports platform. Olawale shares his journey from construction to real estate and now advertising and sports.

This week we had Bola Lawal on the Grinders Table. Bola Lawal, an impact Entrepreneur focused on emerging markets, founded ScholarX (LearnAm), an Education Finance platform that helps students access funding to get an education. Bola shares insights and learnings from his journey in 'startuping'.