Jobberman founders launch student innovation fund

About two weeks ago, the guys behind Jobberman were in the news following a shout out from Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg. They are back in it again.

This time, the duo of Opeyemi Awoyemi and Olufunbi Falayi, have set up a student innovation fund to support innovation and startup founders still in school.

The fund will be known as FastForward Student Innovation Fund and it will be investing between N250,000 and N2,000,000 for as much as 25% in innovations started by current students and people that have recently graduated within a three-year time frame.

The money to be invested is raised from alumni of specific universities, high net worth individuals, private equity companies, and it is supported by the Federal Government of Nigeria.

According to report by Innovation Village, the fund will be administered by Investment One.

Per a blog post, Awoyemi outlined the areas which the fund will be interested in investing in. They are as follows:

Innovation of all kinds. We are investing in tech-enabled innovations, not just software, apps or internet startups. Agriculture, healthcare, environmental innovations can create even more impact than software innovations.
Nigeria’s own Elon Musk. We are looking for visionaries and risktakers who value the global impact their project creates than the money. We are looking out for disruptive groundbreaking tech ideas that improves dramatically on current technologies / processes. They don’t necessarily have to make business sense in 2016.

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Job Creation. Sustainable ideas that empower others to make money. Uber of things. Tech-enabled solutions that enables self-reliance. Opportunities that will create hundreds of jobs.
Innovations tackling big problems. As a Nigerian, living in Nigeria these issues are very obvious. Power for homes, offices and small business, clean water, improved agriculture systems, quality education, financial inclusion, affordable housing, open governance are some of those needs.
Foreign Exchange Earners. One of the biggest problems of Nigeria’s economy is that we are more consumers than producers. Another equally big problem is that we have lots of local businesses and a handful of global businesses that bring money back into the country. Interested in supporting global ideas where a company can make millions of dollars outside Nigeria for a Nigerian company.
Sector Revivals and New Sector Creations. There are too many untapped sectors and industries in Nigeria today — dead or non-existent. We are looking for ideas that addresses these issues. See how many makeup artists, personal shoppers and bakers we have in Nigeria now compared to 6 years ago.
Smart and Visionary Founders. Being a student, your world view may be somewhat limited. However if that did not discourage us from wanting to invest in students, that should not discourage you from following your dream and adapting/improving along the way. Real Smart people might look arrogant, but they learn fast and improve on advice of experienced people.

So if you are a student and you know you have something genuine and worthwhile in any of these areas listed above, then you should hurry to the fund's website and enroll. Happy hunting!