Zone Tech Park, a new venture builder for start-ups in Nigeria, has officially opened for business and is already turning great ideas into products and services quickly, efficiently – and profitably.
According to Bolaji Olagunju, its founder, “African startups are faced with significant challenges that hinder their growth. Zone Tech will change the status quote and help individuals and their businesses to realise their full potential through education, venture building and strategic enterprise support.”
Located in Lagos, Zone Tech Park has appointed Toro Orero as CEO of Zone Tech Park and brings vast experience with startups both as a managing partner at Silicon Valley VC Fund DDF and the founder of The African Startup Institute and SpeedUPAfrica. Olagunju is a serial entrepreneur and Founder and CEO of The Workforce Group, Nigeria’s leading HR company.
To date, US$6.5 million has been invested in Zone Tech Park to build the infrastructure and environment needed to help African startups scale and compete globally.
Zone Tech’s startups will have direct access to more than 400 domestic and international corporations who are clients of WorkForce.
Zone Tech Park is open for start-ups at all stages in their life cycle, from those that are a great idea on paper to those with customers already on-board. Its co-working space is FREE for start-ups, which are not charged for access to the tech hub’s multitude of services and advisers.
Zone Tech Park also promises to plug its start-ups into a network of more than 400 corporations, giving them direct access to market, helping them to avoid bottlenecks, strike deals faster, and scale quicker. Zone Tech Park will supports its start-ups in preparing for funding rounds by giving access to a network of potential investors, accelerator programs, and ecosystem architects.
The hub is also promising an experienced in-house engineering team of 20+ software developers and designers, and entire finance, legal, marketing, sales and fundraising teams.
Zone Tech Park has five meeting rooms that can accommodate up to 100 people; a 650-seat event and conference hall; and parking for 150 cars.
Prior to its official launch, Zone Tech ran a small pilot program and has built Peerless, a learning management system that already has 10,000+ users and revenues of 100,000 USD and Outwork, a staff on-demand solution with 7,000+ users.
Toro Orero, CEO of Zone Tech Park said “We are not another co-working space, we build companies. With the wealth of corporate clientele at our disposal, we have hit the ground running and are already building world-class products, and hosting great startups.”