How we are using software to build low-cost technology solutions —Rasheed

What is IderaOS all about?

IderaOS is a software company building low-cost technology solutions that drive business and economic growth in emerging markets. We are helping small businesses birth, nurture, grow and scale their businesses by providing an end to end ecosystem that caters for creating and customizing online stores, managing products, inventory, local logistics, local payment, mailing system and selling in multiple places.

Our latest product, Listbuy is a digital e-commerce and logistics platform for small businesses to create their online shops, reach and connect with their customers, seamlessly accept payment and securely ship to them.

I have worked with companies like Facebook and Google on programs that have empowered over 10,000 small businesses in Nigeria.  I have been recognised by the Tony Elumelu Foundation as one of the top young emerging entrepreneurs in Africa. My other accolades include recognition from the Accra Business School and Yali RLC as an Africa Young Leader and a young West African leader, respectively.

What inspired you to venture into this kind of business?

Nigeria as far as I am concerned is the poverty capital of the world and the current unemployment rate is 23.1%. From my personal experience and journey, I have come to the conclusion that there are two factors that greatly contribute to this alarming situation.

The first is the high failure rate of businesses. According to statistics released by UNIDO in 2017, 8 out of 10 businesses die within three years. The second reason is our archaic tertiary education system. The system consistently churns out half-baked graduates who add no value to businesses making them unemployable. Now, when the citizenry can neither run successful businesses nor contribute effectively as employees, there is bound to be a rise in poverty and unemployment as is the current situation.

Growing up was not rosy, I was born into a family of three and my parents struggled so hard to give us quality education. In secondary school, I spent almost half of every school term at home due to school fees debt. Our financial situation also affected me in university. I had to drop out of university because I could not afford it any longer.  Fortunately for me, I was able to bounce back. I raised money from family and friends and enrolled at The Polytechnic, Ibadan for a Diploma in Electrical Engineering. To keep me going while I was at the polytechnic, I did an unpaid internship to learn digital skills. Afterwards, I started offering services based on these new skills and that was how I earned the money to support myself.

This taught me that people can change their circumstances and rise above poverty if they have the necessary tools and opportunities. It inspired me to start empowering entrepreneurs with the business, digital, and financial literacy skills needed to run successful businesses to support their families. In September 2018, I started building IderaOS with my co-founder.

I have made it my life’s mission to create solutions to these two problems. Of course, this is greatly influenced by my background. My family was not always poor. My parents both owned thriving small businesses. My mother’s business failed when the government placed custom sanctions on the importation of textiles. On the other hand, my father’s fashion business failed because it did not evolve with the changing times and technology. There is a huge cost to failed businesses, people lose their livelihood and there is a corresponding increase in unemployment and hunger, the family crumbles, crime becomes prevalent and healthcare becomes the ultimate nightmare.

As enormous as these problems are, however, I think it presents an incredible opportunity to create prosperity. We can accelerate business growth by making it easy for entrepreneurs to acquire low-cost technological and business tools. With business growth comes a reduction in metrics such as poverty, crime and unemployment.

That is the inspiration that drives us at IderaOS.

What was your start-up capital?

My startup capital is really my social capital.  Let me explain. When we started IderaOS, I did not have all the capital I needed for the business technology and operations. Instead, I relied on the reputation I had gained over the past five years. I teamed up with Quadry Olalekan. He had some capital and he shared my passion. It’s important to tell this part of the story because there are several people who are sitting on great ideas that believe that what they need to get started is money. Sometimes all you need is to find the right person to collaborate with. It is better to own a small chunk of something big than own 100 per cent of nothing. Today our business is in existence, impacting peoples lives and worth some millions just because of the power of collaboration.

Do you have any expansion plan?

Our expansion plan is to target the fastest-growing cities or city clusters – urban centres where per capita income and consumption spending far exceeds the national average. A city-based strategy is essential in Africa, given the rapid pace of urbanization and the differences in growth rates even among cities within the same country. In terms of numbers, by December 2020, our plan is to empower 5000 SMEs to start and grow their businesses through our platforms directly employing about 12000 people ( at a ratio of 2 to 3 people per business) and indirectly providing jobs for about 3000 people. In five years, our goal is to power 100,000 businesses that will impact over a million people.

Our business will lead to massive creation of jobs as youths launch businesses with the potential of employing others leading to Increased revenue for the individual, community and the country at large. Our long term plan is to be a digital hub of technological solutions for small businesses in Africa.

What are the major challenges you have faced since you started?

Erratic power supply almost ran us out of business. The cost of generating our own power supply was huge. Eventually, we made the switch to solar energy. Inevitably, we ran into issues getting the right kind of people to work with us – people with the skills and the drive. Just like with power, we had to find a way around this. What we did was hire people with the right attitude and whom we felt had potential. We then paired with experienced team members who would help them learn and grow. Access to finance was also problematic, but we have found that having strategic partners is immensely effective.

How do you think the government can address these challenges?

There are many ways the government can be more effective. But all of these will fail if the people in government do not show some empathy. As SMEs, we provide 60% of jobs and 40% of the revenue in the economy so we want to be treated like we matter because we really do. Ease of Business needs to stop being an empty metric and translate to the sort of policies and regulation that gets enacted. It needs to translate to taxation, especially multiple taxations. We are seeing some progress with The Finance Bill but we need more than that. Power is also something that needs to be fixed as a matter of urgency. It is hurting many businesses including ours. Enough of empty promises. We want to see genuine progress.

How many Awards and grants have you won so far?

I have won quite a few. Some of them are the National Finalist Global Student Entrepreneurship Award 2020,  the Top 1000 emerging Entrepreneurs in Africa by Tony Elumelu Foundation 2019, Africa Young Leaders Award 2019 by the Accra Business School.

IderaOS was selected as one of the top 10 high impact and high potential startups by Mass Challenge Rhode Island in 2019. This was in addition to being recognised as one of the Top 10 Emerging Startups in the US by StartUp World Cup USA 2019.

What advice do you have for other young people that are interested in what you do?

My advice for any young person interested in building a business either in tech or any other industry is to start small, start with what you have and start right now. It will be tough and rough however starting small and right now will let you be able to test if there’s a market for the business without necessarily spending a lot of money and will allow you move on swiftly should you fail.

Also, the most important business skill is selling. As an entrepreneur, you have to learn how to sell your product or services. It is the most important skill for an entrepreneur.  If you do not know how to sell or you do not have a sales partner, you probably should not be in business yet. In my case, I had to first learn selling before starting our business.