Obi Emetarom, The Fintech Pioneer Building Africa's Future With Blockchain

Obi Emetarom is a serial tech entrepreneur who has focused his entire career on the Fintech space in Africa. For his first venture in 2004 (fresh out of college), Obi co-founded Parkway Projects as a provider of bespoke fintech solutions for commercial Banks in Nigeria and grew the venture to over a million dollars in revenue before he exited.
In 2008, he cofounded Appzone and since then has led the creation of several innovative startups within Appzone, including a bespoke Fintech software business, Africa’s first Banking SaaS platform on the cloud, Africa’s first card management system and card vending machine as well as Africa’s first private Blockchain network for payment in Fiat and regulated digital currencies.
In November 2022, Appzone rebranded to Zone, a regulated blockchain payment infrastructure company. Obi and the team are now super-focused on connecting every monetary store of value using blockchain to make very simple user interactions that ordinary people can relate to.
This episode of Founders Connect is supported by IRL, an original podcast from Mozilla, made for people who are into or build AI, and develop tech policies. Mozilla IRL is available wherever you listen to your podcasts. For more information, visit irlpodcast.org/
0:00 - Introduction
1:51 - Growing up in the East
2:55 - Favourite Childhood Memory
4:21 - Schools
6:11 - Moving to Lagos
6:48 - Building Parkway
11:55 - Getting into Interswitch's Programme
13:51 - Leaving Parkway, starting AppZone
15:51 - First three years of Appzone
20:39 - Top Successes
26:16 - Lessons from Parkway that helped in building Appzone
28:47 - Why Blockchain?
35:49 - Why they are one of the fastest companies to grow
39:00 - Biggest Lessons as an Entrepreneur
40:58 - Why has he been building for so long?
47:35 - Advice for Entrepreneurs

[@samuelodey9823]

It is a beautiful coincidence that this video came live on a day I am studying Nigeria's blockchain adoption so far in 2024

[@ugochukwu-nnadi]

My takeaway - "Sometimes things take a little longer than you expect, but that doesn't mean they aren't going to work" 👌. Thanks Peace ✌.

[@OlajideJubril_]

Regarding "Focus", it offers a comparatively easier path to outcompeting large corporations. In big corporations, the pace of innovation tends to be slower. Your "Focus" becomes an advantage in accumulating market share...

[@davidijie4872]

Proud Zoner 💜💜💜

[@damilareemmanuel7063]

Thanks Peace for leading this initiative. I enjoy listening to experienced professionals. I won't run out of data if you don't stop.😂

[@lisamurray2662]

Superb Interview! Very Interesting. The IRL Podcast is Banging too!
Well done Peace!

[@williamenzor6392]

I love listening to Peace

[@eribohwobernard299]

Good morning Peace, you have been doing great 👍

[@dehbrar]

Amazing Interview👏🏼🤓

[@samuelodey9823]

Thank you, Peace for this piece. 🙏🏾

[@okosunfamily1081]

I see what you did there😂. It's really a nice piece informative as always.

[@adedotunvictor7662]

😃😃

[@maxsteel360concepts5]

First to comment...ever!!😅

[@Myfoodtoken]

Who is the entrepreneur being talked about around the 18th minute of this video