Seun Osewa is the 32 year old founder of Nairaland. He is one of the most celebrated tech entrepreneurs in Nigeria. He started out in 2005 and has now built a business that rakes in millions monthly
However, his story is not all glory and happiness; he has had his own fair share of hammerings of frustrating magnitudes. Take a look at some of them.
1. Most of his Business Ventures Failed:
In an interview CP Africa, Seun Osewa noted that “All my business projects were failures before I started Nairaland”
Before Seun created Nairaland, he had a web hosting service. After three months, he could only boast of one customer so he had to close shop.
He sheds more light on this in his interview;
“About 2 years earlier, I had attempted to start a web hosting service, but after 3 months, I could only boast of one customer, so I ran out of capital and the business died”
2. He had shortage of funds when he started.
In fact, he only started Nairaland because it was the only idea that did not require additional capital-
he had internet access and a family friend paid for his VPS whuch was $15 per month.
3. He once had to shut down Nairaland
“I remember when I had to lock all Nairalanders from Nairaland for a public holiday because I couldn’t keep up with the spammers anymore”
4. Nairaland didn’t immediately take off- He had to beg & pay people to join.
In an article on his site, seunosewa.com he notes-
“Until your social network takes off, you’ll just have to bribe or beg people to join and participate. I did that.”
So what inspires him?
In an interview with Dipo Tepede, he says
“A strong desire to be financially independent and achieve good things that will affect millions of people and last even after I’ve died of old age.”
His Driving Force is
“Survival, a strong desire for independence, and a desire to be influential.”
Yes, influential and free he is.
