Nigeria's tech story is no longer confined to Lagos. A growing wave of Nigerian-born founders are building and leading companies worth billions of dollars in the United States and the United Kingdom, spanning fintech, healthcare, logistics, aerospace, and productivity software. Despite a global venture capital slowdown between 2023 and 2024, these entrepreneurs have kept attracting serious investment into 2026. Here are ten of them.
Tope Awotona (Calendly)
Tope Awontona CEO Calendly
Tope Awotona (Calendly)
Tope Awotona built Calendly, the scheduling platform used by businesses worldwide, after growing frustrated with the back-and-forth of booking meetings during his time in sales. He launched the Atlanta-based company using personal savings and a small business loan. In 2021, Calendly raised $350 million, pushing its valuation above $3 billion. Awotona's majority stake is now estimated at over $1 billion.
Abbey Wemimo (Esusu Financial)
Abbey Wemimo. CO-Founder Of ESUSU
Abbey Wemimo co-founded and co-leads Esusu Financial, a New York fintech that helps renters build credit by reporting rent payments to credit bureaus. The platform now serves more than 20,000 properties and roughly 1.8 million users. Esusu raised $130 million in 2022, crossing the $1 billion valuation mark. Wemimo's drive traces back to his family's experience with predatory lending due to a lack of credit access. He holds degrees from the University of Minnesota and NYU's Wagner School, and previously worked at PwC, Goldman Sachs, Accenture, and the European Commission.
Chinedu Echeruo Founder HOPSTOP,TRIPOLOGY,GIGAMENT
Chinedu Echeruo (Beloved Ecosystem)
Chinedu Echeruo founded HopStop, the transit app later acquired by Apple and folded into Apple Maps, and Tripology, acquired by Rand McNally. He now runs Beloved Ecosystem, a New York-based venture builder focused on AI-powered startups. Echeruo holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and previously worked in M&A and leveraged finance at J.P. Morgan Chase.
4. Ade Olonoh (Formstack)
Ade Olonoh founded Formstack in 2006, a no-code workplace productivity platform for building digital forms, documents, and signature workflows, headquartered in Indiana. Born in the US and raised partly in Nigeria, Olonoh bootstrapped the company into a global SaaS platform serving more than 25,000 organizations by 2021. Formstack secured $425 million in funding in 2022 and rebranded as Intellistack in 2025. Olonoh remains a board member.
5. Oluseun Taiwo (Solideon)
Oluseun Taiwo co-founded Solideon, a California startup building decentralized, robotics-driven micro-factories for rocket component manufacturing using 3D printing. The company has raised more than $5 million, and Taiwo has been recognized on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list. He studied Manufacturing Engineering Technology at Northern Illinois University.
6. Toyin Ajayi (Cityblock Health)
Dr. Toyin Ajayi co-founded Cityblock Health in 2017 with Iyah Romm, building a tech-driven primary care provider for underserved Medicare and Medicaid populations across the US. The company's largest round, a $400 million Series D led by SoftBank, pushed its valuation to roughly $5.7 billion. Ajayi studied human biology at Stanford, completed a master's at Cambridge, and earned her medical degree from King's College London.
7. Makinde Adeagbo (/dev/color, ColorStack)
Makinde Adeagbo founded /dev/color in 2015, a US nonprofit career accelerator supporting Black software engineers through mentorship and peer networks, and now serves as a board member at ColorStack. Adeagbo graduated from MIT in 2007 with a degree in Computer Science and Electrical Engineering.
8. Oluwapelumi Dada (Sorce)
Oluwapelumi Dada co-founded Sorce (formerly One Click Apply), a Silicon Valley, Y Combinator-backed app often called "Tinder for jobs," where users swipe on listings while AI handles applications and cover letters. The app has automated applications for more than 500,000 users. Dada started coding at age 11 and interned at Tesla and Dell before completing his computer science degree.
9. Tobenna Arodiogbu (CloudTrucks)
Born in Enugu, Nigeria, Tobenna Arodiogbu moved to the US at 16 and later founded CloudTrucks, a San Francisco company helping independent truck drivers manage payments, compliance, and freight contracts. CloudTrucks has raised a combined $141.6 million, including a $115 million Series B that valued the company at $850 million. Arodiogbu holds a finance master's from Johns Hopkins and an economics degree from Penn State.
10. Ola Fadiran (ChipMango)
Ola Fadiran founded ChipMango in 2024, a semiconductor design and e-learning company based in Irvine, California, that combines AI-driven training with international partnerships to build technical talent pipelines across Africa and North America. Fadiran launched the company after twelve years combined at Intel and Boeing, and holds an MBA and a master's in Electrical Engineering from USC.
