Entrepreneurs

"We are facing the time where the unconscious evolution period has almost finished, and we come to the new era, a new period of controlled evolution"

"Autonomous life-support system for the human brain linked to a robot." In other words, they'll have the tech for implanting the human brain into the robot. By 2035, a human should be able to upload their brain into a robot, and by 2045 our bodies will be replaced with holograms. When this happens, Itskov says we will become "a new species"

"We shouldn't just observe the wonderful entrepreneurs, we need to move ahead systematically," Itskov said in an interview. "We are really at the time when technology can affect human evolution. I want us to shape the future, bring it up for public discussion, and avoid any scenario that could damage humanity."

"If we do a good job and tell the story properly, people really bond with it. If you can tap into the public sentiment with a good story, further explanation can add but it isn’t necessary. That is the type of art that I try to create: It’s high art but it’s super pop too, something a grandmother and her grandson can both “get” and enjoy. If it’s too conceptual, people can get lost, so I try to use art that is immersive, participatory, accessible, equalitarian — something that everybody can connect too. Otherwise, we add a layer of complexity to something that is already complex."

"Human resources mean everything when it comes to building a successful technology company, and we are lucky that Nigeria has an expansive pool of talent to support our operations."

"Early childhood development is the best way to build our future, because today’s children are tomorrow’s leaders. We must guarantee that they are able to fulfil their potential"

"There are no necessary connections with the acquisition of Stabus Ghana, which will now be known as Treepz Ghana. But after a successful seed round, we immediately started thinking of how scaleable the indigenous name Plentywaka would be around Africa and the rest of the world."

"Niklas and I are entreprenuers at heart, and eBay understands that. I am still at Skype and I think that is where I spend most of my time. On The Venice Project we have tried to build a management team that will take care of things."

"Kazaa and Skype were based on a piece of technology called the “Global Index.” Skype basically built a communication layer on top of that. That technology has evolved since then, and the Venice Project, is built on that global index and we have developed a P2P video streaming layer on top of that core technology"

"We are building an ad-based system, and it is close to the television model. We will do revenue share with the content providers. With our system, people can be targeted with the right kind of ads. We are respecting the copyrights. We will reveal more details about the technology soon"

"What people don’t like is television that is locked in linear time. We want to try and preserve the best bits of television, and discard bits people don’t care for."

"That’s what the Venice Project is doing. What we have done is created a streaming P2P platform for television. This is a platform, which is good for content owners, for advertisers and of course the viewers."

"Coming up with an idea, presenting it to people and getting them to say “yeah we believe in this” was nothing but entrepreneurship."

"In the fundamentals of robotics, the more freedom of movement you have, the more expressions the character can have."

"At the end of my first year, myself and another student created a program to take robotics into local schools. Robotics is the perfect combination of the STEM subjects – Science, Technology, English and Maths – which younger students might not think to combine. The program expanded to four schools in Bristol in four years."

"I grew up in Nigeria and moved to the UK with my family when I was 11. I did my GCSEs and A Levels in Kent where I developed a real interest in the sciences. Moving into robotics seemed like the ideal way to combine physics, biology and maths in one subject, so I went on to study robotics at UWE here in Bristol."

"To build a great brand, you have to explain why everything looks the way it does."

"Having spent time researching robotics undergraduate courses up and down the country, I was impressed by a video of the work being done in the labs here in Bristol – especially what was being done here with legged robots. That was what I specialised in while studying the degree course."

"At the end of the day the key to a good pitch is to put yourself in the shoes of the person you’re talking to at the fund."

"AI is moving fast we need outcomes not just dialogue."

"What is going down in the investing space has not really hit the early-stage investments as hard yet it is still mostly later-stage investors that have slowed down. So, I think everybody should prepare for a tighter market fundraising, people should prepare for fundraising to become more difficult. If you have raised before the slowdown, use your capital well; stretch it as far as it can go to profitability and sustainability. And if you haven’t raised, you need to know that it’s going to be a lot more difficult."

"If the next majority are left out the world misses out on what its young brilliant minds including Africa has to offer."

"Global expansion will make African tech companies more resilient, especially since they will be less reliant on the African market and less susceptible to its unreliability."

"Success is the fire and how big you can make it burn."

"We’ve built a really good data unit within TechCabal called TC Insights. And that’s because we know this matters. This is the future. This is a critical aspect of being the kind of publication that TechCabal wants to be."

"At TechCabal, we think that technology will be the biggest driver of innovation, of employment growth, and high-quality employment growth, of productivity growth across countries over the next decade and beyond. And what that means is that the media that covers that technology must grow. There must be more of us to tell the stories of what's happening, how technology is affecting people's lives."

"I initially moved back to Nigeria kicking and screaming. I wasn't ready for it, but I decided to make it work and avoided making rash decisions for the first six months to a year."

"Stripe and Paystack are both Y Combinator alumni, so that was the first point of contact. We were introduced to Patrick, who then offered to invest. Stripe would then lead our Series A, and along with Visa, invest $8 million in 2018. Since then, Stripe has been a close partner, and after over two years of knowledge exchange between our teams, we've built up a lot of mutual respect for each other. Eventually, it became obvious that our visions were so aligned that the natural evolution of the relationship would be to join forces in this way."

"Businesses are bought, not sold. The most important thing is to choose a problem you are excited about solving, and focusing on that every day."

"It’s important to utilise all skills and knowledge gained from different experiences to create a successful business."

"Choose a platform where you can be consistent and you think you can build an audience, stick to what you are great at."

"Figuring out a market that is growing is some of the things people look out for."

"It is important to think of your co-funders and your partners as people you are going to be on a long journey with."

"After that, the guys at Big Cabal, the founders, and I started a conversation and they said, you know, you should come join us. And they wanted me to come do biz dev for them. And I was like, you guys can’t afford me. And somewhere along the line, the conversation goes to, do you want to come run it? And I said, that could be interesting because career-wise, I’d always wanted to kind of run my own business. I’d always wanted to build something, and I thought, I really liked TechCabal, I really liked Zikoko. I think the fundamental thesis of the business is interesting. We could do something with this, we could make it big."

"All acquisition conversations always require careful thought and consideration, and it was no different in this case. The Paystack team has been interacting with Patrick and the Stripe team over the past couple years and after significant amounts of collaboration and knowledge exchange between both companies, we agreed that this move was a natural evolution of what was and continues to be a great relationship."

"Solutions to hard work is persistence and resilience."

"Media is not an easy industry. But when it’s done right, its impact is massive."

"Build something remarkable, be resourceful enough to find places where you can articulate what you are doing."

"Venture-backed companies are generally destined for one of two outcomes. IPO or acquisition. Five years in, neither of these were on the list of things that we care about as a company. We’ve always been focused on building the best payments and growth tools for African businesses and are in it for the long haul. The option to team up with the world’s most sophisticated payments company to accelerate our ambitions happened to show up, and we believe it was fortuitous."

"The story stays the same but how you tell it changes as you progress further and further up."

"Let's build something that truly works not just for the few but for everyone."

"“The fusion of media and technology is reshaping how we communicate, share stories, and consume information.” Tomiwa Aladekomo at a tech summit speech."

"Any company that is looking to expand to a new market has to learn to sell in those markets."

"But you should never do anything that puts your entire company at risk. You need to contain your risks."

"If governance is shaped only by those who already holds power it isn't governance but infringement."

"Throughout his decades-long career, Son has made headlines for spectacular victories as well as disastrous failures. For a time, at the beginning of 2000, he claimed to be the world’s richest man, with a fortune worth an estimated $78 billion amassed by buying up internet startups. However, the collapse of the dotcom bubble just months later wiped out more than 90% of his wealth."

"Well, we can still create things. We can still enjoy. We can still try to sell something, try to design something, try to communicate with others. This may be just a job, and it may be a job you don't like very much. But we have to do it just to live, just to earn an income, to have food to eat, a roof over our heads, and clothes to wear. We must have some income, even if it is just to live. For this purpose, many people are working, but they don't necessarily like it. They have to work to make a living. And those who have to work to live, many of them will be replaced by a more efficient solution, that is, smart robots, robots with intelligence. Well, that way we can move on to more exciting things."

"Even today, we don’t need to remember so many things because you can search for relevant information on Google. It's like a part of your brain - it becomes an extension of your brain. So we don't have to do some primitive things. We can use our brains to think more. You know, think more creatively. The brain is no longer used to remember how many days there are in a year, or what happened, nor is it used to remember what the name of this plant is or what shape its rhizome is. Because we can Google it really quickly, right. However, our brains still function in many ways. Our brains are still very active and actively thinking. The extension of the brain enables a seamless connection between virtual and reality. It is also an extension of our lives."

"But the most important thing is that to have a more wonderful and richer life, we must also compete. Competition can get more stimulation, which will be the driving force for innovation and development."

"I am an optimist, okay. There will always be various problems in the future. But we humans are smart enough. We always try to adapt to new situations."