Meet Ibrahim Adepoju, Co-founder Of AjoMoney, A Collective Savings & Credit Platform, More Of A Digital Cooperative Society

He was motivated to start up AjoMoney because of the increasing rate of poverty, unemployment, and poor access to capital for SMEs. Meet Ibrahim Adepoju, the Co-founder of Ajomoney.
He speaks to Elorasblog in this interview.

Please tell us a little bit about your background?

My name is Ibrahim Adepoju, I have a bachelor’s degree in Geology and Mineral Sciences from the University of Ilorin. I developed an interest in information technology during my secondary education but I wasn’t privileged to the influenced into studying information technology-related courses. Though my dream has always been to become an engineer I couldn’t say precisely which one. I love mathematics, computing and building stuff.

After my degree program, I decided to focus more on software engineering as a self-taught and buying courses on udemy. I was young and I felt I have enough time to still learn and transit rather than chasing jobs. Learning to code and being capable of building anything I can imagine with a computer program was the biggest investment I made in myself.

What motivated you to start up AjoMoney?

The primary thing that motivated me to start AjoMoney is the increasing rate of poverty, unemployment, and poor access to capital for SMEs. I discovered that many existing solutions are in place. Such as saving money, investing money, and digital loans.

But the primary factor here is, that many Nigerians do not have a good credit rating and no one is helping to develop the trustworthiness and actions that will give them access to a good credit rating. The demand for digital loans is far higher than that for savings and investment. But can they pay back?

What are the services provided by AjoMoney?

The AjoMoney is primarily a collective savings and credit platform. More of a digital cooperative society. We curate our solution to the consumers through our mobile application, to businesses and cooperative societies through a SaaS platform, and also to partners or developers through our savings and credit API integration into their existing products.

Meet the team of Ajomoney

How did you come up with this business idea, what was the Inspiration?

The idea came as a solution to the problem that motivated me to start up AjoMoney. The solution was community financing, building a system that peers, connect, and links people together for the motive of saving, investing, and lending. Making savings and investment an indicator of credit access and making the credit access interest-free for all.

How do you convince customers to participate in AjoMoney?

Convincing customers to participate in AjoMoney wasn’t a problem, we were growing organically right from the onset. Our first 5000 users were 90% organic. We were only convincing people to trust AjoMoney, the security, the safety, and the assurance that it is not another get-rich quick Ponzi scheme.

What are the major challenges you’ve encountered and also setbacks you’ve faced doing this business?

The major challenge is with streamlining our targeted audience. Everyone wants to participate in AjoMoney credit features such as the rotating group savings, thrift micro-loans, and buy now pay later, but not everyone can be qualified to get access to this unless they allow us to help them replan their finances. This does lead to making not all our registered users become paying user, everyone want an instant loan even if they are not qualified and they are difficult to educate on credit building.

In Nigeria talented entrepreneurs hardly get support from the government, how does this affect you?

Honestly, I have not really explored the option of financial or any form of support from the government. All I do is ensure that the company abides by all regulations available within the operating niche.

Where do you see in AjoMoney 5 years?

In five years, I see AjoMoney helping billions of African home and abroad build credit when they collectively save and invest. In addition, we won’t be doing this alone, but become the primary infrastructure helping democratize access to the solution.

Email: elora.akpotosevbe@yahoo.com