Meet Entrepreneur Yewande Akinse, Co-Founder Of Genera, A Family Lifestyle Management Platform Which Enables Users Save, Invest, Insure, Gift & Pay Bills

Meet Yewande Akinse, a serial entrepreneur driven by deep intellectual curiosity, hardwork and innovations. She’s the Co- founder of Genera, a family lifestyle management platform which enables users save, invest, insure, gift and pay bills. She speaks to Elorasblog in this interview.

Please tell us a little bit about your background?

My name is Yewande Akinse, I hold a Bachelors and Masters degree in Law from the University of Lagos. I am a serial entrepreneur driven by deep intellectual curiosity, hardwork and innovations.
In my spare time, I write poetry. I am also an author of two collections of poems titled “A tale of being, of green and of ing” (2019) and Voices: A collection of poems that tell stories.

Can you share with me the services Genera provides?

Genera is a family lifestyle management platform which enables users save, invest, insure, gift and pay bills. The legacy feature enables users write wills in favour of named beneficiaries and set up educational and living trusts. Our mission is to enable families create sustainable financial security for present and future generations.

What motivated you to start up Genera?

We realised that one of the major propellers of poverty is zero to low transference of intergenerational wealth among low to middle income earning families, the inability of families to plan for financial emergencies before they arise, and more. It is with these problems and many more in mind that my team and I developed Genera with the aim of ameliorating these problems. With a seamless user experiences families can build generational wealth together on Genera.

Why did you choose the name Genera?

The name Genera was coined from Generation and is also the plural form of Genus in biology ranking between family and species.
Our mission is to enable families create sustainable financial security for present and future generations.

How did you come up with this business idea?

This business idea was developed alongside my Cofounder who is also a serial entrepreneur who grew up as an orphan and had to scrape and toil from childhood to adulthood. We developed Genera with a view to protecting the younger generation from the hardship they would otherwise suffer from the loss of parents, sponsors or breadwinners. The legacy feature on Genera enables families write their wills, set up educational and living trusts in favour of named beneficiaries so even in their absence, their beneficiaries are well taken care of.

Did you attend any form of training before starting up Genera?

Yes, I studied secured credit transactions at Masters level and my legal background enables me handle the legal tech part of Genera such as wills, probate, trusts and the like.
At Genera, we have secured partnerships with 3rd parties to power the core of the technology with their API’s integrated into the platform.

Many young youths like you have business ideas but raising capital is the challenge, how were you able to raise capital for your business?

We have bootstrapped till date and rely largely on personal funds. However, we’re currently seeking to raise VC funding to scale.

Genera is a family lifestyle management platform which enables users save, invest, insure, gift and pay bills,
how can your clients build their trust in your services?

We are a registered company with the Corporate Affairs Commission and we are in a space deeply regulated by the Federal Government of Nigeria.

How do you make profits from these services?

Our revenue model is commission based. We receive:
1% commission on early withdrawals
3% Commission on investment deals
2.5% on Gift transactions
3% Markup on FX
$10 – $500 Monthly Subscription on Wills & Educational Trust Management.

Can you share with me the setbacks and challenges you’ve encountered in this business?

At the initial stages, we experienced setbacks with finding the right team to develop the technology. We had issues with finding competent and dedicated tech talent. We have realised the importance of commensurate remuneration of these talents. It’s quite challenging for a startup in its early stages to pay tech talents as they don’t come cheap. Equity incentives keep them loyal and dedicated to the company’s vision.

Where do you see Genera in 5 years?

In five years, our vision is to enable over 5 million families to become financially sustainable with Genera.

Email: elora.akpotosevbe@yahoo.com