Once A Taxi Driver, He Sold Laces Materials & Distributed Drinks – Business Man Adenuga Hustled Hard While Younger

69 year old petty trader who rose from “the trenches” to become Nigeria’s admirable billionaire

Under the able leadership of the trailblazing Adenuga, Globacom also made history as the first telecom company to build a high-capacity submarine fibre-optic cable, popularly known as Glo-1.

When you mention Mike Adenuga today, the mind of an average Nigerian quickly pictures the “billionaire owner of Globacom”.

Yes, Michael Adeniyi Agbolade Ishola Adenuga is a billionaire and Nigeria’s third-richest man, according to Forbes. And he also owns Globacom, Nigeria’s indigenous telecom company.

But his story did not start here. It started from “the trenches”.

About 69 years ago, specifically 29th of April, 1953, Adenuga was born in the ancient city of Ibadan to the family of Micheal Agbolade and Omoba Juliana Oyindamola Adenuga.

He’s an alumnus of the popular Ibadan Grammar School, Ibadan and had his tertiary education at Northwestern Oklahoma State University.

Adenuga also got an MBA at Pace University in New York.

To fund his education in the US and fend for himself, the billionaire businessman worked as a taxi driver.

Don’t get it wrong, Adenuga’s parents were successful in their own right; his father was a teacher, and his mother, a successful trader.

However, the Globacom owner didn’t fit into the archetype of a child born with a silver spoon.

To make ends meet, Adenuga hustled hard in the trenches. At some point, he sold lace materials and distributed drinks. And he proved himself a dogged entrepreneur, making his first million in 1979 at the age of 26.

Since then, he hasn’t stopped. From oil and gas to telecommunications, he ventured into various businesses and made good fortunes from them.

Doing business with a difference: The story of Glo

When Nigerians lament the ineffective privatisation of the power sector, they imagine what could have happened if the success recorded in (the privatisation of) the telecom sector could also be replicated there.

Yes, the privatisation of the telecom sector is the backbone of its success. But what sustains the success is the daring steps taken by Adenuga and some other stakeholders.

Any report about the success of the telecom sector in Nigeria without mentioning Adenuga’s input is certainly incomplete.

In the early days of the private telecom providers, two things, apart from mobile phones, were extremely unaffordable for Nigerians: airtime and SIM cards.

With his business ingenuity and selfless commitment to making the lives of Nigerians better, Adenuga solved these problems with Globacom, the company he established in 2003.

At a time when other operators thought it was impossible, Adenuga’s Globacom introduced per-second billing in Nigeria.

The customer-centric move by the telecom company endeared it to many Nigerians and its subscriber base grew exponentially.

Today, Globacom has 55 million subscribers.

Also, as part of its efforts to deepen telecommunication penetration in Nigeria, Globacom demystified the SIM card acquisition.

At a time when SIM cards were not only expensive but also a big deal, Glo distributed them FREE OF CHARGE to customers.

Under the able leadership of the trailblazing Adenuga, Globacom also made history as the first telecom company to build a high-capacity submarine fibre-optic cable, popularly known as Glo-1, the first successful submarine cable from the United Kingdom to Nigeria; with the attendant high increases in internet speeds and download rates with resultant significant improvements in online technologies.

Source: Premium Times ng.com

Email: elora.akpotosevbe@yahoo.com