Biographies, Profiles of Business, Tech and Influential Leaders
Corporate leadership stories often look sudden from the outside. This one was planned for months. Yomi Olugbenro was named CEO-elect of Deloitte West Africa early in 2026, spent a transition period alongside his predecessor, and took over as chief executive on June 1, 2026. His rise followed a path that is common at professional services … Read more
Telecom networks are usually judged by coverage and speed, but the systems behind them decide whether a customer can recharge, pay or send money in seconds. Shoyinka Shodunke has spent nearly three decades building that hidden layer. In March 2026 he became MTN Group’s Executive: IT Core Design and Delivery, a role that spans the … Read more
Some founders start with a grand idea. Tosin Eniolorunda started with a job, a skill and a frustration. He spent about six years inside one of Nigeria’s biggest payments companies, saw how many small businesses were ignored by traditional banks, and left to build something for them. That company is now Moniepoint, one of Africa’s … Read more
Most people know the face of a company, which is usually its chief executive. Far fewer know the person who builds the systems underneath it. Felix Ike is that person at Moniepoint, one of Africa’s most valuable fintech companies. As co-founder and chief technology officer, he helps run the technology that moves billions of dollars … Read more
Every generation of founders finds a gap that established companies overlook. For Ridwan Olalere, it was the way immigrants send money home. The co-founder and chief executive of LemFi was told early on that remittance was a solved problem, and he built a company on the belief that it was not. His name is now … Read more
More than 90% of Nigerian households still cook with firewood, charcoal or kerosene. The smoke from those fuels harms health, and the fuels themselves strain forests and family budgets. Okey Esse decided to attack that problem with engineering, not advocacy. He is the founder and chief executive of Powerstove Energy, a clean-energy company that builds … Read more
Eunice Baguma Ball has built a career around a question that continues to shape Africa’s technology sector: how can technology create wider opportunities for people across the continent? The Ugandan entrepreneur has worked across technology, social innovation, entrepreneurship and digital inclusion, building programmes that connect African talent with new opportunities. She founded the Africa Technology … Read more
How does a young engineer from Lagos end up running a company whose systems move money across dozens of African countries? The answer lies in a career built on one stubborn idea: payments across Africa should work as smoothly as they do anywhere else. Olugbenga Agboola, widely known as GB, co-founded Flutterwave and now serves … Read more
Elon Musk is the chief executive officer of Tesla and SpaceX, and the world’s wealthiest person. He briefly became the first trillionaire in history in June 2026, when SpaceX’s stock market debut pushed the value of his combined holdings past one trillion dollars. He remains one of the most closely watched figures in business and … Read more
Femi Otedola is a Nigerian businessman best known for building Zenon Petroleum and later Forte Oil into major players in the country’s downstream oil sector, and for his current role as chairman of First HoldCo, the parent company of First Bank of Nigeria. He is back in the headlines in 2026 for aggressively increasing his … Read more