Nigeria has launched a Startup Support and Engagement Portal, which is a crucial prerequisite for carrying out the Nigeria Startup Act.
With the Nigeria Startup Act, which was launched in May 2021 by the Nigerian presidency and a group of influential Nigerians in the tech sector, the country hopes to establish guidelines for the cooperation between startups, government agencies, and regulators to foster the expansion of its burgeoning technology sector.
It was signed into law by then-President Muhammadu Buhari last October after being approved by the Federal Executive Council in December 2021 and passed by the Senate in July 2022. The law’s stated goal is to elevate Nigeria’s startup ecosystem to the forefront of Africa’s entrepreneurial scene.
“The launch of the portal will allow us to initiate the process of setting up the startup consultative forums to select representatives to the National Council for Digital Innovation and Entrepreneurship, to facilitate discourse and consensus among Nigerian ecosystem players,” stated the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA).
To help ecosystem stakeholders participate and get support, the new startup site is an important component of the Nigeria Startup Act’s continuing implementation. It will help find and aggregate Nigerian startups, VC firms, hubs, and innovation centers.
After Italy approved the world’s first startup law in 2012, the first two African countries to implement similar regulations were Senegal and Tunisia.
The platform is open for registration to all innovation centers, hubs, venture capital firms, and startups in Nigeria.
The complete text of the bill is available here.
As an additional resource, you may access the bill’s summary for download here.
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