• Thursday, March 28, 2024
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Entrepreneurs to access support funds from Next Titan Season 8 reality show

Entrepreneurs to access support funds from Next Titan Season 8 reality show

The Next Titan Season 8, ‘The Uncaged’ is set to reward entrepreneurs that have potentials, creativity, and tenacity to transcend all circumstances, barriers, and limitations.

The Season 8 is a special edition as it gives an opportunity for top 1000 contestants from auditions with good business ideas and with registered businesses to automatically qualify for N3,000,000 funding while unregistered businesses will qualify for N250,000 funding from Nigeria Investment Youth Fund (NYIF).

The overall winner will go away with a grand Prize of N15,000,000 Cash for his or her business.

Speaking at the premiere for the commencement of the season 8 of the Next Titan Nigeria, Mide Akinlaja, executive producer, The Next Titan said Next Titan is an entrepreneurial reality show designed to provoke the entrepreneurial spirit of young Nigerians.

He noted that aside from the entertainment aspect of the 10-week competition show, its importance lies in igniting entrepreneurial spirit and showcasing the possibility of entrepreneurship in transforming lives with just an idea that can be scaled to greatness with a market and with Nigeria’s population.

Akinlaja said the show, by scouting for young talented people who have entrepreneurial acumens, grooming them through rigorous tasks, boardroom process, mentorship, and eventually funding a winner’s idea leading to an opportunity to create jobs for themselves and others is indeed a big contributor to the socio-economic development of our country, Nigeria.

“Apart from the success stories of the previous winners of the show which have been phenomenal, the Next Titan being on national television has also positively impacted on the generality of other young people who are the viewers who have shared their testimonies regarding the programme causing a paradigm shift in their mind-sets to moving from Jobs -Seekers to Jobs-Creators.

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“We are excited again about the commencement of the new season which is Season Eight. We received over 20,000 entries, and the Season 8 Auditions held in 6 cities which are Abuja, Kano, PH, Enugu, Ibadan, Lagos and also on Online which gave the Contestants across Nigeria an opportunity to pitch their business ideas in different zones to our Audition Judges, and from which 70 vibrant young entrepreneurs were able to make it to the TITAN BOOTCAMP which we have been in the last three days,” he disclosed.

He assured that Season Eight promises to be more impactful, and the winner of the season 8 would walk off with N15m cash as grand prize, adding that about 1000 best contestants who earlier auditioned for the show are already being shortlisted for NYIF funding of up to N3m each courtesy Federal Ministry of Youth and Sports Development.

He stressed that the show not only celebrates some of the nation’s best entrepreneurial ideas but also makes an attempt to provide a launch-pad to the most deserving of Nigeria’s budding entrepreneurs where people with ideas would dare to bid for their dreams and ideas. It is a way of encouraging young unemployed graduates to take their destinies in their hands by using their talents to build values.

At the premiere, Top 16 or 18 contestants with bright ideas were unveiled, and these entrepreneurs shall live together to compete by carrying out weekly business tasks and challenges around the city of Lagos for 10 weeks on television, and with weekly evictions during the boardroom shows.

The judges of the main show still remain the same, and these are top Nigerian business leaders such as Kyari Bukar, Ex Chairman, Nigerian Economic Summit Group; Tonye Cole, Founder, Sahara Group; Chris Parkes, and Lilian Olub, CEO EFG Hermes. They will take advantage of their positions as judges to mentor the contestants and millions of viewers. The mentorship aspect of the show will also entail the visiting of other young successful entrepreneurs to the house of the contestants on weekly basis.

“Our sincere appreciation goes to Heritage Bank Plc, for headlining the new season as the Lead Sponsor. We are also grateful to the Gold Associate Sponsors, MSPORT and Sifax Group; and to our Silver Associate Sponsor, Haven Homes. We are grateful to all our supporting sponsors: Terra Seasoning Cubes, Air Peace, Lifemate Furniture, RC Cola, Nikky Taurus Limited, Cummins Generators, Arinka Collectibles, 31 Attire, as we are also grateful to our media partner, Premium Box.

“We appreciate the Minister, Federal Ministry of Youth and Sport Development for the Ministry ‘s partnership with The Next Titan Nigeria which will cut across two different seasons, Season 8 and Season 9,” Akinlaja said.