Bola Lawal is a social entrepreneur, and business developer. He is the CEO and founder of ScholarX, an impact tech startup.
Bola Lawal and his team developed a mobile and web platform for Africans, with goal of helping them access quality education through scholarships, tuition crowdfunding, and training/workshops.
The vision is to leverage new generation information technology tools that will create a world of possibilities, in which Africa will fully realize its Human Capital potentials. The Goal is to ensure that Africans can access top quality education/training on any level worldwide.
The core operation of the company is run out of Lagos, Nigeria. It currently operates in Ghana as well through a partnership, and they are also working on launching in South Africa. When Bola saw the challenge in Africa of access to quality education and recognized it as a Pan-Africa problem, he got the vision to create the solution and so his goal, along with his company is to strategically spread across the continent as they continue to grow.
Bola Lawal is interested in human capital development and is focused on the four pillars of Human capital – Education, Health/wellness, Workforce Employment, and Enabling Environment.
The team members in the company chose to focus on education because, it is the base. A nation with a well-educated population stands a much better chance of solving all other issues, as well as competing on the global stage. Education is the engine of any prosperous nation. This is what will fuel the Human Capital growth that Nigeria is in need of.
“We work with a few technical interns, who have had the opportunity to work on critical projects. One of such project is our Tuition Crowdfunding platform currently in production. With such experience, the interns will be able to work for both local and international clients/organisations on various projects” said the CEO ScholarX.
Bola speakings says, “We are very passionate about our youths, especially looking at the massive growth with this demographic. And so, we have taken on the task to mentor a few youths on an individual basis. We understand that we would have to develop a program where we can mentor and incubate them at a much larger scale. That is why we are currently working on creating an Accelerator for student run tech. We are also looking to create Entrepreneur focused scholarships.
On making money, the CEO ScholarX said “We are currently focusing on user acquisition; however, our business model revolves around: yearly subscription (N1,000), admin fees (village – Crowdfunding), strategic partnerships (foreign universities and educational services), training/workshops and ad sales”
It is a for-profit impact focused tech start-up. Thus, the company’s activities depends on the level of impact made.
You can find Bola Lawal on his website www.scholarx.co
Email: Bola@scholarx.co
Social Media: Instagram – @scholarx, twitter – @scholarx2016
