Ilorin, a city long associated with academia and public administration, is positioning itself as a new node in Nigeria’s expanding technology ecosystem, as policymakers and investors look beyond Lagos in search of the country’s next wave of startup growth.
At the Ilorin Innovation Hub Demo Day on 17 April, venture capitalists, corporate executives, policymakers and founders gathered in Kwara State’s capital to assess whether Nigeria’s innovation economy, still heavily concentrated in Lagos, can successfully decentralise.
The event, which brought together stakeholders including local and international investors, was framed as a test case for a broader shift: whether Nigeria’s digital economy can move inland and still attract capital at scale.
“We have capital, investors, venture capitalists, Indian investors, and the media all here in Ilorin, not in Lagos or in Abuja,” Managing Director of the Ilorin Innovation Hub, Temi Kolawole, said in his opening remarks.
“That convergence is the reason we call this event the ‘Convergence’.”
Nigeria’s technology sector has grown rapidly over the past decade, producing a wave of startups and attracting billions of dollars in venture funding. But that growth has been geographically concentrated, with Lagos accounting for the bulk of investment, talent and infrastructure.
The Ilorin Innovation Hub represents an attempt to change that dynamic by deliberately building an innovation base in the north-central region.
Kolawole said the initiative reflects a joint decision by the Kwara State Government and private sector partners, including IHS Towers, to treat innovation as a national, rather than city-specific, priority.
“Innovation is not just a Lagos conversation or an Abuja conversation; it is a Nigeria conversation,” he said. “We see technology as one of the biggest tools to move the country forward.”
He added that the hub is designed not only to support startups but also to attract investors who may previously have focused exclusively on Nigeria’s commercial capital.
Since its launch, the Ilorin hub has positioned itself as both an incubation centre and a regional ecosystem builder.
According to programme lead Zumah Yahaya, the hub has supported 23 startups to venture readiness within 10 months and built a community of more than 9,000 members.
It has also extended its footprint beyond Kwara State, conducting ecosystem workshops across at least eight states and engaging more than 5,000 participants in entrepreneurship and technical training programmes.
“We started with ecosystem mapping, bringing in government, academia, civil society and industry to understand the opportunities and gaps,” Yahaya said. “That shaped how we designed every programme that followed.”
Among its key outputs is the training of 171 artificial intelligence engineers, part of a broader push to close Nigeria’s digital skills gap.
The hub has also hosted more than 50 community-led events, ranging from technical workshops to networking sessions, and recorded over 20,000 physical visits since inception.
The Demo Day itself was structured around a series of startup pitches designed to connect early-stage founders with potential investors.
Nine startups presented across sectors including healthcare, agriculture, renewable energy and digital services. Some received prize funding as part of an accelerator programme supported by Accelerate Africa.
For Senior Vice-President and Chief Operating Officer at IHS Nigeria, Kazeem Oladepo, the goal is to move startups beyond the idea stage into commercially viable businesses.
“What we are seeing today is the result of a one-year journey of nurturing talent and refining ideas into products that can solve real problems,” Oladepo said. “The opportunity now is to validate and scale those solutions.”
He said investor interest in the cohort has been strong, with both local and international participants engaging directly with founders.
But he cautioned that funding alone is not sufficient. The hub’s model includes access to infrastructure and deployment opportunities within partner networks to help startups validate their products in real environments.
“If you solve problems in healthcare, agriculture, energy or waste management, you are building something that can transform communities and eventually scale into large businesses,” he said.
A recurring theme at the event was the need to address fragmentation in Nigeria’s startup support system.
Executives from IHS Nigeria argued that founders have historically had to navigate disconnected pathways, accessing training, mentorship and funding from separate institutions without continuity.
The Ilorin model, they said, attempts to integrate these elements into a single structured pipeline that supports founders from ideation through to scale.
“We asked founders what they needed to succeed, and the answer was consistency,” said Akeem Adeshina, chief commercial officer at IHS Nigeria. “So we built a system that provides infrastructure, capacity development and funding access in a coordinated way.”
He added that beyond symbolic support, infrastructure remains central to the model, particularly reliable connectivity, power and physical workspace.
“It is not just about giving startups a space,” he said. “It is about giving them the foundation to build sustainable businesses.”
The presence of investors at the Ilorin event reflects a gradual shift in attention towards Nigeria’s emerging regional innovation hubs.
For many years, Lagos has dominated venture capital flows due to its density of startups, talent pools and financial infrastructure. But rising costs, congestion and saturation are prompting some investors to explore alternative ecosystems.
Kolawole said the Ilorin hub is deliberately designed to reduce barriers for investors seeking exposure to early-stage opportunities outside Lagos.
“Many of these startups have never had exposure to investors before today,” he said. “Our role is to bridge that gap and bring both sides together.”
He added that corporate partners such as IHS Towers are helping to de-risk early-stage investment by providing infrastructure and validation platforms.
While Demo Day is often viewed as a milestone event, stakeholders stressed that it represents only the beginning of a longer investment and development cycle.
Temitope Yusuff, Vice-President for Group Audit and Risk at IHS Nigeria, said the company tracks startup performance beyond the programme through structured engagement and data monitoring.
“This is a one-year programme, but our engagement does not end here,” she said. “We maintain regular touchpoints to track progress and support founders as they scale.”
She said the ultimate goal is to ensure startups evolve into sustainable businesses capable of addressing real economic and social challenges.
“We are not just looking at how many startups graduate,” she said. “We are looking at how many become viable companies that contribute to the economy.”
Beyond startups, speakers highlighted a wider economic shift driven by changing work patterns, digital connectivity and cost differentials between cities.
Kwara State Commissioner for Business, Innovation and Technology, Damilola Yusuf-Adelodun, said there is a visible mindset change among young Nigerians.
“More young people are now asking how to build ideas rather than how to find jobs,” she said. “That shift is fundamental to economic transformation.”
She added that lower operating costs in cities like Ilorin could attract remote workers, startups and digital businesses seeking alternatives to Lagos.
Despite early progress, stakeholders acknowledged that building a competitive innovation hub outside Lagos will require sustained investment, policy stability and continued investor confidence.
For Kolawole, the long-term ambition is clear: to turn Ilorin into a self-sustaining innovation hub capable of producing scalable companies.
“This is just the first year,” he said. “But in time, this could become a place where startups grow into major companies and even unicorns.”
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