How Peace Itimi grew a platform to tell African tech stories to almost 25,000 subscribers

Dennis Da-ala Mirilla
Her true calling soon found her; as she puts it, “to document the Nigerian tech ecosystem.”
How Peace Itimi built the Founder's Connect to almost 30k subcribers

Peace Itimi would have vowed she would stay in Nigeria, notwithstanding what happened. But, the Lekki tollgate shooting in October 2020 made her reconsider her nationalistic stance. After the #EndSARS protests, She would move to the UK but sustain her goal to keep sharing knowledge.

Itimi is committed to teaching and inspiring young people; from life lessons, she picks up on her journey to marketing and growth strategies.

Say ‘Peace Itimi is the tech sis creating a repository of tech stories that will later become historical reference points.’

How did it all start?

“At some point, it sort of clicked that in as much as I want to teach people, I can’t do this on the scale that I want to without burning resources or energy,” she said in an exclusive interview Technext, from her new home in London.

In the early days of her tutoring journey, she spent her time doing a lot of physical training. But she felt the need to do more, to share her skills with more people.

The core part of why I went into YouTube is because I wanted to share.

Peace Itimi

She told herself at the time that “I’m just going to create content around marketing, business growth. So that people can just be inspired.”

“At first, it was ‘I’ll teach people what I know,’ but I found it amazing when I am not the only one sharing,” she said.

Her true calling soon found her; as she puts it, “to document the Nigerian tech ecosystem.”

Already, she boasts almost 30,000 subscribers with her Founder’s Connect, the de-factor flagship series on her Youtube channel, where she speaks to, as they say, movers and shakers of the Nigerian tech space.

The stories

Just barely a year in, she has interviewed Odunayo Eweniyi, the co-founder of PiggyVest; Tomiwa Aladekomo, CEO and co-founder of BigCabal, the parent company of TechCabal and Zikoko, Iyinoluwa Aboyeji, the co-founder of Flutterwave and Andela and others.

“Their stories are inspiring,” she said, adding that now “there are investors who are looking at my videos to be able to understand their founders better.”

How Peace Itimi built the Founder's Connect to almost 30k subcribers
Itimi currently seats atop the Growth division of the offline fintech app, Stax

The Nigerian tech ecosystem

Itimi, who currently seats atop the Growth division of the offline fintech app, Stax said that interviewing tech founders came to her naturally. “I work in tech. I have seen the space grow. I am just so fascinated by the stories that we have,” she said.

Technology is changing lives on a small scale and a big scale. We are on a mission to document the evolution of technology in Africa. There is a much bigger ecosystem. I want to be able to talk to them as well.

Peace Itimi

Even as she has picked up a following with Founder’s Connect, a Future Award nomination here, and a slot on the YNaija’s Establishment List there, she remains laser-focused on teaching “with the hope that it will inspire the next generation of tech entrepreneurs in Africa.”

As the debate over fintech being ubiquitous in the Nigerian space bubbles to the top, with the front row seat she has intervening founders, she knows well that the stories of these companies are very different.

“One key thing that stood out for me is that everybody’s story is connected,” she said.

“When I started, I thought that it was going to be single stories, but as I seat down with founders, I realise that what this person is saying is different from what that person is saying. You just see that the people who have built this company and have these employees who start their own companies three years down the line,” she adds.

But she is not only here for the founders. She is telling the stories of all the people who are getting things done in the ecosystem.

“It’s really about the people,” she said. “One of the questions that I ask founders is ‘what is your biggest challenge?’ What is the secret to your company?’ Both questions always have similar answers. It’s the people. It’s a very connected ecosystem.”

In the ecosystem, like has happened in Silicon Valley and elsewhere, a reckoning happened earlier this year, sparking a debate about whether or not tech founders have overreached. There was the David Hundeyin investigative work on Flutterwave and TechCabal’s report on Bento.

Itimi sees her role as a storyteller of and for the space differently.

“I am not looking for a controversial story,” she said. “I am focused on hearing this person’s story. We are literally just seating on a couch and they are telling me their stories.”

Now that she has broken even with Founder’s Connect, inundated with pitches from founders who want to seat on her couch to tell their stories, she is re-strategising, looking for ways and resources to tell even bigger stories.

How Peace Itimi built the Founder's Connect to almost 30k subcribers
Itimi started the Founder’s Connect to inspire young tech entrepreneurs
What’s next for Peace Itimi?

“Evolution,” she said. “I am very open to letting my channels and medium of expression work for themselves. When I started, I had no idea that it was going to be a thing. But now, I see that it’s making a difference with the founders and their businesses and the ecosystem itself. I want to do tours. There are a lot of places in Africa to tell their stories.”

Even though a tour will bring a lot of money for her, Itimi said that money is not the goal. “For me, it’s not a money project. It’s like a CSR.”


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