Investing in Nigeria is not always an easy task, but many diaspora Nigerians have invested and started successful businesses in Nigeria despite the challenges.
In this article, we explore some successful diaspora investments in Nigeria and highlight the lessons we can pick from their investment and successes.
1. Flying Doctors Nigeria: Dr Ola Orekunrin’s Healthcare Revolution
In 2007, Dr Ola Orekunrin founded Flying Doctors Nigeria, West Africa’s first indigenous air ambulance service. The company operates a fleet of over 20 aircraft (helicopters, jets, and propeller planes) with 47 staff across Nigeria, providing emergency medical evacuation services primarily to oil and gas companies, mining operations, and government agencies. The business is now valued at tens of millions of dollars and has transported over 500 patients in critical medical emergencies.
Why Flying Doctors Nigeria Succeeded:
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She Addressed a Validated Market Need, Not an Emotional Assumption
Dr Orekunrin didn’t return to Nigeria immediately after her sister’s death to start an air ambulance. She spent a year conducting systematic research, speaking with businessmen, doctors, and senior aviation figures in Nigeria. She studied evacuation models in other developing countries and consulted existing air ambulance services in the UK and East Africa. This research validated both market demand and operational feasibility before she committed capital.
Nigeria’s oil and gas sector alone employs thousands in remote offshore and onshore locations where accidents occur regularly. Mining companies face similar challenges. Yet no coordinated system existed for rapidly transporting critically injured workers to hospitals. “There was a situation in Nigeria where there were only two or three very good hospitals, and they were sometimes a two, three, four-day journey away from the places where incidents happened,” Dr Orekunrin explained.
The business model was clear: companies would pay retainer fees for emergency evacuation services, creating predictable recurring revenue. Individual wealthy Nigerians would pay per-use for critical medical transport.
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She Built Professional Infrastructure Despite Discouragement
Every aviation expert Dr Orekunrin consulted told her the business was impossible. Nigeria’s bureaucracy, poor infrastructure, and high aviation costs made air ambulance services financially unviable, they said. She persisted, but critically, she persisted professionally.
Dr Orekunrin began by leasing aircraft rather than purchasing, keeping initial capital requirements manageable. She established formal partnerships with hospitals across Africa and internationally, creating a network for patient hand-offs. And secured all necessary aviation licenses and medical certifications before operations commenced. She hired qualified flight physicians and trained paramedics to international standards.
This professional approach meant higher upfront costs and longer launch timelines, but it created a legitimate business that could scale. Nigeria ranks 147 out of 189 countries on the World Bank’s ease of doing business index – companies succeed by navigating bureaucracy properly, not by circumventing it.
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She Leveraged International Expertise While Adapting to Local Realities
Dr Orekunrin modelled Flying Doctors on UK air ambulance services she’d observed during her NHS career, but made radical adaptations for Nigeria’s context.
UK services cover small distances with predictable infrastructure. Nigerian operations span vast distances across West and Central Africa with unpredictable conditions – “Actually, most of the airstrips in the country require you to get the cows off the runway before you can land!” she noted.
She became a licensed helicopter pilot herself, understanding operations intimately rather than managing from a distance. And priced her services appropriately for Nigerian market realities by targeting high-risk industries like oil, gas, and mining, where companies budget for emergency services and understand trauma care’s value. She accepted that reaching profitability would take years, not months, given Nigeria’s operational challenges.
Her diaspora advantages – UK medical training, international safety standards, global aviation contacts, combined with Nigerian operational knowledge, created competitive differentiation.
She wasn’t trying to run a UK air ambulance in Nigeria; she was building a Nigerian air ambulance informed by international best practices.
2. Wecyclers: Bilikiss Adebiyi-Abiola’s Waste-to-Wealth Model
Founded in 2012 by Bilikiss Abiola, Wecyclers provides household recycling services in Lagos using cargo bicycles (now also motorised tricycles) to collect waste from low-income neighbourhoods. The company has registered over 25,000 households, collects 28 tons of waste weekly, employs 200+ people, operates 15 kiosks and three main collection hubs, and supports eight franchisees across Nigeria. Wecyclers has collected over 3,000 metric tons of recyclable materials and rewarded subscribers with over $75,000 in gifts and cash prizes.
Why Wecyclers Succeeded:
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She Tested the Model at the Minimum Scale Before Committing
When Wecyclers started, Bilikiss would personally take out a tricycle to do collections, learning the business firsthand. This wasn’t romantic entrepreneurship; it was systematic validation. She needed to understand whether Lagos residents would actually participate in recycling, whether the SMS-based incentive system worked, whether collected materials could be sold profitably to manufacturers, and whether the operational model scaled beyond the pilot phase.
Her initial concept during MIT was offering raffle tickets in exchange for recyclables. When she discussed this in Nigeria during vacation, the enthusiasm surprised her. That market feedback prompted refinement – switching from raffle tickets to SMS-based points redeemable for food, household goods, and airtime recharge. This iterative approach based on real user feedback proved critical.
The business launched with cargo bicycles in two Lagos neighbourhoods – Ebute-Metta and Itire, Surulere. This constrained geographic focus enabled proving the model thoroughly before attempting citywide or national expansion. By 2015, Wecyclers had collected 500 tons of waste, employed 80 people, and signed up over 5,000 households, demonstrating viability before seeking major investment.
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She Secured Strategic Partnerships That Provided More Than Capital
Wecyclers partnered with Coca-Cola and GlaxoSmithKline to subsidise operations and provide rewards for subscribers. These weren’t just funding sources; they were corporate waste generators needing recycling solutions, creating symbiotic relationships.
The Lagos Waste Management Authority (LAWMA) partnership provided legitimacy and regulatory support.
These partnerships addressed Wecyclers’ core challenges: funding for expansion, rewards to incentivise participation, waste sources beyond households, and government relationships for regulatory navigation.
Rather than attempting to build everything independently, Bilikiss structured Wecyclers to leverage partners’ strengths – corporations’ CSR budgets, government’s waste management mandate, manufacturers’ need for recycled materials as raw inputs. This partnership-centric model enabled scaling beyond what pure self-funding could achieve.
Action Steps
Dr Orekunrin’s Flying Doctors and Bilikiss’s Wecyclers demonstrate that diaspora investments can succeed spectacularly when executed professionally with validated market needs, proper structure, and adapted implementation. Both businesses generate strong returns while creating meaningful social impact – the combination diaspora investors seek but rarely achieve.
The question isn’t whether diaspora can successfully invest in Nigeria; these stories prove they can. The question is whether individual diaspora investors will learn from these successes or repeat the informal, unvalidated approaches that typically fail. The lessons are clear. Implementation determines outcomes.
Thinking of investing or starting a business in Nigeria? Book a free session with Mr Ted Iwere today to get clarity on how to get started.
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