Following a painstaking and detailed assessment of applications, the iDICE Startup Bridge has on-boarded 185 founders into the inaugural cohort of its Founders Lab, marking one of the first major milestones in the rollout of the broader Investment in Digital and Creative Enterprises (iDICE) Programme.
iDICE is an initiative of the Federal Government that was launched in 2023, as part of the administration’s broader agenda to drive innovation, youth enterprise, and economic diversification. The $617m programme is co-financed by the African Development Bank (AfDB), Agence Française de Développement (AFD), and the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB), while the Bank of Industry doubles as the executing agency as well as a financier to the programme.
Beyond providing financing opportunities for startups, iDICE was designed as a long-term economic development programme with ambitions that extend across digital infrastructure, innovation hubs, creative industry financing, skills development, investment facilitation, and policy support. The programme shall establish 66 innovation hubs and centres of excellence nationwide, train up to 300,000 young Nigerians in market-relevant digital and creative skills and support hundreds of startups with financing and investment readiness support.
