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The Bank of Industry (BOI), the Implementing Agency for the Investment in Digital and Creative Enterprises (iDICE) Programme of the Federal Government of Nigeria, has launched two dedicated debt-financing windows to expand access to affordable growth capital for startups in Nigeria’s technology and creative sectors. The two facilities — the BOI-iDICE $45 million Debt Fund and the IsDB-iDICE $65 million Debt Fund — are now open to eligible enterprises across all 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory.
The launch marks another significant step in the rollout of iDICE, Africa’s most ambitious intervention in the digital and creative economy. Both funds address a persistent constraint facing innovative businesses in Nigeria: access to patient and affordable capital matched to where startups actually are, in their growth journey.
The big picture
iDICE is a $617 million fund, which is one of the largest government-backed innovation programmes on the continent, bringing together three of the world’s foremost development finance institutions — the African Development Bank (AfDB), Agence Française de Développement (AFD), and the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB) — as co-financiers, with the Bank of Industry (BOI) as Executing Agency and co-financier. The programme rests on a simple premise: Nigeria has abundant talent, ideas, and ambition — what it needs is skills, markets, and capital to realise and commercialise them. The two windows that are launched today are targeted instruments within that architecture. Whilst they both provide debt financing opportunities; each operates under a distinct framework.
