The Tony Elumelu Foundation is set to announce the 12th cohort of beneficiaries of its Entrepreneurship Programme on Sunday, March 22, 2026, following what it described as a record surge in applications from across the continent.\n<\/p>\n
In a statement on Friday, the foundation said it received over 265,000 applications from entrepreneurs across all 54 African countries, reflecting growing interest in business development opportunities, particularly in sectors such as artificial intelligence, agriculture and the green economy.\n<\/p>\n
The foundation said the announcement of the new cohort will be made virtually at 2:00 p.m. West African Time.\n<\/p>\n
The statement read, \u201cIn an unprecedented demonstration of Africa\u2019s rising economic empowerment. the Tony Elumelu Foundation is set to unveil the 12th cohort of its flagship Entrepreneurship Programme on Sunday, March 22, 2026.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis follows a record-shattering surge of over 265,000 applications from across all 54 African nations. This massive influx of interest underscores a continent-wide hunger for transformation, particularly within high-impact sectors like artificial intelligence, agriculture, and the green economy.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
The foundation disclosed that it will provide $16m in seed funding to 3,200 entrepreneurs selected for the 2026 cohort, with each beneficiary expected to receive $5,000 in non-refundable capital, business training and mentorship support.\n<\/p>\n
According to the statement, the programme is being implemented in partnership with the Heirs Holdings, European Commission, IKEA Foundation, UNICEF, and the United Nations Development Programme.<\/p>\n
It added that the selection process for the programme was independently audited by Ernst & Young to ensure transparency.\n<\/p>\n
\u201cThis year, the Foundation\u2019s impact scales to new heights, mobilizing $16 million in seed capital to empower 3,200 visionary entrepreneurs through a formidable coalition of partners, including Heirs Holdings Group, the European Commission, IKEA Foundation, UNICEF, and the UNDP.\n<\/p>\n
\u201cEach selected innovator will receive $5,000 in non-refundable funding, world-class business training via TEFConnect, and elite mentorship to catalyze their growth,\u201d it said.\n<\/p>\n
The statement noted that beneficiaries of previous cohorts form part of a network of about 24,000 entrepreneurs across Africa, which it said have collectively generated $4.2bn in revenue and created about 1.5 million jobs since the programme began.\n<\/p>\n
Founder of the foundation, Tony O. Elumelu, was quoted in the statement as saying that supporting entrepreneurs remains critical to the continent\u2019s economic growth.\n<\/p>\n
\u201cAs Founder Tony O. Elumelu, CFR, maintains, empowering these local creators is the most sustainable path to Africa\u2019s economic sovereignty,\u201d the statement read.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Tony Elumelu Foundation is set to announce the 12th cohort of beneficiaries of its Entrepreneurship Programme on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":396588,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[178],"tags":[164152,289,79,103603,159378,18,236,130417,54085,180455,19,17,31466,180456,180457],"class_list":{"0":"post-396587","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entrepreneurship","8":"tag-african-entrepreneurs","9":"tag-artificial-intelligence","10":"tag-business","11":"tag-business-development","12":"tag-economic-empowerment","13":"tag-eire","14":"tag-entrepreneurship","15":"tag-entrepreneurship-programme","16":"tag-green-economy","17":"tag-heirs-holdings","18":"tag-ie","19":"tag-ireland","20":"tag-seed-funding","21":"tag-tony-elumelu-foundation","22":"tag-tony-o-elumelu"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116267141531989047","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396587","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=396587"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396587\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/396588"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=396587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=396587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=396587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}