Mike Adenuga
Today, April 29, he turns 71 but still spots the chubby face of a man in his fifties. He is a rare patriot who believes in Nigeria. Whether it was patriotism or sheer business that motivated billionaire Mike Adenuga, it is to his credit that Nigerians today enjoy lower telecom tariff.
His company, Globacom, was the first to introduce per second billing scheme as against the rubric Shylock practice in which subscribers were billed per minute even when talk duration was for just five seconds. More than any Nigerian, he has impacted positively on the Nigerian entertainment industry by making the icons of Nollywood (Nigeria’s movie industry) and the artistes the ambassadors and iconic models of Globacom.`
His strength: Dogged, innovative, patient, bold. Unlike some Nigerian billionaires who enjoy lavish federal government patronage, some shrouded in acute illegality, Adenuga grew all his businesses practically by sheer combination of contemporary entrepreneurial resources: people and technology. Again, unlike his contemporaries who were propped up and supported by the Nigerian government, Adenuga at a time suffered persecution in the hands of the federal behemoth. But rather than buckle, he waxed stronger and bolder expanding his frontiers with the bullish mien of Bill Gates and the visionary lustre of Carlos Slim.
As he flips the page in a long-running chapter of a glorious life, it is apposite to examine a few of the entrepreneurial qualities that have stood him out of the clustered crowd of proven entrepreneurs and pretenders.
Every entrepreneur is a dreamer but dream is not a vision, hence there are too many dreamers but very few visionary men and women. Adenuga is the quintessential visionary entrepreneur. His business far-sightedness has seen him profit from the short-sightedness of the competition. He made an early foray into banking, morphing from merchant banking to commercial banking but he was able to sniff ahead of others the rot that was to attend the banking sector and deftly made a switch, pushing his strength and might into telecom while still not taking his big foot off the pedal of oil and gas.
Today, his vision has paid off. Adenuga makes more money from his telecom empire than all his efforts and investments in banking could ever give him. Visionary entrepreneurs do not wait for the future to happen, they create the future. The Bull as he is fondly called simply created his own future and brought the rest of humanity to co-habit it with him. He saw ahead of others that the once lethargic telecom sector would be the real deal in Nigeria’s emerging economy. Smartly and strategically, he divested from banking and pushed through the competitive telecom bourse to emerge at the cusp as one of the top players out of Africa.
Inflexibility, stubbornness or being resolute is one attribute that runs through the grain of successful entrepreneurs. Adenuga has it in good measure. Obstinate and unflinching, he pursues his vision with bullish determination. When his company, CIL, lost the GSM licence in 2001 in controversial circumstances, not many gave him a chance to play in the telecom market having lost a goodly $20 million deposit in the process. But Adenuga dug deep into his inner resolve to pitch for an even bigger stake in Nigeria telecom. He would later win the slot as Nigeria’s second national carrier. Whereas other entrepreneurs would have sulked away from a deal gone awry, not Adenuga! The Bull got more bullish, abandoning the shallow waters to fish in the deeper ocean. His catch? Something bigger than GSM, indeed, the ultimate prize in any country’s telecom market – national carrier status.
Innovation is thinking out of the routine, changing the convention and shifting the paradigm. When Globacom arrived the telecom scene, so much had happened. The early birds had taken over the cream of the market, but it is never too late for an innovator. Adenuga’s innovative mind configured a marketing formula that got Globacom not only a huge chunk of the market but sent the competitors back to their strategy rooms to be able to contain the Glo tsunami that was about to swallow them up.
At that time, the theory from service providers was that per second billing was impossible. Nigerians were haemorrhaging under the N50 per minute billing system but Glo bucked the criminally exploitative trend by introducing the per second billing regime. With this innovative marketing, it clawed its way into the hearts of Nigerian telecom consumers to rank as one of the top two GSM service providers. Add to this Glo’s fibre optic network and what you get is a giant telco out of Africa. Today, thanks to Adenuga, Nigerian telecom consumers enjoy per second billing and it has become the standard in the marketplace.
No Nigerian entrepreneur consistently ranked in the Forbes Billionaire list in living memory has exhibited more patriotism and love for country than Adenuga. In a nation with a long history of public sector thieves who steal from the national treasury and stash their loot away in foreign lands, it is soothing to know there are Nigerians who would at all times invest at home. But Adenuga is not a public servant, neither is he numbered among the crooks. He is a private sector player who has over the decades built his enterprise into a flourishing conglomerate. Ordinarily, Adenuga is not obligated to invest and keep reinvesting in Nigeria but he has remained an incurable patriot who believes that wealth at home is indeed the real wealth. Adenuga has kept his wealth in Nigeria, using same to create more wealth, empower the people and create jobs. He is by far Nigeria’s most patriotic globally-certified billionaire entrepreneur.
One area Adenuga has lavishly displayed his pan-Nigeria spirit and patriotism is in entertainment industry. From sports to music and Nollywood, he towers above all in his commitment to the development of the sector. No Nigerian, living or dead, has impacted more positively on all the gamut of entertainment than Adenuga. Thanks to his generosity and patriotism, Nigerian movie stars, comedians, musicians and a growing galaxy of entertainers have become proud Ambassadors of Glo, earning millions of naira to match their public status. He insists that those who must be the face of his products and services are largely Nigerians irrespective of their tribe and tongue. When the late Stephen Keshi, the most successful indigenous coach, won the Nations Cup with Super Eagles and threatened to resign, it took the intervention, benevolence and magnanimity of Adenuga to persuade Keshi from walking out on the nation in her moment of glory as the champion of the continent. He remains the biggest indigenous sponsor of Nigerian football and chief promoter of soccer excellence on the continent courtesy of the Glo CAF Awards.
One enduring trait of Adenuga is his cultured ability to be absent, yet present. He is reclusive but his silhouette is all over the business and socio-political space. He plays in the big league of social life but rarely can you find him in any public function including the one organised exclusively for billionaires of his calibre. Yet, though absent, he would never miss out on anything that transpired at such gathering. He has mastered the art of being absent yet present at all times. Whereas billionaires and entrepreneurs of his class have cultivated a penchant of throwing themselves at senior government functionaries as a way of guaranteeing them government patronage, Adenuga on the other hand shies away from such gatherings and more curiously, you are not likely to see him grace any occasion including the ones hosted in the surreal and palatial chambers of Aso Rock but from his safe distance he keeps his claws firmly rooted in the subconscious of the high and mighty in government. It is a special skill that calls for a deeper analysis and inquisition.
Management guru Peter Drucker once said: “the best way to predict the future is to create it.” Mike Adenuga remains the outlier Nigerian entrepreneur who created a less stressful future for Nigerian telecom consumers when he bucked a trend that almost choked the people. He did not only create a better, friendlier future in Nigeria telecom, he opened the doors for all shades of Nigerians – sportsmen and women, actors and artisans, the young and the old, etcetera – to be part of that future. I celebrate a rare patriot.
