The days of raising money in Nigeria on the strength of a good idea and a confident pitch are largely over. Investors are now looking harder at compliance records, legal structure, and evidence of real paying customers before they commit to anything. That was the consistent message from speakers at the fourth edition of Founders Meet and Chat, organised by BlackCrest in Lagos.
The event brought together fintech experts, startup founders, and investors to discuss what it actually takes to attract funding in a tighter fundraising environment, and the advice was notably more practical and harder-edged than the optimistic growth narratives that dominated Nigerian startup conversations just a few years ago.
Managing Partner of BlackCrest, Osita James, said investors are increasingly interested in how founders plan to remain competitive and resilient, even when their initial business strategies face challenges. He emphasised that founders must develop strategies that protect their businesses from competition and ensure long-term relevance in the market.
James explained that such strategies could include developing an ecosystem of complementary products rather than relying on a single offering, or targeting customers who would continue using the product over an extended period rather than making one-off purchases.
He put the investor’s question directly. Investors want to know how you are building the competitive advantage that will allow you to remain resilient in the market, even if your current strategy is no longer working.
This is a meaningful shift from the growth-at-all-costs playbook that Nigerian startups followed during the boom years. Investors who burned through capital backing startups that collapsed the moment competition arrived are now asking harder questions before writing any cheques.
The compliance point from James was arguably the most direct warning of the event. He stressed the importance of obtaining sound legal advice before entering into business transactions, warning that promising investment opportunities could collapse if founders fail to meet regulatory requirements. He noted that the absence of the required licences or strategic partnerships for startups operating in highly regulated sectors such as finance could discourage investors regardless of the quality of the business proposal.
For Nigerian fintech founders in particular, this is not a soft suggestion. The Central Bank of Nigeria, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and other regulators have made it progressively harder to operate financial services products without proper licensing, and investors who have previously been caught holding equity in a startup that gets shut down by a regulator are not making that mistake twice.
A pitch deck with impressive user numbers means very little if the business model requires a licence the founder has not obtained.
Co-founder of Middleman, Omolara Sanni, advised entrepreneurs to focus on demonstrating tangible results and market traction, noting that investors are primarily interested in businesses with proven demand. She urged founders to prioritise acquiring customers and developing products that people are willing to pay for.
This distinction between users and paying customers matters more than most early-stage founders appreciate. A product that people use for free at scale is not the same as a business. Investors in 2026 are far more interested in a startup with 500 paying customers than one with 50,000 free users and no clear revenue model.
Sanni also encouraged founders to explore alternative funding sources such as grants, which do not dilute ownership or place undue pressure on businesses. For Nigerian founders who have historically viewed grant funding as a consolation prize rather than a strategic tool, this is worth reconsidering. Several major grants available through Google, the Tony Elumelu Foundation, the African Development Bank, and various government-linked programmes offer capital that does not require giving up equity or meeting aggressive revenue milestones.
The Chief Operating Officer and Co-founder of Winich Farms, Winner Attai, said successful fundraising extends beyond networking and documentation, stressing that founders must present a compelling business story to potential investors. He advised entrepreneurs to clearly define their fundraising strategy by identifying the type of investors they seek, whether impact-driven financiers, traction-focused backers or those primarily interested in financial returns and growth metrics.
Attai emphasised that raising capital is a gradual process that requires structure, adding that founders should view it as a long-term journey.
This is practical advice that often gets lost in the noise around fundraising. Not every investor is the right investor for every business. An impact-first investor who cares about financial inclusion is not the right audience for a pitch focused purely on revenue multiples. A growth-stage VC is not the right audience for a pre-revenue social enterprise. Knowing who you are talking to before you walk into the room shapes everything from the deck you prepare to the metrics you emphasise.
There is a way to read this tighter fundraising environment as good news for Nigerian tech overall. The boom years produced a lot of startups that raised money without the legal, operational, or product foundations to use it well. Many of those startups are gone now.
What is emerging in their place is a more demanding market that rewards founders who have built real compliance infrastructure, genuine paying customer bases, and resilient business models rather than just a story about a large addressable market.
For Nigerian founders who have done the harder work of building properly, the current environment is not the obstacle it might appear to be. It is actually the filter that clears the field.
