Startup Square also called StartupSQ is a community of innovative entrepreneurs and mentors driven by the need to support each other to build solutions to everyday problems as a team.

Startup Square aims at supporting each other in their strength areas to address the challenges that startup entrepreneurs face in the process of starting up and running their businesses.

These challenges may range from idea validation, business model design or logistics, to accessing funds, access to market, access to resources, ideas on improving existing models to perform better and many more.

The focus is to help entrepreneurs and their businesses with the necessary support they need to become successful in the startup space, hence reducing the failure rate of businesses in the region.

We provide the Tech and Entrepreneurial services and Infrastructures that encourage collaboration among great minds.

 Olotu Square model consist of three (3) functions:

1. Co-Working Space
2. Solutions (Olotu Square Labs)
3. Community

 Our Co-Working space creates an enabling environment for Entrepreneurs and Startups to run business activities at a fraction of the cost. With our co-working space, they get access to power, internet, and resources for their business, including our network of advisors, mentors, and investors.

 Olotu Square Labs is the arm that champions our creative and solutions-development talents. Olotu Square Labs consist of our Developers Square, Graphics/Creativity Square, and Hacker Square. These squares create a base for us to grow talents and build sustainable products and businesses. Developers Square is where we house hardware/software developers. Graphics and Creativity Square is where we house the best designers, and Hacker Square is where we house bright minds to hack any problem including security related issues.

 At Olotu Square Labs, we build in-house solutions for our clients, and outsource Talents (like Designers, Developers, Business Developers, Digital Marketers, Product Managers, Project Managers, etc). We personally handpick our talent pool and train some of them professionally to ensure our clients get the best hands for their project.

 We also organize events to bring the tech and entrepreneurial community together, and still grant the community access to information from our network.

A pitch day is simply a day we award to any startup looking to get feedback on their startup idea, product, brand design, A/B Test concept, approach to market, pricing, and more. Members of the square and the public is invited to hear the startup pitch after which all necessary feedbacks or support needed is offered. This is also a recruitment pipeline for our Incubation programme.

Pitches will be a “pitch-fire” format, which means you will have just 60 seconds to get the audience interested in your idea. You will have no slides or props -just your voice. You won’t have time to go over features, so just focus on the core of the idea and make your enthusiasm contagious.

Here is the format for pitches that we recommend:

Who are you and what is your background? (5-10 Seconds)
What is the problem that your product is solving? Or, begin with a story (10-20 Seconds)
Explain the product and how it solves the problem (10-20 seconds)
Who do you need on your team (a developer, marketing, designer?) (5-10 seconds)
Finally, make up a name for your startup so the facilitator can give it a title

Voting & Forming Teams

After pitches, you will have more time to mingle. If you pitched an idea, this is your time to start recruiting others that may be interested in your idea. If you did not pitch, or if you are having trouble finding others to join your team, use this time to seek out those that pitched other ideas that you found interesting.

Next, the crowd votes on their favorite pitches. This is simply a way to encourage quick team forming. This is by no means an exclusive process and if you pitched an idea and it is not voted as one of the top ideas, you are more than welcome to work on it if you find some other people who want to work on the idea with you. From there we will form teams and these are the startup ideas that will be worked on over the weekend.