Interview with Hakeem Belo-Osagie, interviewed by Obi Isiadinso, Nigeria
Publisher: Harvard Business School
Published: 2002
Place of publication: Boston, MA
Language: eng
Number of pages: 55
Subjects: Interviews; Alumni and alumnae; Businessmen; Banks and banking; Corporations; Finance; Entrepreneurship; Personnel management; Social responsibility of business; Business; History; Commerce; United Bank for Africa; Harvard University. Graduate School of Business Administration
Description: Hakeem Belo-Osagie discusses the challenges of working in Africa and how he identified opportunities in the financial market in Nigeria. He also talks about how he managed risk as he turned around a bank and downsized the staff by about half.
Notes: Title from PDF title page (viewed on September 8, 2015).

Access restrictions to transcript may apply. Contact Baker Library Historical Collections for more information.

Video interview conducted in English in 2002 March in Nigeria Obi Isiadinso, MBA Student, Harvard Business School, as part of the Arthur Rock Center for Entrepreneurship "Entrepreneurs Video Project."

Interview with Hakeem Belo-Osagie, interviewed by Obi Isiadinso, Nigeria, March 2002, Arthur Rock Center for Entrepreneurship "Entrepeneurs Video Project", Harvard Business School.

System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader.

Mode of access: World Wide Web.

Hakeem Belo-Osagie, (United Bank for Africa), HBS 1980, grew up in Nigeria, England and the United States. After graduating from HBS in 1980, he returned to Nigeria to work in financial services. He started at a securities trading outfit and soon realized that there was little trading activity going on in commercial paper, treasury bills and bankers acceptances. So, together with a few Nigerian shareholders and some international shareholders like the World Bank, he set up a niche firm. Later, he realized that if a large commercial bank were well organized and efficient, it would "blow a smaller group (like his) out of the market." When the Nigerian government decided to sell its shares in the United Bank for Africa, Hakeem recognized a bargain and purchased the bank. Today, Hakeem Belo-Osagie is Chairman of the United Bank for Africa. In March 2002, he described his experiences as an entrepreneur and business leader in Nigeria.

Forms part of: Creating Emerging Markets oral history collection, 2006-