By Ashemiriogwa Emmanuel
At the end of The Next Titan Season 8, Nigeria’s foremost business reality TV show, the most talented youth with outstanding entrepreneurial acumen will go home with the sum of N15 million, the organisers have promised.
The programme, which is tagged The Uncaged, is a 10-week competition where entrepreneurs from across the country will carry out weekly business tasks and challenges as teams or individuals with weekly evictions in the boardroom by the judges.
Chiefly sponsored by Heritage Bank, this season saw entries from more than 20,000 participants, but only 75 made it through auditions in Abuja, Kano, Port Harcourt, Enugu, Ibadan, and Lagos, while 18 contestants eventually scaled through to the next phase after the boot camp.
In addition to the N15 million grand prize to be won by the overall winner, the top 1,000 contestants with good business ideas and those whose businesses are registered will receive N3 million funding.
Explaining the importance of the show, the Executive Producer, The Next Titan, Mr Mide Akinlaja, noted that the challenge is aimed at fanning the flames of entrepreneurial spirit in Nigerian youths.
“Apart from the success stories of the previous winners of the show which have been phenomenal, the Next Titan being on national television has also positively impacted on the generality of other young people who are the viewers who have shared their testimonies regarding the program causing a paradigm shift in their mind-sets to moving from job-seekers to jobs-creators,” he said.
Also, the Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, Heritage Bank, Mr Ifie Sekibo, disclosed that the financial institution would soon introduce a product that would encourage the entrepreneurial acumen of the over 20,000 individuals who applied for the contest.
He stated reiterated the bank’s firm commitment towards developing and positioning youths to create jobs for themselves and others through financial empowerment and the right platform to grow.
Adedapo Adesanya 
Modupe Gbadeyanka