IrokoTV and its founder are still hungry six years on

Iroko TV now has its own production company and has expanded into Francphone Africa

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Six years ago an ambitious young man landed in Nigeria from the the United Kingdom with an idea. It was an idea that had been borne out of a simple errand to find his mother some DVD's of her favourite Nigerian movies.

Jason Njoku could not have imagined that his little plan to find a single online distribution point for the massive Nigerian film market would lead to the video on demand and pay TV giant that is now Iroko TV.
Business Insider Sub Saharan Africa editor, Godfred Akoto Boafo sat with Jason Njoku on the birthday of his dream.

After six years what emotions prevail when you look back on all you have achieved in the time?

play Jason Njoku is focused on African expansion

It's been a spectacular upheaval. There have been great wins, and dark times; but I don't think this is unique to IROKO. Any other entrepreneur in the Nigerian consumer internet / start-up ecosystem will tell a similar tale. Emotions that have prevailed during these six years have been both exhaustion and energy - simultaneously. I've worked until I was ill, and have been so energised by what we're doing, that I've worked non-stop for the longest time. I'm also proud that we're still here. And relieved. Running a business is actually pretty emotional.

Iroko has de-emphasised streaming to focus on mobile and downloads, has that proven to be a winning decision?

Absolutely. As of this year, Nigeria finally became our biggest subscriber base in the world. Why? because we tore apart and painstakingly rebuilt our product for the Nigerian consumer. It was by no means an easy decision, but we are delighted with the results of our global teams' hard work. 

What are the struggles Iroko has faced as it has metamorphosed from being a distributor to a producer?

Are studios as welcoming as they used to be? Just three years ago, we were at an impasse with many of the Nollywood film makers, who were demanding extortionate fees for the online licenses of their movies; there was absolutely no chance we would have been able to grow IROKOtv if we had continued to pay such prices for content. So it forced the situation and made us, and by us, I mean my wife, Mary Njoku, to consider moving into content production. Now, we are in a stronger position than ever before, in that we now have our own studio, ROK, which was launched by and run by her. It is her innate understanding of how the industry works, her creative abilities and her focus on creating brilliant content that can be enjoyed around the world, that has completely changed the company. We work with a number of other production houses in Nigeria and Ghana, and commission movies from a selection of trusted creative partners. So we are now, predominantly, only reliant  upn our ourselves - that's a big change.

Several startups in Nigeria have been taken over or sold out, how hard has it been to resist offers?

It's been easy to resist because we know we still have a lot further to go in growing IROKO into the sort of company we think it can be. IROKO was never a short-term venture for me. It's a long term emotional investment that still has a long way to go. We're creating value within the company and are still aggressive in our aspirations for it to grow across the continent.

You have recently been involved in helping other startups to raise funding. How important is it for you to give back?Is the current generation of entrepreneur that you meet prepared to navigate the path of becoming successful businesses?

 I am a firm believer in giving back to your immediate community - six years ago, when I started out, there was not one person in Nigeria who I came across who wanted to invest in IROKOtv. In Nollywood. In digital content. So personally, I'm acutely aware of the challenges that face young entrepreneurs here. So, in terms of funding, through Spark, we've invested in the likes of Hotels.ng, Drinks.ng, ToLet.com.ng, OgaVenue, Paystack and Medsaf - all companies that I believe have a significant chance of 'winning' in the ecosystem. They are founded by a generation of young entrepreneurs who are willing to take risks and throw all manner of blood, sweat and hustle into their enterprises - and they are seeing their hard work start to pay off. It's a slow process, but they are seeing growth which, in this market, is exceptional.