Health-tech startup emerges winner at Wema Bank’s Hackaholics

A health-tech startup, IRETI, that helps women bridge the gap and manages breast cancer, has emerged winner of the Wema Bank’s Hackaholics 4.0.

The winner was announced on Friday during the Wema Bank/ALAT Hackaholics digital summit and grand finale tagged ‘Re-imagine: Disrupting the ecosystem for scale’ held in Lagos.

In a statement, it said IRETI won the N15m cash prize for the best-pitched business, while GRIP, a fintech startup won N10m as the first runner-up, and Trakka won N7m as the second runner-up.

Also, it noted that Outsidee won N5m for the Women Led Award, a prize instituted to support women in tech.

Other winners were Naijabox as the best energy startup; PUP Industries won the award for the best climate subset; MumAlive won in the health startup category; Chao won the e-commerce category, and University-X won the edutech category.

Also, three universities won the Wema Bank Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics endowment fund. They are Babcock University N10m; Afe Babalola University N7m and Nile University won N5m respectively.

The Founder and Creative Director of IRETI, Jane Agbaohwo, said, “Going forward we will be able to reach out to women in urban communities and women in rural communities because we are partnering with NGOs. We are reaching out to them; helping them to create awareness about breast cancer, it kills, but you stand a chance to live if you detect early and start treatment on time.”

The Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of Wema Bank, Moruf Oseni, said a unique blend of traditional banking expertise, and technology embedded deeply in the bank’s system had allowed it to support the growth of the tech ecosystem in Nigeria.

Oseni added that entertainment and sports had put Nigeria on the global landscape in a positive light, but they could not help to predict technology and infrastructure deficits that would see Nigeria achieve its true potential.