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Corporate Stories
Corporate Story: The rise and fall of HiTV
In this latest installment of Corporate Stories, we are going to tell the story of a young man, who dared to take on a mighty monopoly with his start-up.
The story navigates through the murky waters of corporate competition. It is about displacing a corporate monopoly and the perils of riding that success.
It navigates the intersection between crony capitalism, patient capital and executive exuberance. It serves as a lesson for any self-determined visionary out there who is building a start-up to take on the next vulnerable monopoly.
Defeating the monopoly
“Power is about to change hands,” a newspaper headline read in late 2006.
A week before then, on November 6, 2006 to be precise, a competitive bid was being held somewhere in the United Kingdom. For the first time, a “proudly Nigerian owned” company was about to displace a foreign owned monopoly that had cornered Africa’s largest market for about 13 years.
Corporate Stories
Standard Alliance Insurance plc: What happened to the most capitalized insurance company of 2010?
After a 39-year journey of high and lows, shareholders await Awodiya to deliver on the promise of profitability.
Standard Alliance Insurance Plc recently held its Annual General Meeting, the first in the last four years. The financial reports received at the AGM were that of FY 2017 and 2018, bringing up the million-dollar question; what is going on with this underwriter?
Nairametrics Company of the Week focuses on the 39-year-old highly ranked insurance company, its past achievements, and current realities.
Almost 40 years ago, the company was incorporated in July 1981 as a Private Limited Liability Company. At this time, it was known as Jubilee Insurance Company Limited until August 1996 when it became Standard Alliance Insurance Company Limited.
Corporate Stories
Corporate Story: Intriguing tale of Seven-Up’s ugly fight for market share in Nigeria
For many years, competition in the Nigerian soft drink market was mainly between Coca-Cola and Seven-Up but in 2014, Rite Food came and disrupted the space.
It was early morning on Wednesday, November 13th 2019, and Ziad Maalouf was not asleep. He could not sleep, not with his mind burdened by what had become a serious problem facing Seven-Up Bottling Company, which he oversees. It was part of his job as the Managing Director to figure out a solution to this challenge. And that was exactly what he was doing as he sat in his study that early morning, typing furiously on his computer.
By 4:37 am that morning, Maalouf had sent out an internal memo and copied 25 top executives of the soft drink manufacturing company. In the memo, he made it clear that he was ready to declare war against the company’s competitors. He would not rest until the war was over and Seven-Up had emerged victorious, he declared.
Seven-Up Factory
But the internal memo leaked
Corporate Stories
A bitter family feud has continued to hamper this company’s growth
Sometime in early 2012, a wealthy, sophisticated, and beautiful middle-aged Nigerian businesswoman walked into a Lagos courtroom to testify before a judge.
Sometime in early 2012, a wealthy, sophisticated, and beautiful middle-aged Nigerian businesswoman walked into a Lagos courtroom to testify before a judge. She had just filed a lawsuit before the court in a desperate bid to salvage her late husband’s investments in the Tourist Company of Nigeria Plc (TCN). She was also understandably trying to secure her financial future and that of her children. Her husband had just died, and she suddenly found herself thrust in the position of the sole breadwinner of the family.
The woman is Mrs Maiden Ibru, the widow of renowned businessman and politician, Alex Ibru. During her testimony on that fateful day, she made some pretty shocking revelations, albeit with some dramatics. She told everyone gathered in the courtroom that just as she was walking in, she supposedly saw the apparition of her late husband telling her to fight. So, fight she did, by spilling all the secrets about the company.
Mrs Maiden Ibru appearing in court to testify.
Apparently, all was not well with the Tourist Company of Nigeria Plc, a hospitality company that owns one of Nigeria’s oldest luxury hotels – the Federal Palace Hotel. Perhaps no one would have known about TCN’s woes if Mrs Ibru hadn’t instituted her lawsuit and subsequently given her bombshell testimony. However, the sad thing is the fact that though it’s been seven years since Maiden Ibru’s court appearance, all is not still well with the company.
