Is Nigeria the testing ground for Africa?

By many accounts, if you want to make it in Africa, then you must first make it in Nigeria, Africa’s biggest economy, and also the most populous. Take MTN for example. The company paid about $285 million as license fees in 2001. The players in the industry thought that this was a big joke. However, consider that the country had 10 million pay TV customers at the time, and so, the MTN CEO thought that if Nigerians could afford Pay TV, then surely, they could afford mobile phones. Currently, MTN has 32 million customers, and has operations in Africa, Europe, and the Middle East. However, Nigeria remains its biggest market to date, and the base of its operations.

Such successes are what makes Nigeria to be the testing ground for businesses that want to operate in Africa, especially those focused on consumer goods. Unilever, Proctor and gamble, and SAB Miller are just
some of the consumer goods companies that have found Nigeria to be a very lucrative market. But still, power blackouts, bureaucracy, and the problem of land still continue to plague many of the companies that have operations in Nigeria. Even then, Nigeria does offer a great testing ground for companies that would want to expand in the continent.