Mike Adenuga; Biography, Banking Investments, Net Worth

Biography of Mike Adenuga

Otunba Mike Adenuga is a Nigerian business tycoon, who is considered to be the second richest person in Nigeria, right after Aliko Dangote.

Michael Adeniyi Agbolade Ishola Adenuga junior was born to Oloye Michael Agbolade Adenuga Snr a school teacher and Madam Juliana Oyindamola Adenuga nee Onashile of Okesopin, ijebu igbo a business woman and royal descent of ijebu on the 29th of April 1953 in Ibadan, Oyo State South Western Nigeria.

Adenuga’s educational foundation was laid at the Comprehensive High School Aiyetoro and Ibadan Grammar School where he obtained his Higher School Certificate.

After which he worked as a cab driver and a security guard to raise the funds he needed to further his education; he ended up as a graduate of North western Oklahoma State University and Pace University in New York with degrees in Business Administration.

Mike Adenuga returned to Nigeria from the United States to take over his mother’s sawmill business which he ran alongside the distribution of lace materials and supply of cocoa to Coca Cola.

In the course of running his business, he met and built relationship with some officers of the Nigerian military who were then very influential as Nigeria was still under military rule.

These friends aided him in obtaining contracts that made him a millionaire at a young age. In 1990, the then military president of Nigeria, General Ibrahim Babangida awarded him an oil prospecting license which he used in building consolidated oil.

In 1991, Conoil struck oil in ondo state, south western Nigeria, it became the first indigenous oil company to strike oil in commercial quantity in Nigeria.

In 1999, he received his first GSM licence and a second one in 2003 after the revocation of the first license for the operation of his currently giant telecommunication company Globacom. It spread quickly in Nigeria and has been launched in other African countries.

In 2009, Adenuga faced money laundering charges from the EFCC (Economic and Financial Crime Commission), he was detained but later left Nigeria for London where he resided until he was granted pardon by Late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua.

He also been said to be hugely indebted as his company Conoil owed Total, the French owned oil company.
In 2015, he made an effort to purchase Ivorian mobile telecoms operator comuim cote d’ ivoire for $600 million.

He has received several awards, the grand commander of the order of Niger (GCON) and the commander of the order of the Niger (OON). In 2007, the African Telecoms Awards named him the African Entrepreneur of the year and in 2009, he was silverbird’s man of the year.

Adenuga is an intellectual, a simple natured man, a workaholic, risk taker who is fondly called the ‘Guru’. Nigerians owe the reduction in the cost of telecommunication services to the launch of Adenuga’s globacom which forced the giant South African network provider in Nigeria MTN to reduce its cost of services due to the emergence of a competitor (GLOBACOM).

Mike Adenuga is a Christian and polygamist who equally loves and cares for all his children. He said to have purchased his own burial tomb for about 200 million naira at a private cemetery in ikoyi, Lagos.

As a philanthropist, the business tycoon has donated $20,000 to Nigeria’s soccer team to encourage and boost their morale in the Brazil 2014 world cup tournament.

As a lover of soccer, he contributes and supports the English soccer club; Manchester united which had Globacom as one of its official sponsors in 2009.

The sponsorship includes young players from Benin, Ghana and Nigeria who train with the club in Manchester. In that same year, Globacom signed deal worth $16.5 million to sponsor the Nigerian premier league for four years.

Business And Investments of Mike Adenuga

Otunba Michael Adenuga is an entrepreneur with major investments in oil and Gas, telecommunications, banking and real estate and aviation. Here is a breakdown of some of his investments.

Globacom

With headquarters in Lagos, Globacom is a private Nigerian telecommunication company, a huge employer of labour that started operations in August 2003. It operates in Nigeria, Republic of Benin, Ghana, Ivory Coast and is spreading to other parts of Africa.

With an estimate of over 34 million subscribers, it has built the first successful high capacity fibre optic cable from the United Kingdom to Nigeria and it’s the first private company in Africa to undertake such a project.

Glo provides reliable, fast and affordable internet services to its users and this explains why it has the highest number of subscribers in West Africa.

Apart from providing internet services, Globacom facilitates foreign investments and constantly employs labour thereby reducing the number of unemployed people in Nigeria.

Glo gateway, a subsidiary of Glo, which is an international wholesale voice and data exchange trading business unit, now covers 140 countries under its roaming services, making it the largest roaming coverage for voice and data in Africa.

It was the first telecommunications in Nigeria to introduce per second billings and other services like vehicle tracking, mobile banking services, blackberry and mobile internet.

Conoil

Conoil with its headquarters in Lagos and one of the strongest downstream companies in the Nigerian petroleum industry.it is an oil and gas refining and marketing company.

It is a huge marketer of refined petroleum products. It also manufactures and markets lubricants, household and liquefied petroleum gas for domestic and industrial consumption.

Conoil operates through three fractions: white products which involve the sale of premium motor spirit, aviation turbine kerosene, dual purpose kerosene, low pour fuel oil and automotive gasoline and grease oil; Lubricants with products such as lubricant transport, lubricant industrial, greases, process oil and bitumen; Liquefied petroleum gas segments that include liquefied petroleum gas bulk, liquefied petroleum gas packed cylinders and halves.

Banking Investments of Mike Adenuga

Mike Adenuga had investments in the defunct Equatorial Trust Bank (ETB) which was one of the largest commercial banks in Nigeria , it was established in 1990 but merged with Devcom bank in 2006 after establishing about one hundred retail branches nationwide,.

In 2009, ETB was found undercapitalized and was rejected of its required new capital by the Asset Management Company of Nigeria (AMCON).

The bank was then taken over by Sterling bank on the 11th of August 2011 and this led to the federal government of Nigeria, owning a significant per cent of shareholding in ETB.

Apart from the investments mentioned above, Adenuga also has massive investments in real estates. He owns the real estate firm Proline investments which has properties all over Nigeria.

Networth of Mike Adenuga

With Adenuga’s Globacom which is one of the largest operators in Nigeria with over 36 million subscribers, his conoil and real estate investments, he is worth about $6.1 billion. He is on thelist of FORBES Africa as one of the richest men in Africa.

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