Dr Aituaz Kola–Oladejo is an intellectual powerhouse and a huge asset to the Nigerian Financial Services Industry. She is an iconic Financial Technology and Ecosystem Development Consultant.

With over 20 years of experience in operations, business development, innovation management and research, she can conquer new territories, develop growth strategies and influence people and processes that would compel market dominance and reduce operational inefficiencies.

Aituaz is passionate about incubating technology startups whose objective is to improve the lives of people in their environment by giving them access to financial services through technology.

Dr Aituaz Kola–Oladejo is Executive Director of Financial Services Innovators (FSI), a company which is based in Lagos. In her role, she is the pioneer executive lead of the company for enhancing financial innovation and inclusion, empowering startups, and engendering industry collaboration within the Fintech ecosystem.

She has recorded a lot of success at FSI in just three years. She has grown the FSI innovators community from zero at the launch of December 2019 to 7,000+ members within 3 years. With a lean team, she developed the First Fintech Industry Innovation Sandbox with over 300 API endpoints and 16 partners.

She launched an incubation program for students in tertiary institutions to discover tech talents eager to build a career in tech or those willing to become entrepreneurs in the tech space with over 3,000 students accessing this platform. She organised 9 innovation challenges within 3 years and 4 months with a total of 102 minimum viable products (MVPs) developed.

She partnered with the Central Bank of Nigeria to educate innovators on CBN’s policies and guidelines. She has pioneered free startup clinics and anchored over 142 sessions since commencement.

Dr Aituaz Kola-Oladejo’s sterling achievements in this sphere began while she worked at the Nigeria Inter-bank Settlement Systems (NIBSS). As Head of Research & Development at NIBSS between April 2016 and August 2019, she was the pioneer leader for institutional research and development, leading innovation management, payment awareness and training as well as strategy. Among other landmark achievements, she led the development of the Financial Industry Sandbox and published 6 NIBSS APIs thereby lowering the barriers for up to 500 Fintech startups to ideate and develop financial products by implementing the requirements of the Financial Service Innovators.

She also led the development of the ‘Address Update’ Blockchain for the Financial Industry as 3 banks (GTBank, Access Bank, and Diamond Bank) participated in the Proof of Concept to validate and update the existing address information of their customers.

She secured the buy-in of CBN to put a framework in place to lower the regulatory barriers of Fintech startups to operate in the payment ecosystem through a tiered licensing regime working with the Financial Service Innovators and the Central Bank of Nigeria.

Aituaz Kola–Oladejo’s journey through the world of financial services began when she joined the then Citizens International Bank (now Heritage Bank) in September 2000 as a Teller. She rose through different roles to become Branch Operations Manager in April 2006.

She was engaged by United Bank for Africa (UBA) Plc in August 2006 as Relationship Manager, Corporate Institutions. She left UBA in 2012 as Team Lead, Credit Products, Credit Risk Management.

Aituaz is a product of the University of Lagos International School where she had her secondary school education. She went on to study at Edo State University Ekpoma where she graduated in 1998 with a B.A. (Hons) in French (Second Class Upper).

In 2008, she bagged a B.Sc (Hons) in Applied Accounting from Oxford Brookes University, Oxford, England. She also studied at the University of South Wales, UK for a Diploma in Education (Innovation in Learning & Teaching) in 2022. She earned a Postgraduate Certificate in Management from the London Bridge Business School, UK in 2023.

It is in recognition of her contribution to national development in the sphere of Leadership in Financial Technology that Dr Aituaz Kola-Oladejo was deemed worthy to be conferred with the Woman of Merit Gold Award which is part of the PSR National Awards.