Internship Description
Natasha Bhuta and Sabaa Notta, ’20SIPA, and Fabian Crudele, ‘20BUS worked with Lidya, a financial services platform to improve access to credit and finance for micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs) across frontier and emerging markets starting with Nigeria. Lidya has an online platform that makes it easier for SME’s to grow, creating wealth and employment, and supporting diversification of the economy. Lidya’s platform has allowed SMEs to apply online, get credit in 24 hours and build a credit history. Natasha assisted with market expansion efforts that involved assessing market viability for Lidya's products and services in target markets and business development with enterprise partners, regulators and other private sector players. She also helped develop and implement Lidya’s annual business plans for expansion markets in Eastern Europe. Sabaa’s role was to assist with the country's expansion in the new region; from building new partnerships to acquiring and managing new customers. Sabaa’s role also included research around expansion opportunities, as well as working on the business plan and budgeting. Fabian helped Lidya, which is based in Lagos, Nigeria, to expand to other frontier markets in Eastern Europe by creating an expansion strategy and forming the right partnerships in new countries. These students were supported with new SESF funding earmarked for financial inclusion.
I spent the summer at Lidya, an online SME lender with current operations in Nigeria. Lidya was started in 2016 with the idea of helping SMEs to grow, creating wealth and employment, and supporting diversification of the economy. By providing access to finance for SMEs, Lidya is helping bridge the credit gap.
With the goal of being the de-facto online lender in every frontier and fast-growing economy, Lidya started its international expansion this summer to Eastern Europe. This expansion is critical for the company, as successfully expanding to a new continent would prove they can replicate its Nigerian model in other markets and pave the way for further expansion. The increased confidence in the business model would allow them to scale up and grow. My project consisted in launching the company in these markets, including:
- Adapting our product to the different markets
- Finding the best partners to help us with the technological aspect of the product
- Building the local team to start operations
- Partnering with the right channels to promote our product
Because we were a small team reporting directly to the founders, I had significant responsibilities that allowed me to put into practice many of the concepts learned during my first year. The courses I took were extremely helpful as I was working in all areas of the company and dealing with all stakeholders. From negotiating with potential partners using the concepts learnt at Managerial Negotiations, to pitching our product using techniques from The Leader’s Voice, I found this internship to be the perfect complement to my CBS education.
Perhaps one of the most challenging parts of the job was also the most interesting one. Usually companies expand from Europe to Africa, but we were doing the opposite. This generated curiosity in the partners we were trying to work with and in most cases we had to make an extra effort to build trust. However, this opportunity allowed me to have a unique experience and taught me how to overcome cultural and language barriers.
Throughout the summer I learnt how to create a great product with the consumer constantly in mind. The internship not only helped me grow tremendously both professionally and personally, but it also gave me a better understating on how startups can generate a social impact. As I plan to return to Argentina, the knowledge I gained will be extremely important in my future career.
