How did the Nigerian billionaires say they built their fortunes, and what did Aliko Dangote say about backward integration?

The Nigerian billionaires in these interviews point to a few recurring routes. One founder who built two billion-dollar companies said that in Nigeria, sustainable wealth comes from helping other people, citing how his companies moved people earning very little into jobs paying far more. He also described a billion-dollar company as a group of people who could each have built a $10 million business but chose to combine forces. A real estate developer said the foundation of wealth is a large portfolio of landed assets sitting behind your name, and that your reputation and keeping your word come first. A banking and investment leader listed hard work, discipline, and deferred gratification as his core attributes, and said his turning point came when he and friends took over a distressed bank and turned it around, adding that preparation is what lets you recognize luck when it arrives. A private equity founder credited her success to refusing to take no for an answer and to spotting gaps others ignored, such as small businesses and women.

On Aliko Dangote, he described backward integration as deliberately producing the goods Africa had been importing, rather than only trading them, which is how he moved from selling candy to building large industrial businesses in cement, rice, flour, and oil and gas.