Founder Dojo Imo brings Silicon Valley rigor to Nigeria, helping local talent unlock global opportunities. It’s not about existing companies; it’s a whole new approach about growing a new base of high performance founders who will seed and grow companies in Nigeria and beyond throughout their lives.
From Owerri to the world
this is where your journey starts.
Mission
To make Imo State the launchpad of the next generation of unicorn founders.
Founder Dojo Imo is powered by the US Market Access Center, a world-class startup development company with experience in 80 countries and with 5000 founders. It builds upon the research at UC Berkeley and involves Hundreds of Silicon Valley entrepreneurs‑turned‑educators. This powerhouse of talent is brought in to help Dojo founders on key topics from strategy and partnerships to fundraising to deep technical issues in AI, Fintech and more. Together the USMAC team has worked with startups who have created tens of billions of dollars of value, all starting in locations outside the US.
People
Meet the mentors
Chris Burry
USMAC CEO
Ken Singer
Chief Learning Officer of the UC Berkeley Sutardja Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology
David Law
Director of Global Programs, UC Berkeley Sutardja Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology
Steve Adelman
USMAC Lead Mentor
Transforming ambitious individuals into global startup founders.
Founder Dojo Imo is designed to transform ambitious individuals into globally competitive startup founders.
This project is a public-private partnership between the Imo State Government, Imo Digital City, and Global Innovation Dojo — a new venture spun from the team behind the US Market Access Center (USMAC), with 25B+ in startup value created globally.No tuition. No fluff. Just real, founder-first growth.
Whether or not you already have a startup idea, the program equips you to find and validate high-value opportunities. Over four progressive phases—Mindset Bootcamp, Opportunity Dojo, Solution Dojo, and Business Model Scaling—you’ll gain the mindset, tools, and mentorship to build ventures that matter. The top founders will even earn a place in a Silicon Valley immersion, gaining global exposure and connections.
Global Innovation Dojo CEO
Chris Burry
Too many ecosystems focus on funding instead of founders. But the key to unlock funding is world-class founders. That’s what Dojo creates. Funding follows great founders.
Global Innovation Dojo brings deep experience
Dojo mentors bring over 100 years of combined experience, $500M funding raised and have founded dozens of startups. Our model rests on 3 key pillars:
Founder-First
We use cutting-edge immersive experiences based on the most advance research in entrepreneurship.
At each step, the learning and personal development builds and deepens.
We focus on building “life-long-founders” who will create, grow, and sell companies again and again.
Learn from the A-Players
Like in football, if you want to be a world-class player, eventually you need to learn from the best.
Our mentors and instructors each bring personal experience founding and growing startups, and experience mentoring founders globally.
The to coaches are on the field, now it’s up to you if you’re ready.
Strategic & Structured Process
Each activity and each step in our programs has been painstakingly planned based on experience with thousands of founders around the world.
While you may be confused by the exercises you go through, as you go everything comes together and you understand the deeper insights.
Each step unlocks another level of insight and skills.