Although the tech sector is dominated by men, a few women have managed to get into the industry and not only succeed but also become well-known, as in the instance of Astria Fataki, an entrepreneur who is passionate about project development in Africa.
Astria firmly thinks that energy is at the heart of socio-economic development, and she has dedicated herself to addressing this challenge in Africa at both the micro and macro levels, as she shares in this conversation with Techbuild.
Tell us a bit about yourself and what you do?
My name is Astria Fataki, I am the president and founder of Energy Generation. Energy generation is a Pan African organization that is based in Togo, and also has representation in Ghana in Accra.
We train young Africans to become entrepreneurs in the field of energy, agriculture, and health care.
Back in 2013, I founded an organization in order to provide decentralized access to energy in rural areas in Africa.
I got very frustrated because as we were trying to scale our impacts, we realized that there was a lack of human capital to help us implement the project and maintain the installations.
I started wondering, how can we contribute to the access to energy in Africa with local resources?
Based on this question, Energy Generation was born in 2016 with the idea that there were several young people in Africa, we’re investing a fortune in energy in trying to solve the problem of access to energy.
But most of the time, they were lacking support, in order to grow their innovative idea into an actual entrepreneurial project.
So we started with organizing a Pan African contest, called the “Africa energy generation prize” and the idea was to gather innovative minds in the same place in Togo, and to really work with them towards transforming their technical innovation into an actual product that they could sell on the market and serve people that need those products the most.
We really grew over time, although it was a very challenging journey because we are positioned in a very particular place on the ecosystem, because we work with entrepreneurs at the idea stage, and we help them develop, build and make their ideas concrete.
So it’s a high-risk investment if I can say so in terms of time and resources, and not many structures and organizations are eager to position themselves that early. Owing to a low rate of success because we work with the entrepreneurs very early, that’s something very challenging, but at the same time, it’s also very rewarding.
As a female entrepreneur, what was your inspiration and how has the journey been for you?
Well, it’s funny because when I started out, I wasn’t seeing myself as an entrepreneur, I was seeing myself as a social worker, trying to build a nonprofit organization that will impact lives for the better.
So I was seeing myself as a socially committed person, but then I realized that if I wanted to grow entrepreneurs, I had to really adopt the mindset of an entrepreneur and to make our entire organization very entrepreneurial because it’s almost impossible to teach entrepreneurship or to help and grow entrepreneurs if you don’t have the experience that can be transformed into expertise and that’s how my mindset started to change.
I love the concept of conscious entrepreneurship and capitalism because, for a long time, I have this kind of dichotomy in my mind that profit was evil, and non-profits were like the right way to go in order to solve the crazy challenges that we are facing right now in terms of climate change, social injustice, lack of human dignity all over the world.
Thus, I really thought that the public good had to be served by the public and by non-profit, however, over the years, I realized that capitalism and profit in entrepreneurship are just a way to create value for society.
I started reading and exploring this idea of countries’ capitalism and conscious entrepreneurship so I qualified myself as a conscious entrepreneur, and my life mission, if I can say so is really to create value for the greater good, and help other people create value for the greater good.
You were named by Forbes Under 30 CEO, the tech world is mostly dominated by men and you’re among the few women that are doing great in the tech world and recognized, what does success mean to you as a female innovator in the tech world?
I work in a space whether it be tech or energy, even entrepreneurship is a male-dominated space and so it’s very funny because I never see myself as a female entrepreneur.
I just see myself as someone that is super eager to solve problems and to better contribute to making the world better and what helped me in this journey is that I don’t limit myself because I am a woman, I don’t see myself as a female.
But the world always reflects back on this image to me, sometimes for better, sometimes for worse but I realized that now beyond what I’m trying to do, I have a responsibility to act as a role model.
For example, I receive messages from young women telling me that they are very inspired by the fact that energy generation is led by a woman, and so I realized that I’ve become a role model, not on purpose.
Now that it has happened, I take this responsibility very seriously, and I try to advocate being present in order to make woman’s voices heard even more loudly.
One thing that also comes with the fact of being a female entrepreneur in a space that is male-dominated, is that I always have to do to 200%, like everything that I do has to be high quality, because when we talk to potential funders or investors, I know that they have this bias, where they will give me less credibility than my male counterparts.
I know that I have to put in a double effort and be more knowledgeable about what I’m talking about, to show that I’m serious.
Technically, you have to be up there, just to prove yourself because you’re a woman, that’s really challenging. So what are your future goals as an advocate for young entrepreneurs?
Well, there are two things. The first thing, I think, is that it’s very important to train people by giving them the knowledge and the structures so that they can grow their ideas into businesses, but support and incubation are not enough.
Entrepreneurs need funds, they need money, they need finances so that they can grow their businesses.
Thus, my next objective is to create a seed fund that will be dedicated to the very early stage, financial needs of startups.
The idea is to invest in very young enterprises and companies, so we will provide investments as low as 10,000 euros up to 350,000 euros because there is a gap In the investment market for this type of investment.
That’s my top priority and now that our incubation and acceleration program is up and running my main focus is on setting up this investment fund.
We already had our first financial commitment from an LP from an investor, so I’m sure that within the next 12 to 18 months, we should be able to start doing the investment.
The second point is that in order to go further in mobilizing youth in this process of becoming entrepreneurs, and entrepreneurs of their own life, I think it’s very important to contribute to a mindset change.
I go to conferences to speak with young people and inspire them with my journey. I created an online program that is called “Defying the odds“. it’s a series of 25 videos that are available for free on my YouTube channel so that young people can just follow this program, and have a more in-depth understanding of my journey, my mindset, and how I defied the odds of my life.
For me, success is living a life that you love, that you’re passionate about. And in this regard, I can qualify myself as successful. And so I, I really want to be able to contribute to other young people’s journey towards success.
What is your advice to young women who are upcoming entrepreneurs?
Well, my first advice will be to watch my program, defying the odds, you will have like the long version of the advice.
First, to be authentic, it’s very important to create a life that is aligned with who you are, what you love, what your strengths are.
So that’s very important first, that would be to be authentic. The second one would be to really develop yourself, you know, to be in a constant journey of personal development.
There are many ways to do that, many tools do that, but I think it’s very important to learn how to conquer yourself and conquer your mind because your mind will be your enemy or ally in what you’re trying to do.
When you’re going to face rejections, where you’re going to face failure, you have to be strong, so that you can rebound every time again and again.
Thus finding ways to go around these challenges, so taking care of your mind, and your relationship with yourself is super important.
This will help you build the strength required to become an entrepreneur and overcome obstacles.
I truly believe that everyone has a special gift and so it’s very important to ask yourself, how can I create? How can I be of service?
I often say to the entrepreneurs, that the income follows impact, if you work on having a huge positive impact on people’s lives, the income will follow.
I’ve never considered income as a factor in my decisions but I always ended up in a better place financially because of the impact that I created around me.
Energy generation is going to have its next intake for the English speaking countries in Accra, in June 2022 and so anyone that is interested to join us in Accra for our two years entrepreneurship program, can go on our website and they will receive all the information they need by email so that they can apply for the program.
Featured Image: Astria Fataki, President and Founder, Energy Generation.
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