Founder Builds CloutEye After Two Startups Shut Down

When regulations killed his second startup, Adebanji Oluwatoni could have given up on entrepreneurship. Instead, he turned his hard-won lessons into CloutEye, a platform now serving Africa's booming creator economy.

Oluwatoni's tech journey started with a simple PlayStation and an empty game library. Too curious to wait, the young Nigerian taught himself to download games, burn CDs, and navigate the early internet.

At Ghana's Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, he studied political science, not computer science. But watching classmates build simple websites sparked a realization: technology wasn't just for consuming, it was for creating.

After graduation, Oluwatoni saw problems everywhere but few people building solutions. He also noticed friends with money to invest but nowhere safe to put it, while others desperately needed affordable loans.

With his co-founder from university, he launched Growly, a fintech startup connecting investors with borrowers. They literally googled "How do you find investors?" to start.

The platform exploded. Nearly 1,000 people signed up in the first week, growing to 17,000 daily users within two months on just $5,000 in funding. Every naira mattered, so the team handled everything themselves.

Then Nigeria introduced new banking regulations requiring digital lenders to hold capital far beyond what a young startup could afford. Growly had to shut down.

Devastated but determined, Oluwatoni tried again with a cryptocurrency product serving African users. When that also faced regulatory challenges and closed, he faced a choice: walk away or keep building.

Why This Inspires

Oluwatoni's story reminds us that entrepreneurship isn't about avoiding failure. It's about what you build from it.

Each shutdown taught him something new about product design, customer needs, and stretching limited resources. Those 17,000 Growly users proved Africans wanted innovative financial solutions, even if regulations weren't ready.

Now with CloutEye, he's applying every lesson learned to help African creators understand and grow their audiences. The platform addresses a real need in one of the continent's fastest-growing sectors.

His journey from gaming-obsessed kid to three-time founder shows that resilience beats perfection every time.

Two shutdowns didn't break Adebanji Oluwatoni, they sharpened his vision for what African tech could become.