The Group Chairman of Mutual Benefits Group, Dr. Akinade Akanmu Ogunbiyi has intensified work on his governorship ambition in Osun State. Over the last few months, he has been traversing the length and breathe of the state, meeting with the people at the grassroot.
A thorough-bred professional, entrepreneur per excellence and an astute business man, Akin Ogunbiyi, who is also an Economist and Management consultant, is an alumnus of the University of Ife (now Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife), Lagos Business School (LBS), Nigeria, University of Navarra, Barcelona, Spain and Harvard Business School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA. He also attended full courses on leadership at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford, United Kingdom and Yale School of Management.
He is an Associate Member of the Chartered Insurance Institute of London and a Fellow of the Chartered Insurance Institute of Nigeria (FCIIN). He is a Fellow of the Nigerian Institute of Directors (FIoD); Fellow West Africa Insurance Institute, Banjul, Gambia and also a Fellow of the Risk Managers Society of Nigeria (RIMSON). He attained the honour of the Commander Great Ife (CGI); the greatest honour of the renowned University of Ife.
His career development in Insurance started during his undergraduate studies when he ventured into Agricultural Insurance as his choice of specialization. Soon after graduation in 1988, Dr. Ogunbiyi was employed by the National Insurance Corporation Of Nigeria (NICON PLC) where, as the Research & Planning Officer, he worked in various strategic capacities within the Corporation, including the training of Chief Executives of Insurance Companies from sister African countries.
In his entrepreneurial pursuits, he has taken quite some big risks. He gave up an impressive and promising career at NICON to go into Insurance Consultancy– a business hitherto unexplored and without a precedent of success in Nigeria. Dr. Akin Ogunbiyi was the pioneer Chief Executive of Finance & Insurance Expert Limited, a firm of Finance, Insurance, Environmental and Management Consultants as Managing Partner/Chief Executive Officer in 1992.
A resilient business manager, he has continued to create wealth for the Nation through the establishment of many viable and well-managed businesses. He is currently the Group Chairman of Mutual Benefits Group- a Conglomerate with nine subsidiaries and over 5,000 employees, who are gainfully employed in various value-adding sectors of the Nigerian economy.
A philanthropist and God-fearing technocrat, Dr. Akin Ogunbiyi is presently promoting the establishment of a private University under the Arubiewe Educational Foundation. The Foundation has supported over a hundred scholarship awards and sponsorship of students in secondary, tertiary professional education. Of these scholarship awards, there were 10 graduates of the West Africa College of Insurance, Banjul, Gambia; 15 graduates from Chartered Institutes of Insurance and Management, Lagos, Nigeria; a postgraduate study leading to the award of PHD in Architecture from University of Leeds, United Kingdom among others.
He sits on the boards of many companies both in Nigeria and other countries.
§Founded and nurtured Mutual Benefits Assurance Plc, a Nigerian company into an enhanced private-sector initiative with full-fledged affiliate companies in Niger Republic and Liberia.
§Integrated and successfully transformed the coordinate business units into highly profitable business ventures in Insurance, Oil and Gas, Agriculture, Transportation, Real Estate, Banking, Mining and Logistics.
§Pioneered grass-root insurance with its tailor-made offerings as catalyst for revenue gains, growth and expansion in the economies of catchment countries.
Ogunbiyi is the Chief Promoter/Founder/Chairman of Mutual Benefits Group- a conglomerate with many subsidiaries in various real sector of the Nigerian and African economies. The Group’s average annual turnover in Nigeria is N10.2 billion in the past 3 years. He has worked in the Managing Director/CEO capacity for 15 years, Group Managing Director for more than 5 years and is presently the Chairman of the Board.
He was the Chief Promoter/Founding Managing Director and Chief Executive of VTL Insurance Brokers Ltd from January 1993 to September 1995. It was the experience he gathered from here that prompted him to go ahead and found MUTUAL Benefits Assurance Plc.
From January 1992 to December of the same year, he held the position of the Managing Partner/Chief Executive of Finance & Insurance Experts Limited, situated at 4, Kofo Abayomi Street, Apapa, Lagos.
He also worked in National Insurance Corporation of Nigeria (NICON) from 1988 to 1991 and held the positions of the Research and Planning Officer as well as Head of the Economic and Business Development Unit at different times.
As a Research and Planning Officer at NICON, Akin was responsible for Research and development of new products, generated statistics from operational units/departments for management use, visited/inspected area/branch offices for control and monitoring purposes, carried out analysis of government fiscal/monetary policies and implications for the insurance industry and the Corporation and also Liaised with the Federal Office of Statistics, Central Bank of Nigeria and other regulatory authorities for data verification and confirmation.
As Head of Economic & Business Development Unit, he was directly responsible for various special assignments which included collation and preparation of the Corporation’s Annual Budget/Business Plans; organisation of NICON Annual Strategic Management Conference; co-ordination of operational/functional units for effective implementation of strategic management conference decision and policies; preparation of conference/seminar papers for The Chief Executive presentation; provision of technical services to other insurance companies at various growth stages; part of the team that co-ordinated the implementation of the commercialisation of NICON with the Technical Committee on Privatisation and Commercialisation (TCPC); and also part of the team that put together the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC).
As a fresh graduate, he started his career at Askars Insurance Brokers, Ikeja, Lagos where he worked from 1987 to 1988. For his National Youth Service Corps in 1986, Akin served at Promoserve Limited in Surulere, Lagos.
As an astute believer in continuous self-development, Akin has attended many courses and seminars
·Global Executive Leadership Certificate programme, Yale School of Management, USA, 2016.
·The Oxford Advanced Management and Leadership Programme, Said Business School, University of Oxford, October 2011
·Entrepreneurship Program and Operational Strategy and Competition, Lagos Business School (LBS); 1998
·Venture Capital Financing and Management, International Graduate School of Management (IESE), Barcelona, Spain, 1998
·Insurance Management Development Course, Lagos Business School, June 1996
·African Insurance Organisation Conference, Dakar, Senegal, May 1994
·African Insurance Organisation Conference, Harare, Zimbabwe, May 1993
·Insurance Directors and Top Executives Conference, Abuja, July 1992
·1st National Oil Directors Conference, Abuja, June 1992
·National Technical Course Workshop on Research Planning Techniques Organised by the Nigerian Institute of Social & Economic Research (NISER), Ibadan, August 1991.
·National Seminar on the Theme: Insurance Industry and Strategic Planning for the 1990s, September 1990.
·Senior Management Appreciation Course, August 1990
·Supervisory Management Course, May 1990
·Export Finance Exhibition Organised by the Guardian Financial Weekly, April 1990
He is a recipient of many awards like:
•Award of Honour from African Church, 2012.
He is the Chairman of, Mutual Benefits Assurance Plc, Chairman, Reals Pharmaceuticals Ltd., Chairman, Track Africa Limited, Chairman, Arubiewe Farms Limited, Chairman, Arubiewe Educational Foundation, Chairman, Arubiewe Pharmaceutical Limited, Director, TFS Securities & Investment Limited., Director, Asaramatoru Marginal Field.
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