Tony Elumelu
Founder, The Tony Elumelu Foundation
Tony O. Elumelu is an African investor and philanthropist, and one of the world’s most prominent voices on Africa’s transformation agenda.
He is the Founder and Chairman of Heirs Holdings, a family owned investment company, which invests in strategic sectors of the African economy, including energy, power, banking, insurance & financial services, technology, real estate and hospitality and healthcare, as part of its commitment to improving lives and transforming Africa.
Tony is the Chair of the United Bank for Africa (UBA) Group, which operates in 20 countries across Africa, as well as the United Kingdom, France, the UAE, and the United States. United Bank for Africa is one of the largest employers in the financial sector on the African continent, with 25,000 employees’ group-wide and serving over 45 million customers globally. UBA provides retail, commercial and institutional banking services, leading financial inclusion and implementing cutting-edge technology.
He also chairs Nigeria’s largest quoted conglomerate, Transcorp Group, whose subsidiaries include Transcorp Power, a leading producer of electricity in West Africa, and Transcorp Hotels Plc, Nigeria’s foremost hospitality brand.
He is the Founder and Chairman of Heirs Energies, Africa’s largest indigenous integrated energy company. Heirs Energies operates OML 17 in the Niger Delta, producing over 50,000 barrels of oil per day and 120 million cubic feet of gas per day, with reserves base of over 1.5 billion barrels of oil and 2.5 trillion cubic feet of gas.
In 2010, Tony created The Tony Elumelu Foundation (TEF), the leading philanthropy empowering a new generation of African entrepreneurs across all 54 African countries. Since inception, the Foundation’s flagship programme has identified and funded over 24,000 young African entrepreneurs and created a digital ecosystem of over 2.5 million Africans, as part of a ten-year US$100m commitment to fund, mentor, and train young Africans.
In 2020, TIME magazine named Tony as one of the 100 Most Influential People in the World.
In 2022, for his contribution to Nigeria’s economic and social development, he was awarded the ‘Commander of the Order of the Federal Republic’. In 2025, he was awarded the Gabonese national honour of ‘Commander in the National Order of Gabonese Merit’. He has also been recognised with Belgium’s oldest and highest royal order.
Tony sits on a number of global boards, including the Global Leadership Council of UNICEF Generation Unlimited and the International Monetary Fund’s Advisory Council on Entrepreneurship and Growth.
