UBA commissions UNILAG innovation hub, business office, reinforces partnership legacy
The United Bank for Africa (UBA), has deepened its longstanding relationship with the academic community and reaffirmed its commitment to innovation, youth empowerment, and nation-building by commissioning its innovation hub and business office at the University of Lagos.
The United Bank for Africa (UBA), has deepened its longstanding relationship with the academic community and reaffirmed its commitment to innovation, youth empowerment, and nation-building by commissioning its innovation hub and business office at the University of Lagos.
Tony Elumelu, the group chairman at UBA, represented by Oliver Alawuba, the group managing director/chief executive officer, supported by other senior executives of the bank and members of the university leadership, led by Folasade Ogunsola, the vice-chancellor of the University of Lagos performed the landmark facility commissioning.
Elumelu, who is an alumnus of the University of Lagos, described the commissioning as both symbolic and strategic.
“Returning to my alma mater for this commissioning makes this moment particularly meaningful. Universities remain the birthplace of ideas, innovation, and future leadership.
“Through this investment, UBA is reaffirming its belief in young people and in the role institutions like the University of Lagos will continue to play in shaping Africa’s future,” he said.
Besides, he emphasised that UBA’s philosophy of empowering people and building institutions remains central to its growth agenda across Africa.
The commissioning marks another defining chapter in the enduring relationship between UBA and one of Nigeria’s foremost institutions of higher learning.
The project also reflects UBA’s historic connection with the University of Lagos and Nigeria’s education ecosystem. UBA was the first bank to establish a campus branch in Nigeria in the 1960s, pioneering financial inclusion and institutional banking support within the nation’s higher education environment.
Ogunsola, in her speech, emphasised that Elumelu remains ‘a son of the university’, and commended UBA for sustaining a relationship built on impact, innovation, and institutional support.
“The group chairman of UBA, Tony Elumelu, one of Africa’s most celebrated entrepreneurs and philanthropists, is, in the truest and most meaningful sense, a son of this university,” Ogunsola said.
In addition, Ogunsola said, “The intellectual rigour, the ambition, and the broadness of vision that he would go on to demonstrate as he transformed a struggling bank into a pan-African institution of global stature, that fire was sharpened here.”
The newly commissioned four-floor complex has been designed as a shared platform that promotes collaboration between academia and industry.
Under the arrangement, UBA will operate its dedicated business office within the facility, providing direct access to innovative banking services, financial advisory services, enterprise support, and engagement opportunities for students, faculty, and the wider university community. The remaining floors of the complex will serve broader institutional and developmental purposes for the university’s use.
Alawuba, in his address, noted that the innovation hub and business office represent an intentional investment in talent, enterprise, and future economic transformation.
“UBA continues to create platforms that connect knowledge with opportunity. This facility will provide students and the university community access to ideas, networks, innovation support, and financial services that help unlock potential and prepare future leaders for a rapidly changing world,” he said.
Meanwhile, the University of Lagos announced the renewal of UBA’s sponsorship and support for the professorial chair in finance, further strengthening collaboration between academia and industry and advancing thought leadership, research, and professional excellence in financial studies.
Alawuba stressed that the UBA professorial chair remains the bank’s most enduring academic contribution.
“Our most enduring academic contribution remains the UBA Professorial Chair of Finance, established in January 1972 as the first-ever Finance Professorial Chair in a Nigerian university.
“It was designed to strengthen finance education, deepen banking research, and support thought leadership in Nigeria’s financial sector. I am pleased that the Executive Management of UBA has approved an additional N61.67 million to further strengthen the Endowment Fund for the Chair and sustain its work through the current professorship tenure,” he noted.
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.
Operating in twenty African countries, the United Kingdom, the United States of America, France and the United Arab Emirates, UBA provides retail, commercial and institutional banking services, leading financial inclusion and implementing cutting-edge technology.
