Building businesses that combine purpose, performance and lasting impact

Lola Masha is a Partner at Antler, a global early-stage venture capital firm that invests in the world’s most driven founders from inception.

She brings more than 15 years of leadership experience at the intersection of technology, agriculture, mobility and business transformation. Her work has focused on building companies, developing teams, creating scalable operating systems and supporting entrepreneurs across Africa’s emerging markets.

Many capable and driven founders lack access to the practical business knowledge required to build venture-scale companies. Venture capital can also feel inaccessible to entrepreneurs who have had limited exposure to investors or the investment process.

To help close this gap, Lola founded Periscope, a podcast and media platform that demystifies entrepreneurship, business building and investment for African founders. Through conversations with experienced operators, investors and executives, Periscope provides accessible and practical insights into the concepts required to build successful companies.

Lola is also a Co-Founder and Board Member of Babban Gona, one of Africa’s most recognised social enterprises. Babban Gona combines technology, financing, agricultural services and access to markets to improve the productivity and incomes of smallholder farmers. To date, the organisation has improved the lives of more than 500,000 farmers across Northern Nigeria.

Before joining Antler, Lola held senior roles at several influential technology and business organisations.

At Bolt, she led regional growth and operations across key African markets. At OLX, she served as Nigeria Country Manager, Head of Product for Sub-Saharan Africa and Director of Global Trust and Safety. She helped establish OLX as Nigeria’s leading online classifieds platform and developed products and safety systems for markets across the OLX Group.

Earlier, Lola worked at Google, where she led partnerships and business development initiatives across Sub-Saharan Africa and Europe. Her work included launching products in new markets, building strategic partnerships and supporting digital adoption among African businesses.

She began her professional career in strategy and consulting, including roles at McKinsey & Company and Bank PHB.

An engineer by training, Lola holds a Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, where she also completed a Management of Technology certification at the Haas School of Business. She holds a B.Sc. in Chemical Engineering with high distinction from the University of Virginia.

Across her career, Lola has remained committed to building ventures that combine purpose with performance. She continues to invest in, mentor and support entrepreneurs developing solutions to some of Africa’s most important challenges.