The CANs Park has opened applications for the first cohort of cyPHER, a nine-month programme aimed at equipping women-led micro businesses in Abuja with digital skills, financial management knowledge and support to formalise their operations.

The programme, supported by the German development agency, GIZ, will select 40 women entrepreneurs aged between 18 and 35 operating businesses in beauty and cosmetics, catering, consumer products and fashion within the Abuja Municipal Area Council, AMAC, and Lugbe.

Participation in the programme is free.

Participants will receive digital skills training, one-on-one business and financial advisory, free Corporate Affairs Commission, CAC, registration, access to digital business tools, implementation support and membership of a business community network.

Speaking on the initiative, Project Manager of cyPHER, Ashley Best, said the programme was introduced to address some of the challenges preventing women-led micro businesses from growing and becoming more competitive.

Best said the initiative would help beneficiaries understand and adopt digital tools that could improve their operations, financial practices and access to markets.

She said: “The main goal of cyPHER is to help women-led micro SMEs decode and adopt digital tools to improve their operations, financial practices and market access.

“Women represent a significant share of Nigerian SMEs but often struggle to scale due to limited digital adoption, financial constraints and inadequate business support.”

The CANs Park on Thursday hosted a virtual soft launch of the programme with the theme, “Digitizing Growth: Empowering Women-Led SMEs in Abuja’s Trade Sector.”

According to Best, the initiative is structured to go beyond conventional training by providing entrepreneurs with practical support to implement the knowledge and tools acquired during the programme.

She said selected participants would also benefit from tailored business and financial advisory, legal and compliance support and post-training guidance.

Digital business platform, Bumpa, is expected to provide tools that would enable beneficiaries to improve online sales, inventory management, financial tracking and other aspects of their daily operations.

Explaining the decision to include CAC registration as part of the programme, Best said many micro businesses were unable to formalise their operations because of financial and administrative barriers.

“Free CAC registration removes a financial and administrative barrier that prevents many micro businesses from becoming formal enterprises,” she said.

“Registration improves credibility and gives businesses better access to financing, partnerships, corporate opportunities and wider markets.”

Best said cyPHER was developed from lessons learnt from previous programmes implemented by The CANs Park.

She disclosed that Women CAN trained 34 entrepreneurs, while FEM-Money trained 41 entrepreneurs, adding that cyPHER would adopt a more comprehensive approach.

“cyPHER builds on that experience through a longer, more structured programme that combines training with tailored advisory, digital-tool adoption, CAC registration, implementation support and a lasting business community,” she said.

She explained that AMAC and Lugbe were selected for the first cohort because of the presence of a large number of women-led businesses in the trade sector.

According to her, concentrating the first cohort in the two locations would also facilitate peer learning, hands-on support and effective measurement of the programme’s impact.

The organisers said the programme is expected to help participating entrepreneurs strengthen their businesses, improve their use of technology and build more formal and sustainable enterprises.