Communiqué 80: Fusion Intelligence’s bet on urban community cinemas

With ticket prices up 300% in a decade and box office revenue down to $7 million, Fusion Intelligence is betting on community cinema to turn things around.

Key Points

1. Target affordability gaps in established markets: When traditional pricing models exclude large segments of the population. Creative entrepreneurs can create accessible alternatives that serve underserved audiences, rather than focusing solely on premium segments.

2. Build Full-Stack Creative Ecosystems: Rather than single-point solutions, Fusion built an integrated stack—content delivery, ticketing, reporting, and venue operations. Creative startups should adopt this approach to unlock multiple revenue streams and increase user retention.

3. Leverage Policy Shifts and Local Partnerships: Fusion benefited from licensing waivers and partnered with co-working spaces and distributors. Creative entrepreneurs should monitor policy changes and collaborate with existing networks to scale quickly and reduce setup costs.

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1. The community cinema detour

In August, Red Circle, the film debut of maverick director Nora Awolowo, will begin screening at four Café One co-working locations across the country, including Owerri, Kaduna, Uyo, and Enugu.

Red Circle debuted in June to rave reviews and a ₦25 million opening weekend gross. By the third week, it had crossed the ₦100 million mark. Previously, for most Nigerian films, an impressive cinema run like that would typically be followed by a streaming deal months later. But before that, Red Circle is taking a detour: a community cinema run powered by Fusion Intelligence, a Lagos-based technology solutions provider for the hospitality industry.

Fusion Intelligence launched FilmHub, its flagship community cinema initiative, earlier this month with a screening of Omoni Oboli’s Wives On Strike 3. FilmHub offers the features of a traditional community cinema, including low-cost projection technology, locally adapted programming, and grassroots partnerships, to provide a more inclusive alternative to the normal cinema multiplex model.

But rather than targeting only rural or hard-to-reach communities, which has long been the default purpose and strategy for community cinema, Fusion Intelligence is betting that the model can also thrive in Nigeria’s bustling urban centres, where large populations exist outside the reach or affordability of conventional cinema.

2. From Filmhouse to Fusion Intelligence

The primary reason for Nigeria’s underwhelming box office performance in the international market is affordability. In 2019, total box office revenue reached a record 6.9 billion naira, equivalent to $17.7 million at the time. Five years later, that figure had nearly doubled in naira terms, reaching 11.4 billion naira in 2024; however, due to steep currency devaluation, that amounted to just $7 million. For context, the Superman movie released earlier this month grossed $125 million in its opening weekend.

This currency mismatch placed cinema operators in a bind: most of their major expenses, including licensing, software, and equipment, are priced in dollars. Global-standard cinema management software, such as Vista Cloud, could cost as much as $80,000 annually. To survive, cinemas passed these costs on to their audiences. Over the last decade, the average cinema ticket price in Nigeria surged by more than 300%, from 1,080 naira to 4,380 naira, effectively pricing out the majority of Nigerians.

Kolade Adewoye, founder of Fusion Intelligence, first became aware of this problem in 2019, during his compulsory national service, when he worked at Filmhouse Cinemas as a business intelligence analyst. “I felt we could have a low-cost alternative for Nigerian cinemas. Maybe within three months, we could have a prototype,” Adewoye told Communiqué. But he would not start building a solution until a few years later.

Following his stint at Film House, Adewoye joined Step Inclusive, a startup that builds payment software for the Lagos State transport sector. When that startup failed, he took what was left of the technical team to start Fusion Intelligence. Fusion Intelligence’s first iteration was as a web development agency, building websites and mobile apps for companies such as Sterling Bank and ABC Transport.