For most, academics, social media, and sports are three distinct aspects of student life. But when former ԱƵ soccer player Uyi Omorogbe ’19 connected organic chemistry, TikTok virality, and soccer, he saw the blueprint for an innovative business model. Omorogbe returned to his alma mater for the October TIA Incubator weekend to reflect on his entrepreneurial journey and inspire student innovators. The Ophsides founder’s interest in entrepreneurship began in his sophomore year at ԱƵ when he stumbled upon his roommate working tirelessly on a startup. Omorogbe was so fascinated by his peer’s grit and determination that he conducted a self-study over the following summer. Once he returned to ԱƵ for his junior year in the fall, the first-generation Nigerian American joined TIA and founded NaSo, a fashion company that donated proceeds to renovate schools in his father’s village.
“I asked the school, I said, ‘Hey, can I go to Nigeria and basically have an experience where I go and find a problem that I wanted to solve?’ And ԱƵ actually funded my trip to Nigeria. ... I met all these kids, right? I was like, ‘They don’t have access to the education that they should have. Like, what if I could use this brand as a vehicle to be able to provide that access?’ And six months later, I did a Kickstarter, we sold over $45,000 worth of product ... and then they were able to build a school before I graduated ԱƵ,” reflected Omorogbe.
Driven by cultural pride and a love for fashion, Omorogbe decided to continue working on NaSo full-time while couch-surfing in New York City. However, like all startups, he faced unprecedented challenges when the pandemic hit in 2020, forcing him to move back home to Albany, and figure out how to advertise NaSo with no budget. This led him to downloading TikTok and out of sheer boredom, began filming comedy content. A skit series starring his African parents quickly went viral and Omorogbe amassed 4 million followers. He recognized this opportunity and had to take it, he said. The entrepreneur leveraged his social media reach into partnerships with major brands such as Nike, ultimately leading to the transition to Ophsides.
“Retrosynthetic systems design [is] an entrepreneurial method of innovation that deconstructs a desired reality into its behavioral primitives, identifies proven reactions using those same primitives in the existing world, and recombines them in a new context to synthesize the desired outcome,” the ԱƵ alum explained.
Omorogbe credited a significant amount of his entrepreneurial success to his organic chemistry professor at ԱƵ, Rick Geier, PhD., Warren ’43 and Lillian Anderson Chair in Chemistry. Omorogbe explained to the TIA Incubator attendees the concept of retrosynthetic design — the idea of working backwards from a target outcome to identify the fundamental components. The goal was to make soccer as popular as basketball or football is currently in the U.S., the human primitives were play, community, status, and identity. He was able to observe how other industries had successfully bonded these concepts together through the popular videogame Fortnite. A free-to-play game that built community as friends strategized together while simultaneously creating an identity with “skins” to signify status. Omorogbe then re-engineered those exact foundations into a game called Play Ophsides. The street sport is a 1v1 game combination of Foursquare and Horse that requires a $10 floor tape and a soccer ball. The idea is that once he establishes status and community, he can begin to sell Ophsides fashion apparel.
“Ophsides is not just like a brand. It’s moreso a mentality to be offsides [as in European football], to be an outsider. And I think being an outsider is actually a strength, because if you’re an outsider, most times you can actually recognize that a system is broken and you usually have the perspective to create a new one,” cited Omorogbe.
Play Ophsides is a community-building game that brings professional athletes and urban communities together to form organic neutral spaces — and it’s just $10. Omorogbe concluded his talk with a challenge to young entrepreneurs in the room: $500 to anyone who could beat him in a game of Play Ophsides. While all attempts at the prize failed, the professional soccer player left students with valuable insight. He encouraged them to maximize what TIA can offer, highlighting how liberal arts coursework, TIA Incubator resources, and real-world experiences can lead to something great.
“The whole point of this presentation is really just to show you guys that I learned this literally from organic chemistry. ... It was literally just taking my ԱƵ education, the resources ԱƵ gave me ... and then putting it into stuff I’m learning here in this room,” concluded the entrepreneur.