Sikiru “SK” Alagbada’s love life was a bit messy last year.
The Berkeley grad student starred on Season 3 of Netflix’s popular reality show Love Is Blind, where contestants date sight unseen in separate “pods” and only meet in person after a marriage proposal is accepted. In November, he revealed he was back together with Raven Ross, the woman he previously said “I do not” to at the altar, only to have three other women accuse him of cheating on Ross with them. Alagbada then got involved in “legal proceedings surrounding the allegations” and called it quits again with Ross.
The reality TV star—whose DMs are inundated by interested women—now says he’s sworn off love and isn’t using any dating apps while he attends UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business.
“I’m not in the market,” Alagbada said in a Zoom interview. “I’m single but not looking. Right now, I’m just really focused on graduating and finishing strong.”
Alagbada, whose move to the Bay Area became a major plot point on the show, started business school at Berkeley last year. He originally wanted to be a venture capitalist and interned at the San Francisco-based fund called Necessary Ventures, immersing himself in the startup world. Since then, Alagbada has pivoted his career goals.
“This is such a bad time to be fundraising in VC, and it’s supposed to be like that for the next few years,” he said. “It’s more of a time to build quality companies, as opposed to the last few years where company valuations got out of control.”
Alagbada is now setting his sights on starting a search fund, which looks to raise money to acquire and operate an existing smaller company. He wouldn’t say how much money he’s looking to raise, but search funds typically gather $5-$10 million. Because he previously worked as a data engineer at JP Morgan, Alagbada said he would be a good fit running a software company that services other businesses, such as a payroll or human resources company.
As for life after becoming a reality TV star, Alagbada said he tries as hard as he can to be a normal grad student. He lives in Downtown Oakland, where he frequents a restaurant called Maya Halal Taqueria. He gets recognized often, he said, but it’s not like he’s “super famous.”
“It’s hard not being able to sometimes bum it out and go to your coffee corner in your pajamas, because you never know who you can encounter,” Alagbada said.
Love Is Blind has been one of Netflix’s most popular reality TV shows during the pandemic, but that doesn’t mean it’s always based on truth. Alagbada says he was a “little disappointed” with how he was portrayed in the show.
“The producers are incentivized to pursue a storyline, and they literally have storyboards and arcs,” he said. “I don't think a lot of the audience realizes that it’s a heavily produced and edited reality show.”
For instance, he said, his proposal to Ross was altered in the show to make it seem like Ross was unsure and paced around after he proposed. In reality, Alagbada said, she accepted immediately.
His focus for the future will now focus less on dates and more on dollars to set himself up for life.
“Love Is Blind is just one chapter of my life, and I really want people to get to know me for all the other things I have going on,” Alagbada said. “At the end of the day, I’m super glad I got to tell my story and gave love a chance, because it’s honestly something I would have never thought I would do. I never thought I would be a TV guy.”