Nigeria-based energy distribution and collection fintech startup Infibranches Technologies has secured US$2 million in a funding round raised from All On, Nairametrics reported. All On is the impact investment arm of oil and gas multinational Shell. The funding will be used to accelerate customer acquisition in current markets, improve existing products, and launch new products and services in the energy distribution sector, Infibranches CEO Olusola Owoyemi, said in the statement. Further, funding will also support inventory and agent acquisition, and product and technology development. It will also finance working capital for the distribution of Solar Home Systems for both household…

Egypt-focused B2B2C payments platform dopay has secured US$18 million in a Series A funding round, the company announced in a statement last week. The company is based out of London and currently caters to its initial market Egypt. Force Over Mass Capital, FMO and NN Group led the round. Meanwhile, participating investors included Mbuyu Capital and Alder Tree Investments. Funding will be used to scale in Egypt, and also build a suite of financial services to top the company’s currently available cashless payroll and prepaid employee cards. The company also has plans to expand across the MENA region. The company’s…

Global cross-border payments company Thunes has announced a partnership with M-Pesa Tanzania to launch a new service corridor, a statement from the company said. The service will allow users of M-Pesa Tanzania to transfer money directly from M-Pesa mobile wallets to bank accounts in Kenya and Rwanda. The two companies have been collaborating since 2018, the statement said. Thunes’ cross-border payments network allows M-Pesa Tanzania users to access remittances to most major e-wallets in East Africa. Currently, Thunes has over 50 intra-Africa corridors in place, providing payments access to over 200 million Africa-based mobile wallets. In July this year, the…

In last week’s MEA fintech news, we saw US-Israeli fintech startup Melio raise a quarter billion dollars at a hefty valuation, while another US-Israeli fintech company Pagaya announced its SPAC listing. Elsewhere, Nigeria emerged the top funded fintech hub in Africa for 2020, while the Central Bank of Bahrain upped the stakes with its Open Banking Framework. Melio is now a US$4 billion payments giant In the biggest MEA fintech news of last week, US-Israeli payments fintech Melio bumped up its valuation 3x within the year with its latest fundraise (Fintech News Middle East). The company raised US$250 million in…

Kashat, an Egyptian micro loan solutions provider, has raised US$1.75 million in a new bridge funding round, Magnitt reported. The round was led by pan-African VC fund Launch Africa Ventures, and had “key” regional investors participate, the report said. This included existing backers of the company Cairo Angels. The fresh funds will be used to develop Kashat’s platform and expand operations. Earlier this year, Kashat raised an undisclosed amount of funding from Cairo Angels, two months after it launched its mobile app for short term loans in February. Kashat has built a mobile platform for micro lending Kashat is a…

Funding rounds made a splash in Africa fintech news last week. African fintech startups Wave, Pezesha and Prospa all raised funding, along with a mega round by Egyptian startup MNT-Halan. The funding news came amidst a new report highlighting that African fintech companies have raised over US$1 billion in investor dollars since the start of the year. Elsewhere, Flutterwave made the headlines twice with some pretty big announcements, asserting its dominance in Africa’s fintech ecosystem. Africa funding boom 2021 African fintech companies have raised US$1.44 billion since January this year, higher than the overall amount they raised over the past…

SME banking fintech Prospa has raised US$3.8 million in the largest pre-seed round to have been raised by a Nigerian fintech startup, according to an announcement by the company. The pre-seed round is the largest of its kind in Nigeria and sub-Saharan Africa, TechCrunch reported. Across the African continent, it is second only to Egyptian fintech startup Telda’s US$5 million pre-seed round raised in May this year. The round was oversubscribed by 380%, and was raised from Global Founders Capital and Liquid 2 Ventures. Numerous angel investors also participated. They included Mercury’s Immad Akhund, Ramp’s Karim Atiyeh, Teachable’s Ankur Nagpal,…

Egyptian financial and logistics super app MNT-Halan has secured US$120 million from private equity and venture capital investors, the company announced in a statement today. The funding was raised from Apis Growth Fund II by Apis Partners, Development Partners International, through its African Development Partner III fund, and Lorax Capital Partners’ Lorax Fund II. They were joined by Middle East Venture Partners, Endeavor Catalyst, and DisruptTech. This is Apis Partners’ maiden investment in Egypt. The funding will help the company enhance its technology and product development, scale its business, and expand beyond Egypt. The MNT-Halan super app provides a host…

Kenyan fintech startup Pezesha has secured a seven-figure seed extension round led by GreenHouse Capital (GHC). The round also included GHC’s sister company Venture Garden Group, which provided “on-lending liquidity support,” the company said. The funding will be used to help the lending infrastructure startup in expanding its presence across Africa. The extension round tops up previous investments by Seedstars last year, and Consonance in 2018 (according to Crunchbase). Pezesha also raised an undisclosed seed round from Kuramo Capital in 2018. Pezesha is a 2016-founded startup that enables non-traditional finance institutions to provide working capital to SMEs through the company’s…

U.S. and Senegal-based mobile money provider Wave has raised a substantial US$200 million in a Series A fundraise, TechCrunch reported. This makes the company the first unicorn for the Francophone Africa region, with the Series A being the largest ever to come out of the region. It values Wave at US$1.7 billion. The round was led by global investment giants Sequoia Heritage (private investment fund and Sequoia subsidiary), Founders Fund, Stripe and Ribbit Capital. Participating investors include existing seed backer of the company Partech Africa, and former Y Combinator CEO and current CEO of OpenAI Sam Altman. Both Founders Fund…

In last week’s Africa fintech news, Australian BNPL firm Zip broadened its global expansion plans with the acquisition of South African BNPL startup Payflex. Zip already owned 25% of Payflex from a deal six months ago (TechCrunch). Zip snapped up the 2018-founded fintech startup for an undisclosed amount, adding it to a list of acquisitions the company has made this year so far. This includes the UAE’s Spotii, QuadPay in the US, and Twisto from the Czech Republic. The acquisition spree this year tops up what Zip managing director and CEO Larry Diamond said was a “truly transformational” 2020 for…

London-based payments company pawaPay, which focuses on the Africa market, has raised US$9 million in a seed round, according to an announcement. China’s MSA Capital and UK-based 88mph led the round. Participating investors included Vunani Capital, Kepple Ventures and Zagadat Capital. Funding will be used to expand pawaPay’s operational presence and market reach across Africa, while boosting hiring efforts. The 2020-founded company provides a unified API that interfaces between different, fragmented mobile money infrastructures of African telecoms. The API allows merchants to access these mobile money systems in one place, sending and receiving payments to large numbers of people. pawaPay…

In the biggest headline of Africa fintech news last week, Nigerian mobile payments platform OPay raised a staggering US$400 million towards expansion. A number of illustrious global investors were involved in a round that gave Africa its fifth unicorn. The week boded well for Islamic banking as well, with two companies moving ahead with their plans for the continent. The week also marked a high point for acceleration initiatives, both by local companies and international players. In other news, governments of several African states take steps to bolster their collaboration with fintechs across the continent. OPay’s super-sized fundraise OPay’s US$400…

Ethiopian challenger bank Hijra Bank has has awarded a core banking deal to Islamic banking provider Path Solutions, according to a recent announcement. The announcement comes after a “highly competitive bidding and selection process,” the statement said. The partnership involves the implementation of Path Solutions’ core banking platform, which is certified by the Accounting and Auditing Organisation for Islamic Financial Institutions (AAOIFI). Through the partnership, Hijra Bank will gain access to a “flexible, scalable and highly customisable core banking platform” for individual and corporate customers in Ethiopia, according to Path Solutions Group Chairman and CEO Mohammed Kateeb. Hijra Bank to launch…

Nigerian mobile payments platform OPay has raised US$400 million in funding from SoftBank, Bloomberg reported. The investment was made from SoftBank’s US$40 billion investment vehicle Vision Fund 2. Existing backers of the company Sequoia Capital China, Chinese superapp Meituan’s VC arm DragonBall Capital, Source Code Capital, and Redpoint China, pitched in for the round. SoftBank Ventures Asia and 3W Capital also participated. The 2018-founded Nigerian fintech is looking to expand its footprint across Africa and the Middle East, the report said. “We believe our investment will help the company extend its offering to adjacent markets and replicate its successful business…

GreenHouse Lab has inducted eight African fintech companies into the 2021 GHL Fintech Accelerator program. GreenHouse Lab (GHL) is the Fintech accelerator by African fintech investment fund and platform GreenHouse Capital’s (GHC) The six-week program is already underway, with corporate partners such as Amazon Web Services, Google for Startups, and InsiderPR holding sessions. The startups come from a number of fintech sectors, including fintech infrastructure, personal wealth management, cross-border remittances, and diaspora services. The statement noted that about 40% of startups backed by GHC have gone on to be accepted into international accelerators such as 500 Startups, Y Combinator, and…

Last week was a big one for Africa fintech news, especially in Nigeria. The country’s fintech sector made it to the headlines, not once but twice. And both times were pretty scandalous. Meanwhile, the wider Africa fintech ecosystem also saw some early stage funding dollars come through. A global startup roadshow also concluded its second leg of its Africa edition, adding three more winners to its first edition. Here’s your weekly round up of Africa fintech news Four Nigerian fintechs are in the CBN’s cross hairs Perhaps the biggest headline for last week emerged when Nigeria’s Central Bank froze the…

After its first stop of The Search – Africa, the global startup roadshow by the Abu Dhabi Global Market (ADGM) moved across the UK and Central Europe, before returning for its second leg in Africa. This second edition featured six new African fintech startups competing for a spot in the Fintech100. The Fintech100 will be featured at the upcoming Fintech Abu Dhabi festival in November this year. Startups at The Search – Africa Stop 2 included Ewarren, a mobile payment and e-wallet solution, investing app Franc, and digital banking platform Kwara. It also featured Mipango, an advisory personal finance app,…

Nigeria-based CapitalSage Technology has raised NGN 2.2 billion, or U$4 million, in debt funding, the company announced. The financing was raised in a Series 1 Private Company issuance with a 365-day tenor, under the company’s NGN 10 billion programme. It is aimed at supporting CapitalSage Technology’s growth across Nigeria and the rest of Africa. The company has received commitments from fund managers and institutional investors, it said. United Capital Plc acted as the Sole Adviser and Arranger for the deal. The company also recently received a short term A3 rating and long term BBB rating with a stable outlook received…

Payments fintech dopay has secured a banking agent licence from Bank ABC Egypt for a virtual banking platform, a statement from the company said. The collaboration will allow dopay to offer its B2B payment and banking platform for SMEs and corporates in Egypt. The platform will allow businesses to open instant accounts for employees, contractors and beneficiaries, and make payments in real time. Each account comes with a debit card, and payments are processed on weekends and holidays. dopay’s cloud payroll service lets employers remit salaries electronically to unbanked staff through a dopay account. Founded in 2014, dopay is an…