High above the bustling city of Nairobi, the African fintech giant, Flutterwave, finds itself entangled in a fierce legal struggle. The Kenyan Assets Recovery Agency (ARA) had cast its net over the fintech behemoth, aiming to seize its fortunes on grounds of money laundering and fraud. Like a thunderstorm on the horizon, this legal onslaught sent tremors through the financial landscape.
It all began in August of the previous year, when the ARA seized a staggering $3 million, believed to be associated with illicit activities, from Flutterwave, Hupesi Solutions, and Adguru Technology Limited. This move came just two months after an even larger sum of $52.5 million, including assets belonging to Flutterwave and six other companies, had been frozen. Legal challenges followed each seizure, with the first case being formally withdrawn in March of this year.
CEO Olugbenga Agboola
Recently, the ARA made an audacious attempt to withdraw its second case against Flutterwave, but the Kenyan High Court, standing tall and steadfast, thwarted their intentions. Judge Nixon Sifuna, demanded transparency and valid reasons for the withdrawal, dismissing the ARA’s vague request. He insisted on an affidavit sworn by the agency’s CEO or a high-ranking officer before any further proceedings could be considered.
Flutterwave, once a shining star in the African financial tech realm, has now been cloaked in shadows of uncertainty. This prolonged legal battle threatens to delay the company’s aspirations of acquiring a license to operate in Kenya, leaving investors and users alike nervously anticipating the outcome.
In the courtroom, a torrent of evidence cascaded forth, with the ARA presenting affidavits, bank statements, and other documents, all pointing fingers at Flutterwave’s alleged misdeeds. The agency contended that the fintech company’s bank accounts were conduits for nefarious money laundering activities disguised as merchant services. Yet, Flutterwave vehemently contested these claims, asserting that they were baseless and unsubstantiated.
The saga of Flutterwave dates back to its founding in 2016 by the visionary trio of Iyinoluwa Aboyeji, Olugbenga “GB” Agboola (CEO), and Adeleke Adekoya. The startup was conceived with the noble mission of facilitating seamless cross-border payments across Africa, bridging gaps and empowering businesses and individuals to thrive. Over time, Flutterwave spread its wings to include other innovative ventures — a remittance service enabling swift money transfers to and from the continent, the Flutterwave Store, an e-commerce platform akin to Shopify, and Tuition, a revolutionary education payments platform.
Like a phoenix rising from the ashes, Flutterwave soared to new heights last year, securing a staggering $350 million in funding at a breathtaking valuation of $3 billion. Such financial prowess cemented its position as one of Africa’s most valuable startups. However, amidst its ascent, the company was not impervious to adversity.
Controversy and hardship loomed over Flutterwave’s flight, with allegations of harassment, funds misappropriation, and mismanagement casting shadows on its once bright image. As the storm raged on, the company’s leaders struggled to navigate treacherous waters and restore their reputation.
In the Kenyan courtroom, the ARA’s case against Flutterwave was just one piece of a larger puzzle. With eyes cast far and wide, the agency targeted a total of seven companies, believing them to be complicit in the alleged money laundering web. Their actions culminated in the freezing of an astonishing Sh7 billion held in 56 bank accounts.
Among the companies ensnared in the ARA’s pursuit of justice were Boxtrip Travel and Tours Limited, Bagtrip Travel Limited, Elivalat Fintech Limited, Adguru Technology Limited, Hupesi Solutions, Cruz Ride Auto Limited, and one Simon Ngige. Each entity stood accused, and their financial affairs were painstakingly laid bare before the court’s discerning gaze.
The intricate web of transactions and purported money laundering activities captured the attention of the court, leading to orders to freeze vast sums in various currencies, including USD, British Pound Sterling, EURO, and Kenya Shillings. The ARA argued that Flutterwave’s accounts, among others, served as vessels for concealing the true nature and origins of the funds, cleverly masking their trail. The agency pointed to suspicious deposits and lack of evidence to validate legitimate retail transactions, further fueling their case.
Yet, amidst this tempest of legal battles and accusations, Flutterwave’s leaders stood firm, maintaining their innocence and pledging to cooperate fully with the investigations. Their vision of fostering a robust and inclusive financial ecosystem for Africa remained unwavering, as they braced themselves against the headwinds.
As the story unfolds, the fate of Flutterwave remains uncertain. Will the fintech giant be able to weather the storm and soar to even greater heights, or will it find itself cast adrift in the turbulent seas of litigation? Only time will tell, as the courts continue their deliberations and the winds of justice blow in all directions.
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based lawyer, who has several years of experience working in Africa’s burgeoning tech startup industry. He has closed multi-million dollar deals bordering on venture capital, private equity, intellectual property (trademark, patent or design, etc.), mergers and acquisitions, in countries such as in the Delaware, New York, UK, Singapore, British Virgin Islands, South Africa, Nigeria etc. He’s also a corporate governance and cross-border data privacy and tax expert. As an award-winning writer and researcher, he is passionate about telling the African startup story, and is one of the continent’s pioneers in this regard
Embattled Africa’s leading payments corporation, Flutterwave, which is valued at more than US$3-billion, has announced the appointment of Mansi Babyloni as chief people and culture officer at Flutterwave.
Flutterwave, Africa’s top provider of payment infrastructure for global merchants and payment service providers across the continent, offers payment technology and infrastructure that allows banks and global merchants to accept and process payments on Web, mobile, ATM and point of sale. Flutterwave serves customers worldwide.
Flutterwave’s CEO Olugbenga Agboola
Since its inception in 2016, Flutterwave has processed more than 200 million transactions worth over $16-billion across 34 African countries.
Flutterwave enables businesses across the world to expand their operations in Africa and other emerging markets through a platform that enables cross-border transactions via one API.
Mansi, who boasts 12 years of experience leading companies, transforming HR and finance functions across industries such as manufacturing, consumer products and fintech, was formally appointed as Flutterwave’s global head of people strategy and special projects in 2020, where she led the team to achieve major improvements in customer experience and helped reimagine experiences for end users.
The fintech giant has now promoted Babyloni to the role of chief people and culture officer, in which she will be responsible for identifying, developing and retaining top talent by transforming the “human” in human resources, and focusing on the culture and process to drive growth for the organisation.
“We are thrilled to have Mansi join Flutterwave. The graduate trainee programme is a key part of our continued efforts to support young talent and help them kick-start their careers. Over the years, we’ve been thinking about developing a programme that serves as a pipeline for talent from the university to the workforce. We’re happy that Mansi and the entire people and culture team at Flutterwave have made this a reality. Because of this project, 200 people will have an opportunity to break into their careers and get started on the path towards achieving their dreams. We’re elated that Mansi is back and pushing impactful projects in her first month with us,” says Olugbenga Agboola, founder and CEO of Flutterwave
Assuming her new position, Babyloni has, in collaboration with the Flutterwave team, launched a programme titled: “The Flutterwave Graduate Trainee Programme”. The programme aims to support young talent in Nigeria, who will in turn support Flutterwave’s growing need for talent while also equipping young graduates across the continent for a career in tech.
The graduate trainee programme witnessed a huge turnout of young tech enthusiasts, recording over 11 000 applications across the country.
“I am very excited to rejoin the Flutterwave team. I believe the potential for growth and value creation is tremendous given the smart and passionate people, strong technology and worldwide footprint. I look forward to partnering with the team,” says Babyloni.
Flutterwave continues to lead the fintech industry in Nigeria and across Africa with innovative solutions to everyday challenges
Kelechi Deca
Kelechi Deca has over two decades of media experience, he has traveled to over 77 countries reporting on multilateral development institutions, international business, trade, travels, culture, and diplomacy. He is also a petrol head with in-depth knowledge of automobiles and the auto industry
Pan African payments technology company, Flutterwave, has announced the appointment of Oneal Bhambani as its new chief financial officer.
He joins the company from American Express and Kabbage, where he managed fintech businesses operating at scale and helped lead the sale of Kabbage and its integration within American Express’ Global Commercial Services segment.
Flutterwave’s CEO Olugbenga Agboola
Having recently completed its $250 million in Series D funding, valuing the company at over $3 billion, Flutterwave is going through a period of rapid growth.
As its new CFO, Oneal will serve a key function in enabling the company’s expansion with best-in-class discipline, operational controls, and financial rigour.
At Kabbage, Oneal was responsible for all of the company’s financial operations and functions including IPO-ready financial and operational controls.
Following the American Express acquisition in April 2022, he was the CFO and Head of Capital Markets of Kabbage’s business unit, which provides credit, banking, and payments solutions to American Express’ commercial customers.
Before and after the acquisition, Oneal was a key stakeholder in capital allocation and led critical strategic initiatives for the business.
Earlier in his career, Oneal was a growth-stage investor at The TCW Group (an investment firm owned by The Carlyle Group), and Riverwood Capital. He began his career in investment banking at UBS.
This period of growth has enabled Flutterwave to further add to its Global Finance team, bringing in executives with a strong track record in controllership, treasury, and tax. The company hired Rebecca Mendel, former Kabbage Controller, and Daniel Eidson, former Kabbage Head of Treasury and Tax. Both Mendel and Eidson will now report directly to Oneal.
“I am excited to welcome Oneal to Flutterwave. His track record of operating finance to enable scale and innovation with listed company standard financial controls will help us accelerate our growth as we continue to meet the needs of our expanding global customer base,” says Olugbenga ‘GB’ Agboola, Founder and CEO of Flutterwave.
“I am looking forward to partnering with Flutterwave’s team to enable solutions for our customers in Africa and across the globe. I fully expect to apply best-in-class strategies learned from my tenures at American Express and Kabbage,” said Bhambani, commenting on his new appointment.
Kelechi Deca
Kelechi Deca has over two decades of media experience, he has traveled to over 77 countries reporting on multilateral development institutions, international business, trade, travels, culture, and diplomacy. He is also a petrol head with in-depth knowledge of automobiles and the auto industry
One of Africa’s leading tech companies and fintech unicorn, Flutterwave has started a process of rebranding that will enable it emerge as a full technology company instead of just a payments platform. This was made known at the unveiling of a significant re-brand and identity at Flutterwave 3.0.
This development followed the announcement of a $250 million Series D funding recently, Flutterwave is now rolling out its new and reimagined identity, to affirm its commitment to creating endless possibilities for all, through technology, as well as introducing new products and services that take the technology leader beyond payments.
Flutterwave’s CEO Olugbenga Agboola
During the Flutterwave 3.0 event, streamed across Youtube, the brand launched a series of products, including;
A Fintech as a Service (FaaS) solution which helps startups of all sizes quickly become Fintech companies using Flutterwave’s pre-built API and solutions.
Capital, a technology platform for businesses & consumers to access Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) & Merchant lending from regulated and certified credit providers.
Grow, a B2B product that helps entrepreneurs easily incorporate their businesses globally.
Checkout, a new checkout experience that is 5x faster, reducing drop-off by 60%.
Card issuing, technology platform to enable businesses to issue both Mastercard virtual and physical debit/prepaid cards to their customers in partnership with Mastercard. These solutions remain subject to regulatory approval.
Additional improvements to existing products include; a new powerful dashboard, Barter v4, and an AI-powered compliance process. The Flutterwave visual rebrand comes with 6 new primary colours which depict creativity, motivation, passion, ease, robustness and eagerness.
Flutterwave launched in 2016, initially building innovative financial infrastructure to enable payments for banks and institutions, before expanding into checkouts and gateways for businesses of all sizes. Having invested in and built out a suite of products and services targeted at both consumers and businesses, Flutterwave has gone on to serve over 900,000 merchants, process over 200 million transactions worth over $16 billion to date, across 34 countries in Africa, which has led to the company becoming one of Africa’s earliest unicorns in March 2021.
Friday’s event saw Flutterwave affirm its commitment to explore more areas of growth for businesses, startups and individuals. The move comes after a significant diversification of products in 2021, whereby the company announced the acquisition of Disha, a creator platform where creatives can receive money from across the world for their craft. In the same year, Flutterwave went on to introduce Market, an extension of its e-commerce solution, Store to improve visibility and by extension, revenue for small businesses. Alongside global Afrobeats superstar Wizkid, in December Flutterwave launched a remittance solution, Send, to help anyone in the world send and receive money.
“We’re growing and for us, payments have become a means to an end.” Founder and CEO, Olugbenga GB Agboola, said, “Every part of our lives includes some form of transaction. Beyond powering those transactions, we want to also create those transactions. We want to help event organizers seamlessly register and sell out their events, we want to help artists receive money for their craft, we want to help entrepreneurs incorporate their businesses, we want to help startups build financial technology products easily and we want to create endless possibilities for all through technology. Our new identity is a system that recognises how far we’ve come in our mission. It gives us space to include all of our dreams and aspirations for businesses and customers
It gives us the freedom to do and be more. We’re excited for this new chapter in our growth.”
Head of Branding and Storytelling, Yewande Akomolafe-Kalu said, “We always wanted to simplify payments for endless possibilities for our customers. Over time, we’ve come to see that the story of our impact goes well beyond payments. We understand how important it is to embrace the full story of our journey and make it a part of our identity. We’re excited to create endless possibilities through technology.”
VP of Design, Flutterwave, Ted Oladele said, “During our first ever rebrand meeting, we asked ourselves; how much does our brand communicate who we are? We discovered we were confining ourselves to a single story of our brand when we were much bigger than that. This new brand is freedom. It enables us to create solutions that help people, whether payments or not. It recognises our growth and actively asks us to do more.”
This rebrand showcases Flutterwave as a technology company enabling growth and creating endless possibilities for all.
Kelechi Deca
Kelechi Deca has over two decades of media experience, he has traveled to over 77 countries reporting on multilateral development institutions, international business, trade, travels, culture, and diplomacy. He is also a petrol head with in-depth knowledge of automobiles and the auto industry
The Future Africa fund which was launched in 2020 has invested US$4.3 million into 43 companies in 2021, taking its total assets under management (AUM) to US$30 million. The Fund was established by Iyinoluwa Aboyeji, the co-founder of Andela and Flutterwave alongside Olabinjo Adeniran and Adenike Sheriff.
The Fund initially planned to build an online community to facilitate conversations about Africa’s future, but the team soon realised more was necessary, and started a process of evolution. The key plank of this is the Future Africa fund, which was opened to co-investors in April 2020.
Iyinoluwa Aboyeji, the co-founder of Andela and Flutterwave
That community of angel investors – the Future Africa Collective – has grown to 257 members as of the close of 2021, with the fund investing US$4.3 million into 43 companies last year. They were active across a broad range of industries, from education to healthcare to media, though more than half of the investments were in the financial services space.
The fund’s portfolio is now 75-strong, with key 2021 investments including Stitch, Lami, mDaas Global, Payhippo, MarketForce, Edves and Kwara. AUM hit US$30 million, up from US$600,000 in 2017. Its portfolio companies raised over US$290 million in follow-on funding in 2021.
“In furtherance of our pan-African drive, we expanded our geographical reach and made our investment debuts in Ghana, South Africa, Tanzania and Zambia in 2021. Through these investments, Future Africa’s presence is now in six African countries, including Nigeria and Kenya,” Aboyeji said.
“At the start of 2021, we committed to ensuring that at least US$1 million of our capital would go to female innovators. We delivered on this, investing over US$2 million in companies with female founders. In total, we have 152 founders in our network, and one in three of our portfolio companies have a female co-founder, including Lami, Kwara, and Knabu, led by female CEOs.”
He said Future Africa was gearing up for an “even more phenomenal 2022” after a “transformative” 2021.
“By all indicators, 2022 is the year of scaling impact by continuing to identify, fund and support founders that are doing the hard things and providing solutions to Africa’s most difficult problems and, as a result, shaping the continent’s future,” said Aboyeji.
Kelechi Deca
Kelechi Deca has over two decades of media experience, he has traveled to over 77 countries reporting on multilateral development institutions, international business, trade, travels, culture, and diplomacy. He is also a petrol head with in-depth knowledge of automobiles and the auto industry
Africa’s leading e-payment platform Flutterwave has partnered with Amole to facilitate money transfers into Ethiopia. Through this agreement, Amole Wallet users will be able to send money to bank accounts and cash pickup locations at over 2,500 locations across the country. This news comes at a time when many remittance services in Ethiopia today are seen as too expensive, with manual paperwork and delays making it challenging and time-consuming. The partnership is expected to solve these problems by providing instant delivery of funds to the receiver at no fee, with more control of where and how to send money, including transparency from a regulatory standpoint.
Flutterwave’s CEO Olugbenga Agboola
Speaking on the partnership, Flutterwave Founder & CEO, Olugbenga ‘GB’ Agboola says, “we are delighted to be collaborating with Amole to enable digital remittances and cash pickup into Ethiopia. This is another significant milestone for payments in Africa as we work together to bridge the financial inclusion gap in the country and across the continent.”
“Our collaboration will ensure that Ethiopian businesses are getting paid from all over the world, opening massive opportunities for business growth, a goal we are passionate about. This is just the beginning, and we hope to deepen the discussions around our partnership to the benefits of Africans, everywhere.”
To make payment via this new service, a sender outside Ethiopia inputs the details of the receiver in Ethiopia, the payment destination (Amole digital wallet, bank account, or cash pickup location anywhere in Ethiopia), and the security question and answer with which the receiver can access the funds if the preferred payment destination is via an Amole authorized agent.
Kelechi Deca
Kelechi Deca has over two decades of media experience, he has traveled to over 77 countries reporting on multilateral development institutions, international business, trade, travels, culture, and diplomacy. He is also a petrol head with in-depth knowledge of automobiles and the auto industry
Iyinoluwa Aboyeji had no interests in technology and had no interests in business. Where he lived, near Simcoe St, Oshawa around the University of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, he had just one focus: to complete his legal studies and take up a job with the United Nations or become a career politician. But then, a stranger was in his way, baggage in hand, staring at him on a heavy afternoon. The stranger had just made it to Ontario, and was looking for where to stay, at least for a night. At first, Aboyeji thought this must be a joke: the stranger had long hair and was white. However, what followed was Pierre Arys ending up staying up to a year, before heading towards Silicon Valley for his cooperative education term. And what remained was an upturned man.
Co-founder of Andela and Flutterwave, Iyinoluwa Aboyeji
“He told me about this amazing world of Silicon Valley, tech and investments, and I was sold,” Aboyeji said, in a recent interview with Forbes.
Last week, after so many years of meeting Pierre Arys, Aboyeji turned in a Unicorn — not some rare, venerated white horse, but a continental payments Behemoth now valued at more than $1bn.
To be specific, according to news sources, Flutterwave, a payments company Aboyeji co-founded towards the tail end of 2016 (precisely December 1, 2016 in Nigeria), has raised a record-shattering $170m, putting it at a valuation of more than $1bn and by industry standards, a Unicorn.
It’s been a five-year journey for Flutterwave. Source: afrikanheroes.com
While Flutterwave’s feat continues to make waves across Africa and beyond, we look at the lessons to be gleaned from the startup’s successful journey to a billion dollar company.
Solving A Continent-wide Problem In A Record Time
Flutterwave’s co-founders understood that although they were not the first in the industry they were about to confront, they needed to bring a major difference to the existing solutions. At the time they came, there was already, for instance, the Nairobi-based Cellulant doing exactly what they were about to do.
In fact, a year after Flutterwave raised $10m Series A in 2017, Cellulant proceeded to raise $47.5m from heavy weight investor TPG Growth’s The Rise Fund.
The funding, even though the company had other businesses at the time, was solely for one purpose — to scale digital payments across Africa.
And even before the funding, Cellulant already had presence in several African countries, including Ghana, Botswana, Zambia, Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, among others.
Flutterwave would only later, buoyed by its $10m and $10m raises in 2017 and 2018 respectively, launch operations in Kenya, Uganda and a few other countries.
Suffice it to say that Flutterwave knew from the outset — unlike Cellulant which kept on test-rolling different services, from napkin to telecom, to agriculture — the problem it was out to solve.
The startup also had a big sketch of a solution that would not only begin and end in Nigeria — it launched operations almost immediately at the time it was founded across Ghana, Kenya, and Uganda, the last two being homes to early Mpesa mobile money markets.
“Flutterwave began because of some of the experiences I had running my last company Andela,” said Aboyeji.
“One of the biggest problems we ran into was sending money into Africa. We had to incorporate in every African country we had developers so we could pay them. Because of that, we processed payments every one to three months to avoid incurring too many fees. Each time, it took at least a week to transfer the money to our local bank account and it still cost us a fair bit each time,” he said.
Having A Formidable Team With Global Connections
One thing that made the major difference for Flutterwave is its founding team, led by Aboyeji. Although co-founder Olugbenga Agboola was himself a techie at the time (having previously worked for PayPal and Google), and although they had penciled down notable tech talent from Paypal, Andela, Standard Bank, Google Wallet and other top companies, the coming onboard of Aboyeji as the CEO of the startup substantially changed the dynamics for the company.
Prior to his coming onboard Flutterwave, Aboyeji had previously helped Andela, a startup he personally founded, to secure up to $180m in funding within a record time from notable venture capital investors, including GV, Omidyar Network, Spark Capital, Learn Capital, Salesforce Ventures, TLcom Capital Partners, Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, DBL Partners, CRE Venture Capital, Amplo, among others. A bulk of the money was raised in just four years, with funding done almost every year, even though Andela is but an edtech company.
And so his impact on the startup as the CEO of Flutterwave was felt immediately. He first properly launched the startup at the Y Combinator of 2016, and then followed it up with a $10m fundraise in 2017 and another $10m in 2018.
It is also noteworthy that some of the investors in Flutterwave — such as CRE Ventures — were previous investors in Andela.
In essence, having a team with deep connections to the Silicon Valley at a time when the concepts of VCs and startups were relatively new to the continent helped Flutterwave to mark its territory early enough.
There is, therefore, no gain saying the fact the first two years of the startup (2016–2018) was key to its eventual success.
A History Of Favourable Regulatory Ecosystem
Flutterwave’s success could also be tied to a relatively stable regulatory ecosystem that favoured it far ahead of others that came later. But first, there is a need to mention that the startup was also strategic about its incorporation.
That is, apart from headquartering in the United States, it also maintains legal presence in countries where it is currently in operations. This strategy has enabled it to decentralise the effects of adverse regulations, especially in Nigeria where its founders come from, and which is its primary market.
Between 2016 and 2021 during which the startup substantially functioned, Nigerian regulators were relatively less killing with their regulations.
Major efforts towards regulating the fintech industry in Nigeria only started in 2018, two years after the company was founded.
Generally, Nigeria has equally been unfavourable to bike-hailing business, with the country’s Lagos state government banning bike-hailing activities on its major highways, a singular act that has put so many investments in bike-hailing startups in the West African country at risks of failure.
Had the Central Bank of Nigeria been ruthless with regulating fintech companies such as Flutterwave, it is doubtful whether it would have achieved the Unicorn status in such a record time.
Strong Product Diversity And Partnerships
Apart from offering a wide range of fintech support services from POS (Point Of Sale) to Debit and Credit Cards, Bank Account, Mobile Money Wallets, American Express, M-Pesa, Visa QR, Bank Transfer and USSD, Flutterwave made a major move by differentiating and targeting customer segments.
First, it expressed its interests in African businesses doing local and international transactions but who are finding payments difficult.
Through the launch of its Business-to-Business (B2B) product, Rave by Flutterwave — or simply Flutterwave for Business — in 2017, the startup was able to resolve this.
With Flutterwave for Business, businesses can choose to integrate Flutterwave with their websites to power checkouts or can simply generate payment links from their dashboards if they don’t have websites.
That way, accepting and monitoring payments, customers and so much more have become much easier and transparent for a lot of businesses, not just in Nigeria but across 33 African countries and the UK and US where the startup is present in.
Again, noticing that by focusing only on a B2B model, an important customer base may have been neglected, Flutterwave quickly expanded its product offering to end users under a B2C model through Barter by Flutterwave.
Barter by Flutterwave is a mobile app for people who want to create virtual cards for their shopping, or send money within their friendship circles, as well as people who want an easy and convenient way of paying bills.
Today, the startup claims to have processed 140 million transactions worth more than $9 billion barely 5 years after it was founded. It also claims 290,000 businesses use its platform to carry out payments under its Rave model, while over 500,000 users do so using Barter. The company’s most recent product offering, Flutterwave Store, launched at the heart of the Coronavirus pandemic in 2020 and already available across 15 African countries, now, also, helps over 20,000 merchants to create storefronts and sell their products online.
It is therefore doubtful if, without diversifying to other product categories, Flutterwave would have reached the Unicorn status.
Flutterwave also seems to be investing more on non-customers than customers. The startup has poured a lot of resources in securing partnership deals with leading payments companies across the world.
In 2019, it entered into partnership with China’s Alipay, which in 2013 surpassed PayPal in payments volume. The partnership sees Flutterwave integrated into the Alipay platform, a move which is considered a significant step towards capturing payments activity around the estimated $200 billion in China-Africa trade.
Apart from Alipay partnership, Flutterwave currently also maintains partnerships with Visa, Worldpay, among others.
Good Choice Of Investors
Perhaps, the single most significant contributor to Flutterwave’s success is not just the funding, but the choice of the investors who understand its market. For one thing, the backing from Y Combinator in 2016 set the pace and help sustain the startup’s valuation. And for another, the entrance of investors such as Green Visor, GreyCroft Partners, Glynn Capital, MasterCard, Fintech Collective, 4DX Ventures, Raba Capital, Visa, Endeavor, African fund CRE Venture Capital, WorldPay FIS, among others, further helped to plug the startup into the global value chain.
S/N
AFRICAN UNICORNS
SECTOR
YEAR FOUNDED
YEAR BECAME A UNICORN
COUNTRY (PRIMARY MARKET)
FOUNDERS
1
Jumia
Ecommerce
2012
2019
Nigeria
Jeremy Hodara and Sacha Poignonnec, ex-McKinsey consultants
2
Interswitch
Financial services
2002
2019
Nigeria
Mitchell Elegbe
3
Fawry
Financial services
2008
2020
Egypt
Ashraf Sabry
4
Flutterwave
Financial services
2016
2021
Nigeria
Iyinoluwa Aboyeji, Olugbenga Agboola
Respect To The Entrepreneurs, Iyin Aboyeji And Olugbenga Agboola
After the encounter with Arys, Aboyeji co-founded with him, Bookneto, a Canadian online question and answer tool designed to facilitate online examination service. The University of Waterloo, however, sued the hell out of the startup for infringing the intellectual property rights in past questions designed by some professors, forcing the founders to sell the startup to Canadian Innovation Centre.
On coming back to Nigeria, Aboyeji, under the continuing inspiration of Arys, proceeded to branch over to Fora.com, a startup that ran open online courses, like Udacity, Coursera, etc. But then he claimed he was naive for Nigerian trusting regulatory authorities so much and for believing that by partnering with Nigerian universities Fora.com was going to make massive hits.
He quickly spun Fora.com into an MBA-selling programme, targeting young bankers desirous of climbing the corporate ladder. That, too, was blown away by the hurricane of superior insights suggested to him by one Jeremy Johnson in New York, on his voyage to secure funding for the then MBA-selling Fora.com.
He had previously met Jeremy in Nigeria, and so being in New York, Jeremy’s place, it was necessary that they met. Jeremy told him that education geared towards skills rather than degrees was what Nigeria, which was sinking under heavy unemployment figures, needed. And so, there and then, Andela, Africa’s leading talent acquisition startup, most recently valued at $700m, was born.
Done with Andela, including helping it to raise more than $180 million in venture capital from the likes of Mark Zuckerberg and other notable investors from Silicon Valley, Aboyeji made his way to Flutterwave, then solving the second problem he was looking to solve — payments.
Aboyeji is no longer the CEO of Flutterwave, having resigned in 2018. He had further moved on to found a community investment firm Future Africa, where he is presently.
For Agboola, this is his first time of being a proper entrepreneur. Before Flutterwave, he had worked with Nigeria’s Standard Bank, Guarantee Trust Bank, Sterling Bank and Access Bank, mostly as head of digital financial services. He is also a former techie with PayPal and Google.
Charles Rapulu Udoh
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based lawyer who has advised startups across Africa on issues such as startup funding (Venture Capital, Debt financing, private equity, angel investing etc), taxation, strategies, etc. He also has special focus on the protection of business or brands’ intellectual property rights ( such as trademark, patent or design) across Africa and other foreign jurisdictions. He is well versed on issues of ESG (sustainability), media and entertainment law, corporate finance and governance. He is also an award-winning writer
Becoming Africa’s newest unicorn probably calls for more responsibilities which evidently captures the expansionary drive of the payments processing company Flutterwave into North African territory. Flutterwave which recently raised $170m in new funding will according to company sources achieve its objectives. To this end, the company will extend its payments network to Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia by the middle of the second quarter.
Flutterwave’s CEO Olugbenga Agboola
Aside from the North African countries, Flutterwave also plans to expand into francophone Africa as “our network needs to be everywhere” on the continent. With the new funding, Flutterwave aims to make it easier for Africans to build global businesses that can make and accept payments worldwide. Flutterwave will also use the money, raised from investors to accelerate customer acquisition and develop new products.
The need to venture into North Africa is informed by the fact that digital payments market in North Africa and the Middle East is set to grow at a compound annual rate of 13.3% until 2026, driven by mobile phone and Internet penetration, which is crucial for the region to have an underlying real-time infrastructure in place to enable these payments.
Among new products is the Flutterwave Mobile service, which allows small merchants to convert a mobile phone into a point of sale and this service goes live this month in Kenya, South Africa, Nigeria and Rwanda.
Kelechi Deca
Kelechi Deca has over two decades of media experience, he has traveled to over 77 countries reporting on multilateral development institutions, international business, trade, travels, culture, and diplomacy. He is also a petrol head with in-depth knowledge of automobiles and the auto industry
One of Africa’s most successful Fintech firms Flutterwave has joined the rank of unicorn with valuation of over $1 billion after joining two other Nigerian firms, Jumia and Interswitch after raising $170 million in Series C funding. The new round was led by growth-equity firms Avenir Growth Capital and Tiger Global. New and existing investors who participated include DST Global, Early Capital Berrywood, Green Visor Capital, Greycroft Capital, Insight Ventures, PayPal, Salesforce Ventures, Tiger Management, Worldpay FIS 9yards Capital.
Flutterwave’s CEO Olugbenga Agboola
This funding round comes a year after Flutterwave raised $35 million Series B and $20 million Series A in 2018. In total, Flutterwave has raised $225 million and is one of the few African startups to have secured more than $200 million in funding.
Flutterwave was founded by entrepreneur Iyinoluwa Aboyeji and Olugbenga Agboola in 2016, the company is present in 20 African countries, with a reach of over 33 countries on the continent. According to CEO Olugbenga Agboola, the company grew more than 100% in revenue within the past year due to the pandemic without giving specifics on numbers. This contributed to its compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 226% from 2018.
With this new capital, Flutterwave says it will invest to accelerate customer acquisition in existing and international markets, as well as develop complementary and innovative products. One of such products is the newly launched Flutterwave Mobile, an app to help to accelerate eCommerce growth as a result of the success of the Flutterwave Stores.
This announcement comes a few months after Paystack’s acquisition by stripe for more than $200 million last year. While there were rumours of Flutterwave taking the same route, this Series C round suggests otherwise.
Flutterwave is the third unicorn coming out of Nigeria after Interswitch and the e-commerce company, Jumia. But what’s really impressive about this is how quickly Flutterwave joined the small club of unicorns – under 10 years.
Kelechi Deca
Kelechi Deca has over two decades of media experience, he has traveled to over 77 countries reporting on multilateral development institutions, international business, trade, travels, culture, and diplomacy. He is also a petrol head with in-depth knowledge of automobiles and the auto industry
Flutterwave, a Lagos and San Francisco-based financial payments startup, has announced it has raised $170m from leading investors, putting it at valuation of over $1 billion. And with this valuation, the company becomes Africa’s latest unicorn, after Jumia, Interswitch and Fawry.
“We look forward to increasing our investments across the continent and deepening the impact our platform has on lives and livelihoods as we take more businesses in Africa to the world, and at the same time continue to bring more of the world to Africa,” said founder Olugbenga Agboola.
Agboola thanked Flutterwave’s 300+ staff force, investors, etc. for making the journey possible. Image credits: Flutterwave
Here Is What You Need To Know
The Series C funding round was led by the New York-based investment firm, Avenir Growth Capital and US hedge fund and investment firm Tiger Global. Also participating are existing investors, including DST Global, Early Capital Berrywood, Green Visor Capital, Greycroft Capital, Insight Ventures, PayPal, Salesforce Ventures, Tiger Management, WorldpayFIS 9yards Capital.
The latest funding comes a year after the startup raised $35 million in Series B round. It also closed $20 million Series A in 2018. This brings the startup’s total investment to $225 million.
With the funding, Flutterwave will work more on its customer acquisition in markets where it is currently operating. It also has plans to improve its current product offerings such as Barter, which now has over 500,000 users. The investment will also help bring about new product offerings, including Flutterwave Mobile, which hopes to turn merchants’ mobile devices into a point of sale, allowing them to accept payments and make sales.
Avenir Growth Capital’s latest investment in Flutterwave is its first in an African startup. Tiger Global has previously invested in Nigeria’s iROKOtv as well as in South Africa’s Takealot.
According to Jamie Reynolds of Avenir Growth Capital and Scott Shleifer of Tiger Global, investment in Flutterwave came as a way of assisting the startup on its quest to build a global and world-class payments company.
Launched in 2016, Flutterwave allows clients to tap its APIs and work with Flutterwave developers to customize payments applications. Existing customers include Uber, Booking.com and e-commerce company Jumia.
In 2019, Flutterwave processed 107 million transactions worth $5.4 billion, according to company data. The numbers have since increased to over 140 million transactions worth over $9 billion, according to Agboola.
Flutterwave’s platform has served the increased B2B business payment needs spurred by the decade of growth and reform that has occurred in Africa’s core economies.
A unicorn is a privately held startup company valued at over $1 billion
Charles Rapulu Udoh
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based lawyer who has advised startups across Africa on issues such as startup funding (Venture Capital, Debt financing, private equity, angel investing etc), taxation, strategies, etc. He also has special focus on the protection of business or brands’ intellectual property rights ( such as trademark, patent or design) across Africa and other foreign jurisdictions. He is well versed on issues of ESG (sustainability), media and entertainment law, corporate finance and governance. He is also an award-winning writer
