In 2016, Flutterwave was not a big deal of a company in Africa when it started operation by Nigerian technologists and former bankers, but today, the fintech company has been able to achieve stellar success within the space of about five years. Perhaps, the rationale behind its success can be attributed to the fact it was a financial tech platform that had a lot of input from those in finance.
Often, the process of technological innovation can seem like a developer’s license to play to the gallery. The app or whatever is developed could therefore lose its ergonomic utility. Flutterwave turned out differently and by 2018, it was a market leader in sub-Saharan Africa.
Flutterwave, a digital payment platform known for being seamless and secure, it has continuously been the choice for small to medium-scale enterprises (SMEs).
Founder and CEO, Olugbenga Agboola said via social media that plan was always to “build a payments technology infrastructure that connects Africa to the global economy by making local and international payments seamless.”
The app is now available in 11 countries, and it will soon increase to 20, according to Flutterwave’s website. This is however, credited to a Series C funding that was announced on Wednesday to much funfair in Nigeria and across Africa.
The $170 million investment secured means in the third round of funding means that the fintech start-up is now a unicorn, a startup worth over $1 billion. Fortunately, this is the first time an indigenous African fintech is valued at that amount.
Moreover, it is apparent that this could only be the beginning of a lot of breakthrough for Flutterwave. Currently, the app hosts more than 1,000 African SMEs that sell their wares on the platform.
Apart from that, individual users of Flutterwave are in their hundreds of thousands, still growing. There are now intentions to expand the company’s services to North Africa as well.
