Since the break of David Hundeyin’s story about the sinister happenings centered around criminality, sexual harassment, and falsehood at Flutterwave, observers on Twitter have raised concern about the effect it will have on the Nigerian Tech sector as a whole.
In David Hundeyin’s story published on West Africa WEEKLY on 12th April 2022, Agboola who is referred to in the story as GB is alleged to have created a phantom ‘co-founder’ identity to give himself more shares in the company’s early days and offered share prices below the company’s valuation to employees who wanted to cash in on their vested options. These employee stock sales, the story alleged, went to an investment vehicle controlled by GB.
Many Nigerians have now reacted to the expose as can be seen from the screenshots below
About Flutterwave and David Hundeyin Expose
Flutterwave was founded in 2016, achieved unicorn status last year, and by February 2022, it was valued at $3 billion having raised $250m in Series D. This made the company the most valuable African startup, surpassing the $2 billion valuation set by SoftBank-backed fintech OPay and FTX-backed cross-border payments platform Chipper Cash in 2021.
David Hundeyin’s Flutterwave exposé sheds light on the web of lies, sexual harassment & criminality hidden behind the facade of Flutterwave as a thriving business.
The Future of Funding in The Nigerian Techspace
In Nigeria, many Tech startups have received international funding and many have been admitted into incubator programs. It is therefore a concern that Flutterwave is the “unicorn” of the Nigerian Tech sector, and facing these fraud allegations may affect the startups that are on their way to attaining great heights with the negative publicity it is getting.
Read Also : How Africa is Regulating Fintech Companies
Future Tech startups in Nigeria, are likely to face much more scrutiny and might not get as much support going forward.