Emerging economies like Africa have recently seen a rapid evolution of digital financial services, such as digital banking and payments. African entrepreneurs are beginning to create and invent more neobanks to meet the need of a large number of customers.
Here are the top 10 neobanks in Africa from the angles of their seed funding and popularity across the continent.
1. Chipper Cash
Chipper Cash is a cross-border payment system based in Tanzania, Ghana, Nigeria, South Africa, Uganda, and Rwanda. This neobank raised $30 million in a Series B fundraising round headed by Ribbit Capital with help from Jeff Bezos’ venture capital fund, Bezos Expeditions.
Thanks to Chipper Cash, users can use free bill payment and money transfer services. Recently, it began beta-testing new tools that allow users to buy, sell, and invest in US equities from Africa. The firm offers not only a P2P app but also Chipper Checkout, a merchant-focused payment solution that brings in the money required to fund Chipper Cash’s free services.
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2. PalmPay
There is arguably anyone in Nigeria that doesn’t know PalmPay. Nigerian startup, PalmPay offers its users the ability to send money without incurring any fees, pay bills, save money on airtime, and send money to their banks for just $0.03.
To have the software pre-installed in more than 20 million devices, PalmPay signed a partnership agreement with Transission Holdings, the company behind Itel, TECO, and Infinix. Transission Holdings, NetEase, and MediaTek contributed $40 million to a seed round for PalmPay in November 2019.
3. Eversend
Eversend, the “borderless money app,” provides virtual USD cards in addition to multi-currency accounts. For the African continent, where 65% of the people do not have access to the internet, Eversend’s ability to be used without an internet connection has made it stand out among neobanks.
The app supports a variety of P2P transactions, including transfers to any Nigerian bank account and transfers between Eversend users in Nigeria, Kenya, Uganda, and Rwanda. It also supports mobile money transfers to MPESA, Airtel, MTN, and Tigo users in Kenya, Rwanda, and Uganda. Moreover, personal loans, individual and group savings, donations, cryptocurrency trading, crowdsourcing, and currency conversion, are just a few functions the app will eventually offer.
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4. Lidya
Lidya, in 2018 raised about $6.9 million in Series A funding. This investment made it one of the largest Series A investment rounds in Nigerian tech history, For small and medium businesses to access flexible, reasonable finance choices quickly.
Lidya has developed an online lending platform. Lidya evaluates each applicant using almost 100 data points to determine credit risk and creates a personalized credit score. Businesses may manage their bills and cash flow using the startup’s exclusive dashboards and tools.
5. Paga
Paga, which was launched in 2009, over the years has become one of the largest payment providers in Nigeria. In 2020, Paga transacted $2.3 billion in business 2020 and $8 billion during the previous four years.
This payment platform has an agreement with Visa to offer businesses solutions that allow customers to pay through money transfers or QR codes. Over 27,000 Paga agents are dispersed throughout Nigeria. In September 2018, it received Series B funding from Global Innovation Fund and Unreasonable Capital.
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6. Sol Wallet
Sol Wallet comes next on our list, mainly because of how it has transformed payment services in South Africa. With just the app, you could run different types of transactions on it.
With Sol Wallet, users can set up multi-currency accounts online and transfer currencies at interbank rates, foreign trade exchange, cryptocurrencies, and stocks. They can also pay for services and utilities, send money to friends, obtain a SOL debit card from Standard Bank of South Africa, withdraw cash from ATMs and retail locations, and buy prepaid goods like airtime, electricity, and cable networks.
7. 7aweshly
7aweshly primary functioning methods are based on a mobile application tool to promote saving. With several interactive features, a good user interface, and a connected Facebook AI chatbot, the app is specifically designed for the younger generations, between the ages of 16 and 21, and also to combat financial illiteracy from these young ones.
Saving money on gold is the newest exciting feature on 7aweshly. On the platform, users can set financial objectives and deposit money via CIB ATMs. In the near future, the business intends to expand the deposit facility to include pharmacies and grocery stores.
8. Paystack
According to Paystack, more than 10,000 businesses and 15% of all online payments in Nigeria are powered by them. Therefore, it has expanded to support 50% of all online payments and more than 60,000 businesses, with clients like MTN, SPAR, and UPS.
Paystack’s acquisition by global finance platform, Stripe in a deal for more than $200 million sent shockwaves over the continent and was a watershed moment for African fintechs. Another breakthrough moment for Paystack was when Y Combinator provided them with $120,000 in startup funding in 2016.
9. CowryWise
CowryWise is basically a wealth management software that allows you to save money for both short- and long-term goals, invest in mutual funds, keep money in a Stash account, and conduct peer-to-peer transactions.
The business was chosen by the Global Inclusive Fintech Accelerator Catalyst Fund as one of 30 early-stage businesses that will benefit from the Fund’s financial and educational support in 2020. These businesses are focused on advancing financial inclusion for underserved consumers. Furthermore, it was selected as one of the 50 winners of the Kairos K50 Tech Summit in 2019, which happened in New York, USA.
10. Migo
Thanks to Migo, an integrated lending platform, companies may offer financing to consumers and small businesses directly from their apps.
Migo raised a $938,000 seed round in 2014 from XSeed Capital Partners, followed by a $2.2m seed round in June 2016 from Xseed Capital Partners, Nyca Partners, Greenhouse Capital, First Ally Capital, and Fintech Collective. This seed funding raised has been really what makes Migo stand out among other neobanks in Africa.
Observations
Although the different neobanks mentioned in this article concentrate on numerous areas, including current and savings accounts, e-commerce checkout, money transfers, fundraising, investments, payments, contributions, and loans, all still share a commitment to meet a demand that has historically gone unfulfilled on the continent.