Paydaythe leading pan-African neobank issuing global (USD, EUR and GBP) bills to Africans has announced a $3 million seed round led by Monie Point Incwith the participation of HoaQ, DFS lab‘s Stellar Africa Fund, Ingressive Capital Fund II and angel investors – Dare Okoudjou Founder and CEO of MFS Africa & Tola Onayemi CEO of Nora base. They join follower investors Tech stars, touching angels, Ingressive Capital & Nu Venture Partners. Together with existing investors Ethos VC, MAGIC Fund, Ventures platform, Voltron capitaland others.
This brings Payday’s total investment to date $5.1 million, following a $2 million+ pre-seed round in 2021. In an oversubscribed round, the new capital raised will be used to secure operating licenses in the UK and Canada, while operations in the UK, where the company recently established, will be expanded . Funding will also be used to drive talent acquisition as the startup’s team expands from 35 to 50 employees, while Payday aims to further drive the future of work through borderless payment alternatives in major currencies.
The round also sees the expansion of the co-founder team with the addition of Elijah Kingson – Payday’s current CPO who previously led product design for Premium and subscription products at British-Lithuanian neobank revolution. Yvonne Obike, the company’s current COO, has also joined the Co-Founding team. Her work with Nigeria’s Industry bank saw its MSME drive growth, societal recovery, economic recovery and development for local, national and international stakeholders. The team also brought on board former Goldman Sachs and Expedia Product Manager, Sean Udeke, as Head of Products.
Payday, the first Rwandan company in history to join Techstars, was launched in June 2021 by Favor Ori and is built to support African remote workers, freelancers and digital professionals with seamless, borderless payments, enabling global payment processing from over 130 countries becomes possible. The startup enables those on the continent and in the diaspora to send and receive money in USD, GBP, Euros and 20 other currencies, enabling Africans to work remotely for international organizations, get paid and withdraw money in the currency of their choice, regardless of location.
Payday is currently operational in Nigeria, Rwanda and the UK and offers its more than 330,000 users virtual Visa and Mastercards, which can be generated quickly using the Payday app. Onboarding over 100,000 new users per month and processing an average of 40,000 transactions per day, Payday processes several million in USD per day due to its growing user base. In February 2023, Payday became a payment partner for Starlink, operated by SpaceX, through which Nigerian and Rwandan citizens can now purchase Starlink routers seamlessly.
In response to the fundraiser, Prefer Ori Payday CEO and Founder said, “We are excited that this round of funding will lay the foundation for the continued growth of our platform as we expand our services to a wider audience. This investment is an important milestone for our company and we are grateful for the trust and commitment of our existing and new investors. We are ready to scale up our platform and reach more Africans not only on the continent but around the world. Our passion for providing individuals and businesses with convenient and secure payment solutions is tangible, and we believe this funding will enable us to do so on an even larger scale.” “Our goal remains the same: to make it easy and accessible for everyone to access their payments on the continent, and with this new funding we are one step closer to achieving that vision,” concludes Ori.
The payday team
With the companiony increase the user base by more than 100,000 per month, the evolution of Payday and its services was inevitable with the launch of Payday 3.0 in January this year. Dedicated to building a super app that improves and simplifies the UX for its customers, some of the new features include:
Global accounts (USD, GBP, EUR, etc.)
Virtual USD and NGN maps
Currency Swaps
Payment Links
Payment of local bills
Peer-to-Peer Transfers
The ability to add user account information to platforms like Share to receive salaries in minutes instead of days
According to Tosin Eniolorunda, CEO of Moniepoint Inc, “At Moniepoint, we are excited about the unique things Favor and the team are doing with Payday. Personally, I deeply empathize with his drive, technical depth and desire to execute. The urge to encourage that fire inspired us to want to be a part of it. More important is the alignment in our goal to provide financial happiness by addressing the key payment pain points – Moniepoint with merchants and Payday with individuals. We see opportunities to leverage their infrastructure to further deepen our offering of financial services to merchants, and we look forward to all that is to come.” Temi Marcella Awogboro, General Partner at MAGIC Fund said: “We were early donors to Favor and the Payday team, supporting their bold vision to enable fast borderless online payment services for Africa. We are pleased with the positive key milestones achieved on this journey and remain confident in Favor and the teams’ ability to positively disrupt the industry and impact lives, connecting individuals and businesses to the tremendous opportunities around the world.” .
Maya Horgan Famodoufounder and MD at Ingressive Capital added, “Favor is one of the smartest entrepreneurs I’ve met. He knows how to assess, implement and adjust where necessary. That’s why Payday has experienced such explosive growth. This is definitely a gem in our portfolio. I would bet on Favor and Payday any day, both to realize the transformative value and to make us proud with an exit that the ecosystem will refer to for years to come.”
Sunil Sharma, Managing Director at Techstars Toronto stated, “A word that best describes Favor Ori is ruthless,” said Sunil Sharma, Managing Director of Techstars Toronto and one of the early investors in Payday. I was touched by his personal story that took him from Nigeria to the US for his computer science degree and some valuable early work experience, then to Rwanda to build a team, then to the UK and back to the US to pursue growth to strive. Favor is always looking for opportunities and nothing can stand in his way”. John AndreiniFounding Partner at Ethos VC said “I had early experience investing with Flutterwave and Chipper Cash and when I met Favor it became clear that he was the right person to lead the next generation of fintech companies in Africa”.
Currently, an estimated 80 million African citizens work remotely. Payday’s global payment processing capabilities make it a valuable tool for the continent’s growing digital nomad population looking to make and accept payments from around the world.
