Business-to-business payments platform Flutterwave has completed a $35 million Series B round.
With operations across eight African countries and the UK, Flutterwave is positioning itself as a strategic partner for companies looking to break into Africa. The company says it will invest its latest funding in improving its technology and expanding its business development team.
MAX, Uber, Booking.com and other companies use Flutterwave’s API integrations to facilitate payments.
A primary motivation jumps out from Flutterwave’s new raise: to grow market share in the countries it operates. The company now sees its mission stretching beyond facilitating payments.
“We don’t just want to be a payment technology company,” says Olugbenga Agboola, Flutterwave’s CEO.
Tech companies in diverse sectors from education to e-commerce depend on Flutterwave’s payments infrastructure. It appears the company will now take the initiative to offer consumer-facing solutions to its varied customer base.
As they plot market share growth, they are racking up more international partnerships. FIS, a US financial services provider, joins Alipay and Visa as Flutterwave’s partners for payments in Africa.
With FIS’s Worldpay platform, merchants in Europe and the U.S. can accept any African payment, Agboola says.
This Serie B brings Flutterwave’s total raise to $55 million since it was founded in 2016, according to Crunchbase. The round was led by Greycroft and eVentures. Visa, Green Visor, CRE Venture Capital and FIS also participated.
Valued by YCombinator at $150 million in 2019, Flutterwave is one of a number of startups keeping fintech atop funding receipts in Africa. The company emerged out of a period when e-commerce seemed to be the buzz.
But playing a leading role toward solving payment difficulties has put it in good stead with global platforms seeking inroads to Africa. GetBarter, a personal finance product for consumers, came out of a partnership with Visa in January 2019.
Flutterwave is currently most active in Nigeria, South Africa and East Africa. It hopes to invest its new fund towards breaking ground in North and Francophone Africa.
