Flutterwave, a Nigerian Fintech company, announced this week it has raised $250 million in Series D funding. The infusion values the company north of $3 billion. The round was led by B Capital Group, with participation from Alta Park Capital, Whale Rock Capital, Lux Capital, and others. Several existing investors who also participated in previous rounds also re-upped, including, Glynn Capital, Avenir Growth, Tiger Global, Green Visor Capital, and Salesforce Ventures. The new funds will be allotted for expansion, customer acquisition, product development and mergers and acquisitions. Further details are promised during an online event scheduled for Feb. 18.
The company has processed more than 200 million transactions worth beyond $16 billion to date across 34 countries in Africa. Flutterwave also serves more than 900,000 businesses across the globe. In 2021, Flutterwave launched a range of new products including Flutterwave Market for merchants to sell their goods via an online marketplace and, most recently, Send, a remittance service that empowers customers to send money to recipients to and from Africa. Flutterwave has also partnered with companies such as PayPal, MTN, Airtel Africa to support financial inclusion on the continent and create possibilities for customers to build customizable payment applications through its APIs
“Our story is that of resilience and hard work,” Olugbenga ‘GB’ Agboola, founder and CEO of Flutterwave, said. “The Central Bank of Nigeria, under the leadership of Dr. Godwin Emefiele, laid the vision of a transformational payment system in Nigeria, provided the framework for innovation in this space, and has continued to create regulations that have enabled us to grow and thrive.”
“We set out to build a platform that simplifies payments for everyone and today, our solutions are used across the globe to connect Africans to the world and the world to Africans. We are delighted that investors believe in us and our story and are committing their resources to this belief. This latest funding demonstrates the conviction of some of the world’s leading investors in both our business model, team and the Africa technology market.”
“At B Capital, we seek to back generational companies with broad platform potential,” B Capital partner Matt Levinson said. “Flutterwave has a unique opportunity to accomplish this as the dominant payments’ infrastructure provider across Africa. In addition to their emergence as the leading enterprise payments processor for the continent, Flutterwave is innovating at breakneck speed with novel fintech solutions for large corporates, SMEs and consumers. Flutterwave may ultimately build one of the most consequential fintech business in the world, enabling hundreds of thousands of merchants to transact online and connect Africa to the global economy.”
“We believe the digitization of payments globally is one of the largest and most important trends in technology,” Glynn Capital managing partner David Glynn added. “Having been investors in Flutterwave since 2017, we have had a front row seat in seeing Flutterwave establish itself as a leading payments company in Africa as it drives adoption of seamless digital payments experiences for merchants and consumers alike. We look forward to supporting the company as it addresses its significant growth opportunity in the years ahead.”
