Nigeria-based fintech company Raenest recently secured an $11 million investment from QED Investors to help freelancers and remote workers receive payment across Africa, TechCrunch reports.
As workers throughout Africa are gaining employment with Big Tech firms and global startups, Raenest’s retail product, Geegpay, is tackling the challenge of making sure freelancers and remote workers get paid through multi-currency wallets, working with USD, GBP, and EUR accounts. Launched in 2022, founders Victor Alade, Sodruldeen Mustapha, and Richard Oyome initially wanted to help foreign companies pay African employees to stay compliant with local norms. Oddly enough, freelancers weren’t on their radar.
However, months in, they realized the problem was workers struggling to receive payments — not the other way around. The experienced engineers took the opportunity to address the growing pain point. “A U.S. company might not care if a payment is delayed by five days, but for someone in Nigeria or Kenya, that’s a big deal — especially when converting to local currency becomes another hurdle,” Alade said.
“Businesses started asking if they could get fixed bank accounts to simplify payments. That’s when we started thinking: How big is this opportunity? Who else is building for Africa?”
It wasn’t long before Geegpay started to become popular with freelancers and remote workers in addition to business sign-ups. The helpful tool came right on time as one U.S.-based fintech, Mercury, started to restrict business accounts from a number of countries, including African nations.
With the support of QED Investors, one of the world’s top fintech venture capital firms that has been heightening its African footprint, partner and head of Africa and the Middle East, Gbenga Ajayi, said the firm believes Raenest is the key to unlocking new opportunities for entrepreneurs. “We firmly believe that by bridging the gap between local and global markets, Raenest will unlock new opportunities for African entrepreneurs, freelancers, and businesses, ultimately driving greater economic empowerment across the continent,” Ajayi said.
Since the fintech’s initial launch, the company has processed over $1 billion in payments, according to Fixextra, which is a massive 160% increase since 2023. With 700,000 individual customers and over 300 businesses in Raenest’s portfolio, the company has plans to use the funding to grow its presence in Nigeria and Kenya, and soon launch in the United States and Egypt.
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Source: Nigerian Fintech Raenest Lands $11M Investment From QED To Advance Payment To Africa’s
