Cellulant, a leading digital payments provider that reaches 40 million people across 11 African countries, has been named among the Top 50 emerging Fintech companies in the world in this year’s KPMG FinTech100 report.
Cellulant is among the only three African companies representing Africa from Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa to be included in the list of leading global Fintech innovators that are transforming the financial services industry and have successfully raised venture capital.
The 2018 KPMG Fintech100 report highlights truly innovative companies creating products and services at the nexus of technology and financial services. Cellulant is among this year’s list of ‘Emerging 50’ firms – exciting new companies that are at the forefront of innovative technologies and practices and are often pursuing new business models. The annual report now in its fifth edition has featured companies from 36 countries divided into two categories; The ‘Top 50’ – established Fintech firms around the globe, ranked based on innovation, capital raising activity, size and country. And the ‘Emerging 50’ firms.
“Being listed as one of the only 3 African new and exciting companies that is disrupting the financial services industry globally is a vindication of our vision to become the leading financial services and payments brand in Africa,” said Cellulant’s Co-CEO Bolaji Akinboro. “Our commitment is to continue scaling a payments infrastructure that can transform two thirds of Africans who do not have access to a bank account. We believe that building a connected payments infrastructure is the foundation of solving real challenges and accelerating Africa’s growth and development.”
Cellulant was selected for operating a one-stop payments ecosystem in Africa; connecting businesses and governments to increasingly mobile consumers and for being the only African company to land the largest investment in the Fintech arena. Cellulant now operates in 11 countries, with roughly 12% of Africa’s mobile consumers now able to make payments using their services and products. Cellulant is now building Agrikore- a block chain based smart-contracting, payments marketplace that ensures every stakeholder in the agriculture value chain can do business in a trusted and transparent environment.
“Cellulant is connecting a continent. In most of sub-Saharan Africa, nearly 90% of all payments and transactions remain cash based yet the rate of mobile penetration in Africa is currently at 43%- we are innovating around digital payments to change this status quo. Diversity has shown itself to be a powerful driver of innovation; we have seen an explosion of innovation over the past five years, across geographies and sectors. We attribute much of this innovation to the diversity of experiences and the inherent creativity of the people working in many of these companies…” said Cellulant Co-CEO Ken Njoroge.
Cellulant among 100 companies on the list, have together raised over US$52B in venture capital. This is more than double the 2017 figure. In the last 12 months alone, these companies have also raised US$28B of capital.
Early this year, Cellulant secured $47.5 million in its Series C round of funding. This is the largest deal of its kind dedicated solely to Africa’s Fintech and payments space. The funding round was led by The Rise Fund. The Rise Fund is an impact investment fund operated by TPG Growth private equity group based in the US. Other startups that participated in the round include Velocity Capital & Progression Africa, Endeavor Catalyst, and Satya Capital.
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