TeamApt completes Series B funding, commits to African market

Nigerian Fintech startup, TeamApt, which provides financial services for the underserved mass market in Africa has completed its series B funding round.
The entire process was led by Novastar Ventures with participation from FMO, Global Ventures, CDC, Oui Capital, Kepple Africa Ventures, Soma Capital, and a syndicate of local angel investors including Gbenga Oyebode.

According to the startup, the funding would see the company extend its offerings directly to customers and micro-SMEs, giving them access to the financial access lifelines, which they need to succeed while expanding its solutions beyond Nigeria.

Citing a recent statistics, which stated that over 50 percent of Nigeria’s 99 million adult population is financially underserved, comprising 36 million unbanked and 14.5 million underbanked people with distrust and access cited as key drivers of this exclusion, TeamApt said given its operation across the 36 states of Nigeria, it would tackle the exclusion profitably with its hybrid solution. It promised to bridge the gap through a current distribution network of over 100,000 agents and reliable technology-enabled payment solutions.

TeamApt has in less than two years, rapidly scaled its agent banking product, Moniepoint, to serve the 29 million previously underserved individuals who had limited access to financial services. Through Moniepoint and payment gateway Monnify, TeamApt said it processed $17.5 billion worth of transactions in the past 12 months, which is a 1,081 per cent increase from the previous year, with an average of 68 million transactions performed on its platform every month. With this raise, it is expected that it would further leverage its agent network to provide wider financial services to the underserved consumers and businesses in Nigeria. The company also has its sights on other markets in Africa where there are significant opportunities for leveraging technology and offline distribution to provide financial services to the mass market.

Announcing the fundraise, Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of TeamApt, Tosin Eniolorunda, said: “Universal access to financial services is key to the advancement of any society. We built Moniepoint because we believe everyone deserves to enjoy financial happiness and this can only happen when they can access financial services effortlessly.”

According to him, “This fundraise is happening at a significant time in our growth as a company. In the past years, we have exceeded several strategic milestones without external funding, helping accelerate the Central Bank of Nigeria’s target of 95% financial inclusion by 2024, but as the hurdles of financial access are not unique to Nigeria, this funding allows us to extend our solutions to other parts of Africa”.

Head of West Africa at Novastar Ventures, Brian Waswani Odhiambo, said: “TeamApt has swiftly and successfully established its agency network to become the leading operator in Nigeria, a testament to the team’s capabilities and the platform’s superior user experience. We are glad to catalyze their vision by providing TeamApt with sufficient capital to pursue its new phase of growth.”

Director Private Equity at FMO, Jaap Reinking, said: “TeamApt’s promise to deliver ‘financial happiness’ for the underserved mass market in Africa makes the company an excellent fit with FMO’s Ventures Program. We are excited to contribute to closing the financial inclusion gap in Nigeria, and invest in the company alongside FMO investee fund manager Novastar Ventures and other like-minded investors.”