Nigerian Fintech Unicorn Moniepoint Eyes Further Growth

In October last year, the Nigeria-based fintech Moniepoint became Africa's newest "unicorn" after raising 110m in a Series C funding round that valued the company at over 1bn. While tighter monetary conditions since 2022 have led to a drop in the amount of venture capital funding flowing into Africa's tech and fintech industry, Moniepoint achieving unicorn status was read by many as a sign of the growing maturity of the market.

Reflecting on last year's landmark funding round, Pawel Swiatek, Moniepoint's chief operating officer, tells African Business that it shows "we are in a moment of great opportunity" for the African fintech space.

"There are lots of people who are ready and interested and keen to participate in modern financial services. This is facilitated by a combination of cloud-based infrastructure, which means you don't have to build data centres, almost pervasive mobile broadband coverage, the fact that smartphones are getting super cheap, and if you can't afford a smartphone, other phones can work via USSD and still hold value for transactions," he says.

"Even if you can't afford a phone at all, the fact you can use the mobile broadband network to access agency banking, the way Moniepoint operates. This combination of infrastructural elements is revolutionary."

Moniepoint works both through an online banking app and through physical POS machines, a portable device which allows small businesses to conduct transactions. POS machines are also carried by hundreds of thousands of Moniepoint agents across Nigeria to facilitate cash withdrawals and other financial activities for individuals without access to internet banking. Moniepoint now serves over 10 million businesses and individuals in Nigeria, processing over 800 million monthly transactions.