Visa has selected twenty-three African startups to join the Visa Africa Fintech Accelerator’s first cohort.

The majority of the chosen startups were from Nigeria, with Ghana, Kenya, Morocco, South Africa, Egypt, Uganda, Zambia, and Tunisia following.

The startups listed below were chosen from:

Nigeria:

Anchor: Provides APIs, dashboards, and tools for developers to embed and build banking products
Dojah: Offers a comprehensive Know Your Customer (KYC) and digital onboarding solution
Moni: Provides low-interest loans to mobile money agent communities
OkHi: Allows banks, fintechs, and businesses to collect and verify customers’ addresses
Orda Africa: African restaurant cloud operating system provider
Traction: Builds the next generation of payment solutions and business tools

Ghana:

OZÉ: Provides digital record-keeping tools with embedded finance products to medium and small businesses
The Blu Penguin: Delivers an in-store Point of Sale (PoS) system
AgroCenta: Runs a mobile merchant platform for smallholder farmers
Affinity Africa: Provides banking products to the underserved and unbanked

Kenya:

Duhqa: B2B platform for retail distribution of consumer goods
Power: Allows workers to take control of their financial health
WorkPay: HR payroll provider

Morocco:

Chari: B2B e-commerce and retail startup
PayTic: Streamlines the back-office operations and risk control of digital payments
Weego: Offers a variety of transportation options and solutions

South Africa:

FloatPays: On-demand wage access platform
Franc: Allows users to invest in leading cash and equity funds
OnLife: All-in-one money management wallet

Rest of Africa:

Sympl (Egypt): Enables customers to shop and pay later, with no interest
Eversend (Uganda): Payments platform offering cross-border payments, virtual cards, currency exchange, and crypto buying and selling
PremierCredit (Zambia): Online microlending and investment platform
Konnect (Tunisia): Offers payment links by SMS, email, Messenger, or WhatsApp

The startups that are selected will get:

Mentoring one-on-one with pioneers and specialists in the African ecology
VISA-specific instruction and collaboration possibilities
Unreported funding
access to more than 100 vendors’ product benefits and discounts totaling $200,000. HubSpot and Google Cloud credits are included in this.

According to BitKE’s June 2023 report, VISA launched the Africa Fintech Acceleratory Program in response to its pledge to contribute $1 billion in the continent’s digital transformation.

Up to 40 entrepreneurs a year will get access to a three-month intensive learning program focusing on company growth and mentorship through the Visa Africa Fintech Accelerator program. After completing the program, a limited number of participating enterprises will be granted access to Visa’s technology and capabilities, as well as additional cash investment from Visa, to expedite their commercial launch.