ImaliPay raises $3M seed to extend financial services to underserved gig workers in Africa
ImaliPay, an African one-stop-shop financial services platform, has raised a $3 million seed in debt and equity round to extend financial services to underserved gig workers in Africa.
Leonis Investments and follow-on investors from VCs such as Ten 13, Uncovered Fund, MyAsia VC, Jedar Capital, Logos Ventures, Plug N Play Ventures, Untapped Global Latam Ventures, Cliff Angels, Chandaria Capital, and Changecom. Angel investors like Keisuke Honda of KSK Angels and others from Serbia, Kenya, and Norway participated in the round.
Tatenda Furusa and Oluwasanmi Akinmusire founded ImaliPay in 2020 after Furusa noticed the challenges ride-hailing drivers faced when accessing working capital or emergencies like running out of fuel.
“One time, a Bolt driver ran out of fuel in Nairobi when I was coming from the airport and couldn’t top off immediately. It triggered me to think of what other pains these gig workers might be experiencing,” he said.
“We researched the gig economy and found that some financial services neglected them. And we saw that we were perfectly placed on building a fintech solving the problems of Africa’s gig economy workers, freelancers, and self-employed digital workers.”
ImaliPay began by offering a buy now, pay later (BNPL) gasoline product for two-wheeler gig platforms, partnering with a few petrol stations in Ibadan, Nigeria, to provide this service to SafeBoda riders.
The startup then built a partner ecosystem in which some partners provide access to new consumers while others maintain the ecosystem and marketplace.
“Around replacement parts, cell phones, power banks, savings and investments, and insurance combined with those things, we built out other services,” Furusa added. “So, similar to accident insurance and income protection loss insurance, we’ve combined these products so that gig workers may qualify for each depending on their transactional behavior.”
The former is primarily due to the gig platforms. Bolt, Glovo, SWVL, Amitruck, Safeboda, Gokada, and Max.ng are among its 15 partners in this area.
Vendors who deal with gasoline, spare parts, mobile phones, and other products needed by gig workers make up the difference. In addition, ImaliPay has worked with other gig platforms in Kenya and South Africa to provide additional financial services like insurance and savings.
Lami, Cowrywise, Ola Energy, Total Energies, HiFi Corporation, and Britam are among the 35 companies involved. In this case, it provides these financial services to gig workers by linking its APIs to partner firms or directly via an independent app, chatbot, and USSD, and the company can expand its network.
ImaliPay’s user base has expanded 60 times in less than 15 months since its introduction. According to the startup, these “tens of thousands” of gig workers use the startup’s services through 4,500 vendor points. In addition, over 200,000 transactions have been completed on ImaliPay’s platform. Transaction and referral fees are how the startup makes money.
ImaliPay previously raised $800,000 in a pre-seed round in the year 2020. This most recent funding will grow the workforce, enhance the technical infrastructure, and expand into new African markets, including Ghana and Egypt.