Nigeria’s Flutterwave raises $250M, reaches $3B valuation

Africa-focused Nigeria-based fintech firm Flutterwave raised $250 million on Wednesday in its single-biggest funding round to date, valuing the fintech startup at more than $3 billion, as it targets acquisitions and mergers and growing the existing customer base.

The newest financing round was led by investors, including Boston-based hedge fund Whale Rock Capital Management and Facebook Inc. co-founder Eduardo Saverin’s venture capital company B Capital Group, Flutterwave said.

Flutterwave has been at the vanguard of a group of companies that have made the Nigerian city of Lagos the hottest fintech ecosystem in Africa, as investors look to tap into a severely underserved market of 200 million Nigerians, millions of whom lack bank accounts.

Founded in 2016 in Nigeria, the San Francisco- headquartered Flutterwave specializes in consumers and individual transfers, one of the numerous fintech firms aiming to facilitate and capitalize on Africa’s booming payments markets.

The completion of the financing round, over two years after Flutterwave announced a partnership with Worldpay and Visa, highlights the growing interest in the fledgling payments market in Africa.

Since its inception, Flutterwave has processed over 200 million transactions valued at more than $16 billion across 34 countries in Africa, the company announced. The fintech firm serves over 900,000 customers.