Grey, a Nigerian fintech that provides virtual international bank accounts to African freelancers and remote workers, has raised $2 million in seed funding to ease digital transactions across the continental borders.
The fintech startup was founded in July 2020 as an instant exchange service to help Nigerians exchange foreign currencies in their domiciliary account for Naira and by last year had raised some pre-seed investment and got accepted into Y Combinator (YC), an American technology startup accelerator’s, winter batch this March.
Following the support by the YC, Grey has since, through collaboration with payments giant Cellulant and edtech upstart Moringa, expanded into East Africa, starting with Kenya.
Grey Co-founder and CEO, Idorenyin Obong, explained that the Nigerian fintech partnered Cellulant to “power our payment infrastructure for Kenyan shillings,” adding that “Moringa is like an avenue and channel for training new tech talent, so it made sense to have such a partnership as we are trying to build this for freelancers.”
According to him, with the collaboration, users in Nigeria and Kenya can receive foreign payments from over 88 countries using USD, GBP, and EUR bank accounts created on the platform, convert them into their local currencies and withdraw directly to their mobile money or local bank account.
In addition, users in both countries can also send money to the UK and Europe on the platform.
Obong also hinted that the fintech startup had upped its functionality to support payouts in the Ugandan shillings, bringing the total number of supported currencies to six.
Although the service is yet to be launched in the country, Obong said Uganda remained in Grey’s regional purview even as he hinted that the fintech will expand into Tanzania within a month.
Currently, Grey claims to have about 100,000 individual users, and since the beginning of the year, its transaction volumes have increased by 200%.
The startup’s Chief Operating Officer (COO), Femi Aghedo, said the company privately launched a business-focused product, Grey Business, to complement this consumer-facing growth and extend its product beyond remittances and person-to-person payments.
He expatiated: “Sending money worldwide is not just an individual problem; it affects African businesses too. Over the last two months, we’ve on-boarded several African businesses to our private beta. Honestly, when I listen to the feedback about how much we’ve simplified a previously complex process, it pushes us to do more.”
Investors in the latest Grey Seed Funding round include venture firms such as Y Combinator, Soma Capital, Heirloom Fund, True Culture Fund and angels like Alan Rutledge, Samvit Ramadurgam and Karthik Ramakrishnan.
Grey, a Nigerian fintech that provides virtual international bank accounts to African freelancers and remote workers, has raised $2 million in seed funding to ease digital transactions across the continental borders.
The fintech startup was founded in July 2020 as an instant exchange service to help Nigerians exchange foreign currencies in their domiciliary account for Naira and by last year had raised some pre-seed investment and got accepted into Y Combinator (YC), an American technology startup accelerator’s, winter batch this March.
Following the support by the YC, Grey has since, through collaboration with payments giant Cellulant and edtech upstart Moringa, expanded into East Africa, starting with Kenya.
Grey Co-founder and CEO, Idorenyin Obong, explained that the Nigerian fintech partnered Cellulant to “power our payment infrastructure for Kenyan shillings,” adding that “Moringa is like an avenue and channel for training new tech talent, so it made sense to have such a partnership as we are trying to build this for freelancers.”
According to him, with the collaboration, users in Nigeria and Kenya can receive foreign payments from over 88 countries using USD, GBP, and EUR bank accounts created on the platform, convert them into their local currencies and withdraw directly to their mobile money or local bank account.
In addition, users in both countries can also send money to the UK and Europe on the platform.
Obong also hinted that the fintech startup had upped its functionality to support payouts in the Ugandan shillings, bringing the total number of supported currencies to six.
Although the service is yet to be launched in the country, Obong said Uganda remained in Grey’s regional purview even as he hinted that the fintech will expand into Tanzania within a month.
Currently, Grey claims to have about 100,000 individual users, and since the beginning of the year, its transaction volumes have increased by 200%.
The startup’s Chief Operating Officer (COO), Femi Aghedo, said the company privately launched a business-focused product, Grey Business, to complement this consumer-facing growth and extend its product beyond remittances and person-to-person payments.
He expatiated: “Sending money worldwide is not just an individual problem; it affects African businesses too. Over the last two months, we’ve on-boarded several African businesses to our private beta. Honestly, when I listen to the feedback about how much we’ve simplified a previously complex process, it pushes us to do more.”
Investors in the latest Grey Seed Funding round include venture firms such as Y Combinator, Soma Capital, Heirloom Fund, True Culture Fund and angels like Alan Rutledge, Samvit Ramadurgam and Karthik Ramakrishnan.
