Nigerian wealthtech Cowrywise raises $3m pre-Series A
Nigerian start-up, Cowrywise, has closed a $3 million pre-Series A funding round.
According to TechCrunch, the investment was led by Quona Capital, with participation from the Tsadik Foundation, Gumroad CEO Sahil Lavingia, and a syndicate of local Nigerian angel investors in the diaspora.
The co-founders aim to democratise Nigerians’ access to savings and investment products.
The digital wealth management and financial planning solutions platform aims to digitise investment management for Africans and enable access to savings and investment products securely.
The start-up prides itself on helping the underserved such as Africa’s middle-class individuals and millennials to better manage their wealth.
Cowrywise was co-founded by Ahmed Razaq CEO and Edward Popoola chief technology officer (CTO). The pair came up with the idea to found the fintech in 2017, after noticing that existing investment management firms only focused on catering to the top 1%, leaving millions of Nigerians neglected.
While banking services have been able to make more progress on this front for other customers, the quality of their resources has drastically changed, doing very little to support those who continue to go underserved when it comes to investment products.
Together, they aimed to democratise Nigerians’ access to savings and investment products to both the growing middle class and millennial populations.
See also: Nigerian challenger bank Kuda raises $10m in seed funding
“Wealth management had been strange to many Nigerians because the existing players were not built for the mass market,” Ahmed tells TechCrunch. “That has always been a problem we felt required a solution.”
For this reason, both founders dedicated the company’s mission to leveraging the telecom industry’s reach in order to extend its investment products to its large consumer base.
“Our mutual fund partners clearly recognise the value of being part of an inclusive digital platform that allows retail investors to invest regardless of faith or financial status,” Ahmed says.
“Razaq, Edward, and the Cowrywise team are providing everyday Nigerians with easy access to powerful and flexible wealth-generating tools that have typically been reserved for people who are already wealthy,” partner, Johan Bosini, tells TechCrunch. “In a market of 200 million people, we think this will be very impactful for individuals to have more control over their financial future.”
The hope for Cowrywise is to increase its number of subscribers, expand its product offerings, support more fund managers in Nigeria and further build out its investment management infrastructure.
The company previously raised more than $500,000 through a combination of equity financing and grants.
Similar Nigerian financial planning firms include Prospa, which set out to build a platform for African entrepreneurs in May 2019, and KiaKia, a lending investment mobile app.
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