Kippa, a Nigerian firm working to improve the performance of small companies throughout the nation with its financial management and payments platform, has reportedly raised $8.4 million in an oversubscribed funding round.

Jephthah Uche, Kennedy Ekezie-Joseph, and Duke Ekezie founded the company in June last year, and it has since attracted funding from organizations including TEN13 VC, Goodwater Capital, Saison Capital, VentureSouq, Crestone VC, Rocketship VC, Vibe Capital, and Horizon Partners.

Kippa stated that the funding would enable it to provide financial products that would help SMEs to increase their operations and expand their team in Nigeria.

In November last year, the firm disclosed its $3.2 million pre-seed funding from Target Global as well as other investors.

Kippa is one of the leading bookkeeping platforms for small and medium-sized enterprises. In the sub-Saharan region, similar service providers include Bamba, Pastel, OZÉ, and Bumpa. 

Kippa has merchants in each of Nigeria's 774 regional administrations, and it has improved the products and services to the merchants. Reportedly, it is due to the challenges and charges in carrying out the entire registration process, most small Nigerian businesses are not registered properly.

The company claimed last week that it has been granted a license to act as a Super-Agent by Nigeria's leading bank, CBN, or the Central Bank of Nigeria, and other agency banking firms TeamApt and OPay.

With the license, companies registered with Kippa can become agents and offer financial services like cash deposits and withdrawals, opening bank accounts, insurance, and bill and utility payments to those customers who visit their small shops to make daily purchases.

According to Kippa, its yearly transaction volume on the platform has now hit $3 billion, which is ten times more than it was in November last year.

Kippa has raised over $11 million in its first full year of business. The firm and its competitors have persuaded investors that the industry in which they serve is large enough for all players to coexist.

Source credit: https://techcrunch.com/2022/09/12/nigerian-financial-management-app-for-merchants-kippa-bags-8-4m-in-new-funding/