On Wednesday, March 9, 2022, Yep! announced that it has raised $1.5M in a pre-seed funding round led by pan-African VC Greenhouse Capital.
Olaoluwa Awojoodu, Airende Ojeomogha, and Garry Ottosen launched Yep! a Nigerian digital bank. Payments, remittances, and banking services are all available through the company’s financial app.
The company was founded to address the shortage of essential financial services in rural regions. According to a statement from Awojoodu, the co-founder and CEO, “We want to finance the folks in Lagos and the guys in Ikot Ekpene community.” At the same time, we’re not just looking at Nigeria; we’re looking at a full African play, so it’s really about financial access for Africans, not just those who are digitally enabled but also those who aren’t. We will bring everyone into the digital environment using both digital tools and agent networks.”
The fintech company will serve users who use traditional banks and digital banks. It plans to offer account opening, debit card issuance, bill payment, credit financing services to these online customers, and financial management services to both consumers and enterprises.
The firm intends to expand to merchant loan services. The objective is to set itself apart from the other digital banks operating in Nigeria. It plans to accomplish this by delivering a better experience in getting debt capital for lending purposes — a method in which agency banking providers supply working capital to their agents, who subsequently lend to their end consumers.
According to reports, the firm presently has a $500,000 credit line to help established merchants get started with working capital loans. Its creators are also in talks with international lenders to raise the amount to $10 million by 2022.
Yep! wants to utilize the pre-seed investment to expand its agent network to over 200,000 by the end of 2022 to improve financial inclusion. The funds will also assist the firm in establishing its digital banking services in Nigeria and four other countries. The company’s founders believe they are ripe for the picking since they face less competition than Africa’s most prominent fintech industry.