Paystack plans to leverage acquisition to expand across Africa
Nigeria’s fintech startup, Paystack has been acquired by payment giant, Stripe for more than $200 million, Techcrunch reports.
According to the report, Stripe is acquiring Paystack in an acquisition deal worth over $200 million, citing undisclosed sources.
Stripe said the plan is for Paystack, which currently has around 60,000 customers, including small businesses, larger corporates, fintech, educational institutions, and online betting companies, to continue operating independently, according to the Techcrunch report.
The acquisition of Paystack for that sum makes it the biggest startup acquisition to date to come out of Nigeria, as well as Stripe’s biggest acquisition to date anywhere, the report noted.
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“There is enormous opportunity,” said Patrick Collison, Stripe’s co-founder and CEO, in an interview with TechCrunch. “In absolute numbers, Africa may be smaller right now than other regions, but online commerce will grow about 30% every year. And even with wider global declines, online shoppers are growing twice as fast. Stripe thinks on a longer time horizon than others because we are an infrastructure company. We are thinking of what the world will look like in 2040-2050.”
For Paystack, the deal will give the company a lot more fuel (that is, investment) to build out further in Nigeria and expand to other markets, CEO Shola Akinlade said in an interview.
“Paystack was not for sale when Stripe approached us,” said Akinlade, who co-founded the company with Ezra Olubi (who is the CTO). “For us, it’s about the mission. I’m driven by the mission to accelerate payments on the continent, and I am convinced that Stripe will help us get there faster. It is a very natural move.”
