The drive to innovate across Africa is on the rise, with a thriving startup ecosystem underpinning its potential as a technological powerhouse. Home to the youngest and fastest-growing population in the world, the continent today is more connected than ever before, with internet users jumping more than 350% in the past ten years.

Amid this rapid digital evolution, fintech continues to be the leading vertical for investment within the broader African tech landscape. Since 2000, African fintechs have cumulatively raised $6 billion in equity financing, reflecting strong investor confidence in a sector expected to reach $65 billion in revenue by 2030 – a 13-fold increase from 2021. Despite a global slowdown in fintech funding in the past year, the long-term forecast for Africa appears optimistic, driven by a young and tech-savvy demographic that creates fertile ground for fintech solutions, coupled with an increasingly supportive ecosystem.

Recognizing this vast potential, the Visa Africa Fintech Accelerator program continues its commitment to uplifting fintech. Since its inception in 2023, the Accelerator has enabled up to 45 startups a year to take part in an intensive 12-week program offering mentorship, resources, and opportunities to secure funding, reflecting Visa’s mission to champion fintech solutions across industries.

‘Accelerator’ momentum continues

Now in its 3rd cohort, the Visa Africa Fintech Accelerator has announced 19 new startups shortlisted to participate in its biannual program. Representing 21 African countries and diverse subsectors—from embedded finance and SME lending to digital banking—the startups will gain access to tools, connections, and expertise to scale their solutions, aligning with Visa’s ongoing investment in Africa’s digital transformation. Supporting the entrepreneurial drive of women across the continent, 85% of the startups feature female leadership, rising from less than 50% in the inaugural edition[5].

The three-month program will conclude with an exclusive in-person Demo Day, offering startups the opportunity to showcase their groundbreaking solutions to an audience of investors, industry leaders, and potential partners.

Support for participating startups extends beyond the parameters of the program. Recently, Visa announced strategic investments in four fintechs—Oze, Workpay, OkHi, and ORDA—that graduated from the Accelerator’s inaugural cohort. This continued commitment spotlights Visa’s dedication to fostering digital growth throughout Africa, helping to bolster financial development and inclusion in every corner of the continent.

The 19 startups participating in Cohort 3 of the Visa Africa Fintech Accelerator include:

1. Credable (Kenya)
   Credable is a digital banking platform that helps businesses and financial institutions across the Middle East and Africa (MEA) embed financial services into their core offerings.
2. Fixa (Rwanda)
   Fixa is an end-to-end staffing platform. Their software enables quick sourcing and deployment of on-demand blue-collar workers to businesses across Africa.
3. Kacha (Ethiopia)
   Kacha is the first fully licensed private payment instrument issuer in Ethiopia, offering mobile money, bill payments, and remittances through their platform.
4. Melanin Kapital (Kenya)
   Melanin Kapital is building a carbon neobank for African businesses to access green loans and carbon credits.
5. Umba (Kenya)
   Umba is a fully licensed digital microfinance bank, offering bank accounts and financial services to customers in Kenya and Nigeria.
6. Zendawa (Kenya)
   Zendawa is enabling neighborhood pharmacies to sell online and use embedded finance services.
7. Enza (Egypt)
8. Enza helps banks better engage SMEs with mobile-led acceptance and extends banks’ current offerings to SMEs with lending and deposits.
9. Moneco (Algeria)
   Moneco is a neobank that links Europe to Africa with the aim of easing access to bank accounts for the African diaspora.
10. MoneyHash (Egypt)
    MoneyHash consolidates multiple payment APIs into a single integration point, simplifying the payment and routing process for their merchants.
    WafR (Morocco)
    WafR has developed a digital wallet that allows informal merchants to market financial services across Morocco.
11. Block Markets Africa (South Africa)
    Block Markets Africa uses real-world asset tokenization to build open financial markets infrastructure (FMI) and institutional applications.
12. Jabu (Namibia)
    Jabu provides a suite of cash management and digital financial service products across Southern Africa.
13. Ordev (South Africa)
    Ordev is an aggregated middleware platform that integrates digital services and providers for retail and hospitality businesses across Africa.
14. Sticitt (South Africa)
    Sticitt simplifies school-related payments to increase collections from parents and the wider community while reducing admin work.
15. Bumpa (Nigeria)
    Bumpa is powering digital commerce for retail and D2C businesses in Africa.
16. Kredete (Nigeria)
    Kredete is a digital lending marketplace that provides an all-in-one credit infrastructure for borrowers and lenders across the continent.
17. NearPays (Nigeria)
    NearPays is a full-service payment platform for businesses to pay, accept payments, transfer funds, and track cash flow.
18. PaySika (Cameroon)
    PaySika is building the first challenger bank in Central Africa, empowering both individuals and SMEs to receive IBANs and transfer money across Africa.
19. WeWire (Ghana)
    WeWire is a B2B cross-border payments solution to help businesses easily collect and pay their vendors, suppliers, and trade partners.