The Finplus Group has been selected for the first ever Google Black Founders Fund in Africa. The funding program will see Google award up to Ksh. 11 million (USD 100,000) in dilution-free funding, plus a further Ksh. 24 million (USD 220,000) in Cloud credits and Ad grants as well as technical and scaling assistance from domain experts within Google and its network.
Finplus is a Kenyan technology company that provides white-label digital finance and e-commerce software to Banks, Consumer goods companies and SME retailers. Their software enables banks and micro-lenders to lend to SMEs at scale, helps consumer goods companies to digitize sales through Finplus’ vertical e-commerce platform Agiza.io. The platform also unlocks access to an instant line of credit for tens of millions of SMEs and individuals in emerging markets.
Since its inception in 2017, Finplus has already processed over Ksh. 66 billion (USD 600 million) in transaction value across 5 African markets including Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Eswatini and South Africa). The firm has also enabled more than 400,000 unique and innovative SMEs and individuals to access credit and saved business customers over 500,000 man-hours through automation.
Commenting on the selection to the Google Black Founders Fund, CEO and Co-Founder Kageni Wilson had this to say, “We are proud to have been selected for funding and support by Google’s Black Founders Fund. Finplus is building a new kind of credit and commerce infrastructure for emerging markets, which is incredibly ambitious work in largely uncharted territory. To succeed we must employ a creative mix of both old and new technologies in innovative ways.”