Less than 10% of payments in Africa occur through digital channels, signifying an immense opportunity for financial institutions on the continent. McKinsey estimates that revenue in the electronic payments sector will grow by 20% each year, reaching $40 billion in 2025.
Despite this opportunity and a growing number of players in the space, payments remain a pain for many businesses. However, payment orchestration startups like Revio help to simplify the process by providing businesses with an API for seamless payment collection.
The three-year-old startup has raised a $5.2 million seed round led by QED Investors, and is the firm's third investment in an African startup following its Moniepoint and Remedial Health investments. Speedinvest, Ralicap, Everywhere VC, and Partech joined the round.
QED's previous investments in Moniepoint and Remedial Health have been growth-stage investments, but after breaking from tradition, Ruaan Botha, Revio's CEO, hopes it spurs other investors to join the early-stage investing train.
Revio provides businesses with over 70 payment options, ensuring that their customers can choose any convenient payment option. It also provides a revenue recovery tool, enabling its users to reduce payment failures. Companies that use this service can re-engage users through WhatsApp, email, or SMS to recover payments.
Currently serving 25 African countries, the startup serves 50 clients, including Standard Bank, Flutterwave, Old Mutual, Innovation Group, and Alpha Direct. It has also seen 1000% revenue growth in the last year but has slightly changed its target market.
"We’re going for very high-value clients that have very complex payment needs. We’ve switched off things like product-led onboarding to being able to build and dominate in the enterprise sales. These companies are typically in multiple markets but headquartered in Africa, or recurring revenue businesses that are somewhat underserved and have unique risks and complexities around collecting payment tokenization and tackling high failure rates. They’re the ones that benefit from Revio’s services," Co-Founder and COO, Nicole Dunn said.
