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FinTech

Amazon CEO backs African fintech Chipper Cash

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Amazon CEO and tech billionaire Jeff Bezos is investing in Africa's fintech startup scene, backing mobile money company Chipper Cash.

According to Bloomberg, the world's richest man's venture capital fund, Bezos Expeditions, has supported a Series B funding round led by Ribbit Capital, which raised $30 million for Chipper Cash.

Over the last few years the continent's growing tech startups ecosystem has attracted interest from tech heavyweights like Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Alibaba founder Jack Ma and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey.

Bezos has previously backed big tech brands like Uber, Twitter and AirBnB but this is the first time he has invested in an Africa-focused venture.

Chipper Cash is a mobile-based, cross-border, peer-to-peer (P2P) payments service which already raised $13.8 million in a Series A funding round earlier this year.

According to Quartz Africa, Chipper Cash was founded by Ugandan Ham Serunjogi and Ghanaian Maijid Moujaled in 2018 and has now deployed its payments service in seven African countries: Ghana, Uganda, Nigeria, Tanzania, Rwanda, South Africa and Kenya.

The cash infusion from Bezos will reportedly help the company widen its mobile money product suite to more business payment solutions, crypto-currency trading options and investment services. It also seems keen to expand its service to more countries.

The company's website says it has 3 million users and is adding 10,000 new users each day and processing 80,000 transactions per day.

*Top image is Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos. (Source: Steve Jurvetson on Flickr CC 2.0)

— The Staff, Connecting Africa

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