African fintech startup, Chipper cash reaches Unicorn status as they raise $100M series C funding

Chipper Cash, a fintech startup that facilitates cross-border payment across Africa has raised $100 million in a Series C round.

This funding round was led by SVB Capital, the investment arm of U.S. high-tech commercial bank, Silicon Valley Bank. Others who participated in this round include existing investors — Deciens Capital, Ribbit Capital, Bezos Expeditions, One Way Ventures, 500 Startups, Tribe Capital, and Brue2 Ventures.

Founded in 2018 by Ugandan Ham Serunjogi and Ghanaian Maijid Moujaled, Chipper Cash offers mobile-based, no fee, P2P payment services in seven countries: Ghana, Uganda, Nigeria, Tanzania, Rwanda, South Africa, and Kenya. Now it has expanded to a new market outside Africa, the U.K.

In November 2020, Chipper Cash raised $30 million Series B funding led by Ribbit Capital and Jeff Bezos’ fund, Bezos Expeditions. This was after closing a $13.8 million Series A round from Deciens Capital and other investors in the same year.

According to Tech Crunch, the number of users on Chipper Cash has increased to 4 million, up 33% from last year. The company also averaged 80,000 transactions daily in November 2020 and processed $100 million in payments value in June 2020.

This new funding round will be used to introduce more products and grow its team. The company currently has more than 200 employees and plans to increase its workforce by hiring 100 staff throughout the year.

According to the CEO of Chipper Cash, Ham Serunjogi, “We’ve launched card products in Nigeria and we’ve also launched our crypto product. We’re also launching our US stocks product in Uganda, Nigeria, and a few other countries soon.”

Chipper Cash is currently valued between $1 billion to $2 billion joining billion-dollar companies in Africa like Flutterwave, Jumia, Interswitch, etc. Up until last week, the only private Unicorn startup in Africa this year was Flutterwave. With this new valuation, Chipper Cash has attained Unicorn Status.