Waza Secures $8M in Equity and Debt Funding

Launched in January 2023 by Maxwell Obi and Emmanuel Igbodudu, Waza is a B2B payment and liquidity product backed by Y Combinator. Waza is providing solutions to the liquidity needs of large enterprises and multinationals with cross-border payment platforms. The startup offers African businesses a more effective payment settlement system, specifically targeting B2B consumers or payments.

To expand its growth and further cement the startup as a reliable payment platform for African B2B, Waza closed its seed round with $8M after securing $5M from Timon Capital for debt financing; with this, the startup will pilot its trade financing for larger enterprise clients.

The startup also secured equity funding of $3M from Y Combinator, Byld Ventures, Norrsken Africa, Heirloom VC, Plug and Play Tech Center, Olive Tree Capital, and many others. This funding success resulted from their fast growth, as Waza processed over $280,000 in its first month of launch and currently processes $700 million annualized transaction volume.

Maxwell Obi, the founder of Waza with a rich background in fintech, elaborated on the company’s value proposition: “Cross-border payments in the context of trade is for businesses to pay their suppliers fast and expect the product to come quickly as exchange rate plays a part in how much they make. So our value proposition has always been on affordability and speed of settlement” This statement underscores Waza’s commitment to addressing key pain points in international transactions, leveraging Obi’s extensive experience from roles at Sendwave, Carbon, and his previous venture, Amplified, to shape the company’s strategic direction and banking partnerships.

The funding keeps Waza’s goal the same; to make business payments in Nigeria and other emerging Africa countries seamless and easy.