Flutterwave, Africa’s leading fintech company valued at $3 billion, has made significant strides in its executive team and product focus as it gears up for the next phase of growth. With the appointment of Mitesh Popat as Chief Financial Officer, the company aims to consolidate its position as a payment powerhouse across the continent.
Popat’s arrival follows a series of strategic moves by Flutterwave to stabilize its operations after the departure of former CFO Oneal Bhambani, who left the company ten months ago. Bhambani’s tenure, though brief, saw Flutterwave navigate a difficult period involving regulatory and legal challenges, particularly in Kenya, where its funds were temporarily frozen. During this time, Flutterwave also made inroads into Rwanda, kickstarted its license application in Kenya, and announced plans to invest over $50 million in expanding its operations in key African markets like South Africa, Nigeria, Tanzania, and Cameroon.
With Popat now on board, Flutterwave’s growth agenda is expected to receive a fresh impetus. This is evident in the fintech’s strategic hire of six additional senior executives across finance, risk, legal, and compliance functions to bolster its leadership structure. According to Flutterwave’s CEO, Olugbenga Agboola, these moves are crucial as the company seeks to optimize for sustainable growth. He remarked, “Mitesh brings the right balance of global and emerging markets experience as we strive to bridge the gap between Africa and the global economy.”
Flutterwave has also restructured its product offerings. Earlier this year, the company shut down its consumer-facing app, Barter, to concentrate on its core products, namely enterprise solutions and remittances. Barter’s discontinuation reflects a strategic shift towards bolstering its flagship product, Flutterwave For Business (FFB), which facilitates payment solutions for banks, startups, and large corporations in sectors like e-commerce, transportation, and FMCG. This enterprise product currently accounts for 90% of the company’s revenue, while its remittance service, Send App, generates the remaining 10%.
Agboola emphasized the rationale behind this pivot, stating, “We are laser-focused on where the majority of our customers are. Businesses want to make more enterprise payments, while retail customers are primarily interested in cross-border transactions. We’re aligning our priorities to meet these demands.”
In tandem with this refocusing, Flutterwave has continued to deepen its presence across Africa, securing licenses in markets like Malawi, Uganda, Ghana, and Mozambique, and expanding to 49 states in the U.S. The company also remains dedicated to its expansion strategy in its core African markets, which include Egypt, Morocco, Nigeria, Ghana, Senegal, Côte d’Ivoire, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya, and Cameroon.
Despite its achievements, Flutterwave is also grappling with challenges tied to its rapid growth. Fraud prevention and cybersecurity are key areas of focus as the fintech scales its operations. Over the past year, the company faced three major security breaches, prompting efforts to strengthen its risk management framework and forge closer collaborations with regulatory bodies like Nigeria’s Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). As part of these efforts, Flutterwave is working with the EFCC to establish a cybersecurity research center that will help the ecosystem combat cybercrime more effectively.
As speculation around a potential IPO swirls, Agboola has made it clear that going public is not a current priority. “Our focus right now is on deepening market penetration and delivering value to our customers. We want to be the infrastructure layer that powers all the key players in payments on the continent, akin to what Adyen has done globally,” he explained.
With an eye on the future, Flutterwave is also expanding its offerings to support customers in various sectors, including entertainment, hospitality, and transport. The company’s approach is to invest heavily in research and development to build features that enable its clients to scale. This strategic emphasis on customer-driven innovation will likely shape the next chapter of Flutterwave’s growth story.
As Africa’s fintech sector continues to evolve, Flutterwave’s efforts to solidify its leadership position through strategic hires, product realignment, and market expansion are positioning it as a formidable player on the global stage.
