Nigeria’s ThankUCash secures $5.3M to build infrastructure for cashback, deals and BNPL services
Loyalty, deals and rewards services are a rarity in most African markets. The unit economics and other factors such as currency instability make such businesses hard to pull off in the region .
So as customers request loans, we generate a code for it, customers input it into the POS machine and the merchant gets credited directly
Yet, ThankUCash, a platform launched in 2018 by Connected Analytics, has managed to thrive, proving that not all is gloom in the deals, coupon and rewards business . And to that end, the startup, which announced an undisclosed seven-figure seed last year, has finally closed the round at $5.3 million .
VC firms 500 Global and Unicorn Growth Capital co-led the Lagos-based company’s seed round . It saw participation from U.S.-based accelerator Expert Dojo, Predictive VC, SaaS Growth Ventures, Betatron Venture Group, Accelerex Holdings. Individual investors like Andrew Dell, former CEO of HSBC and Craig Fenton of Google UK also took part.
The company plans to use the investment to expand within its home market Nigeria – where it operates in Lagos, Port Harcourt and Abuja – and outside to Ghana and Kenya. It also wants to improve its product offerings and add more staff.
For years, store-like businesses in Nigeria such as supermarkets and restaurants have operated offline, relying on bookkeeping and head knowledge to record their customers’ activities in their shops.
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