Pezesha, a Kenyan fintech that has built a platform where small and medium enterprises can access funding has raised $11 million in a pre-series A equity and debt funding.
The funding was led by Women’s World Banking Capital Partners II with partners such as Verdant Frontiers Fintech Fund, cFund and Input Output Global (IOG) among other VCs.
The startup was founded in 2017 by Hilda Moraa who Is also the CEO. The fintech integrates its services with other lenders, allowing micro, small and medium enterprises(MSMEs) easier access to funding. Through its platforms, business owners seeking capital are matched with investors such as banks, microfinance institutions and other lenders The fintech plans to expand its financing offers to Rwanda, Nigeria, and Francophone Africa, which adds to its current markets in Kenya, Uganda, and Ghana.
“The opportunity and impact in solving working capital problems for SMEs is huge. [We are] solving the root cause, which is information asymmetry issues, to ensure quality and responsible borrowing. Pezesha solves this through our robust API-driven credit scoring technology,” said Moraa.
Pezesha says it has partnered with more than 20 lenders who have allowed it to expand loans to more than 100,000 businesses. Businesses can access loans of up to $10,000 at single-digit interest rates.
“We are building for the future and this means tapping new innovations for additional liquidity that allows us to offer affordable loans to SMEs,” said the CEO.
It hasn’t disclosed how much it has raised so far, but the CEO said 20% of its initial pre-seed investment injected in 2017 was raised from local angels.
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