Paystack was accepted into Y Combinator in 2016. In 2020 Stripe bought it for over 200 million dollars.
Founded in 2015 by two Nigerian software engineers, Paystack processed more than half of web payments in Nigeria by 2020, and is now part of Stripe.
Paystack was founded in 2015 by Nigerian computer science graduates Shola Akinlade and Ezra Olubi. The company took part in Y Combinator’s Winter 2016 cohort and launched publicly that year.
Funding path
- 2016: 1.3 million dollars of seed funding from investors including Tencent and Comcast Ventures.
- 2018: an 8 million dollar Series A led by Stripe, with Visa and Tencent participating.
- October 2020: Stripe announced its acquisition for over 200 million dollars, one of the largest fintech acquisitions in Africa.
Scale at the time of the deal
Paystack secured payments for around 60,000 merchants. In November 2020 the BBC reported that it processed over 50 percent of all web payments in Nigeria, and counted FedEx, UPS and MTN among its customers. Stripe said Paystack would serve as a growth engine for modern businesses in Africa.
After the acquisition
In May 2021 Paystack expanded to South Africa, its first market outside Nigeria after the deal. In November 2023 Bloomberg reported it was restructuring, scaling back in Europe and the Middle East to focus on African markets.
The company is a case study in focus: take one problem, helping businesses get paid, and solve it well enough that a global leader wants to be part of it.
