PayStack is an API-based payments service similar to Stripe, which allows users to set up online payment gateways to enable their businesses to accept credit and debit card payments online from customers.
Paystack was founded in 2015 by Ezra Olubi and Shola Akinlade but the domain was registered in 2011 as you can see in the image below. Paystack is a Nigerian fintech startup that was just acquired by Stripe for $200 million.
One of the press released by the company stated;
“In order to help grow Africa’s online GDP, Stripe has entered into an agreement to acquire Paystack, a technology company based in Lagos that makes it easy for organizations of all sizes to collect payments from around the world.
“Today, more than 60,000 businesses in Nigeria and Ghana use Paystack to securely collect online and offline payments, launch new business models, and deepen customer relationships.
“Incredibly, Paystack already processes more than half of all online transactions in Nigeria.
Paystack has ambitious plans to expand across the continent and recently started a pilot with businesses in South Africa.“Stripe and Paystack have been working closely together for some time. In 2018, Stripe led Paystack’s Series. Financing round and has provided ongoing guidance as the company rapidly scaled.”
TechCrunch reported on Thursday that Stripe had raised $600 million to invest and acquire payments companies in developing nations. It disclosed that the Nigerian startup had been on Stripe’s bucket list for a while since 2018 when Stripe led an $8 million funding round for PayStack.
It was reported from Sola Akinlade one of the Paystack Co-founder that the company was not up for sale when Stripe initially approached for the acquisition; however, the founders are mission-driven and believed Stripe could accelerate it. Akinlade also disclosed PayStack investors, VISA, and Tencent also approached to acquire the company.
Akinlade Further said.
“Paystack was not for sale when Stripe approached us.
The Founder of Stripe
The CEO of Stripe, Patrick Collison told TechCrunch that the deal with PayStack is an enormous opportunity, as African e-commerce grows by 30% every year, which would give Stripe an early footing in the region.
“In absolute numbers, Africa may be smaller right now than other regions, but online commerce will grow about 30% every year. And even with wider global declines, online shoppers are growing twice as fast.
Stripe thinks on a longer time horizon than others, because we are an infrastructure company. We are thinking of what the world will look like in 2040-2050.”
Patrick Collison also added that Stripe is also planning on understanding the ecosystem and keep its eyes open so it can see where help is needed, as the company does not tie up its investments into “complicated strategic investments.” The announcement of the acquisition was however delayed due to the #Endpolicebrutality and #EndSARS protests going on in Nigeria.
Shola Akinlade noted that the payments ecosystem is still broken and PayStack is still in its early days. PayStack provides payments API for companies and takes a cut from every transaction. The company has 60,000 customers so far, from SMEs to large cooperation,s and would continue to run independently.
Techcrunch also reported that the full terms of the deal were not disclosed. However, they confirmed that it is worth over $200 million, making it the largest tech acquisition in Nigerian corporate history.
According to Crunchbase, PayStack has raised $11.7 million so far.
