When it comes to digital bookkeeping, Nigeria and the whole of Sub-Saharan Africa remains an untapped market dripping with growth opportunities for startups. The Nigerian bookkeeping market alone is worth $200 billion. This is because the majority of small businesses still depend much on paper and pen in keeping their transactional records.

For many startups like Kippa, Pastel, Bamba, OZÉ and Bumpa that have taken up the job to provide digitized records for Small, Medium Enterprises (SMEs), Sub-Saharan Africa has provided huge markets that keep investors running after these startups.

Thus, Kippa, a Nigerian fintech startup serving small businesses, announced that it has raised $8.4 million in a seed round.

The investment, which the startup said will allow it to develop financial products that help SMEs grow their businesses and expand its operation in Nigeria, was backed by Goodwater Capital, TEN13 VC, Rocketship VC, Saison Capital, Crestone VC, VentureSouq, Horizon Partners and Vibe Capital.

“We expect the number of digitally active small businesses to grow exponentially over the next three to five years. As more small businesses come online, Kippa will own the money button on the devices of these merchants,” Kippa CEO Kennedy Ekezie-Joseph said.

Kippa offers financial management services that include payments and bookkeeping to SMEs in sub-Saharan Africa. The fintech which was launched in June 2021 by Kennedy Ekezie-Joseph, Duke Ekezie and Jephtha Uche, saw the seed round oversubscribed. It had earlier in November last year, announced its $3.2 million in a pre-seed round led by Target Global.

Digital documentation offered by startups like Kippa is helping small businesses to make a shift to digital life by moving their inventory tracking, staff and sales records from offline to online. This means that their records are protected from unforeseen events like fire, and they can be accessed from anywhere in the world. This minimizes risks for small businesses and helps them to keep track of their financial flow.

Lack of proper record-keeping is said to be responsible for almost nine out of 10 small businesses fizzling out in the first five years.

Startups like Kippa, through their digital bookkeeping services, now offer small businesses the opportunity to change their story. Kippa’s CEO told TechCrunch in an interview last November that the startup had more than 130,000 active businesses consisting of kiosks, street corner shops, local food vendors and high-end merchants in its customer-base.

The customer-base has since then grown to have over 500,000 small businesses, signifying a massive growth within a short period.

Kippa said its services are available across Nigeria with its merchants scattered across the country’s 774 Local Government Areas. But there is a huge challenge that it has found a way to overcome to clear the path for growth. Kippa said the majority of small businesses in Nigeria are not formally registered. This is due to cost and the complex process of registering businesses with the Corporate Affairs Commission, Nigeria’s business registration agency.

The company said to beat the challenge; it has to make registration cheaper and the process easier for small businesses.

“We’ve built a product on top of the current Kippa product that allows businesses to register in 3 days for N15,000,” said Ekezie-Kennedy indicating his platform’s alternative to help these businesses incorporate legally. This feature forms the basis for Kippa’s plans to stack financial products besides getting significant traction and driving more revenue, the CEO added.

Besides its core bookkeeping business, Kippa is planning to establish itself on other financial services fronts. The company announced last week that it has secured a license from Nigeria’s central bank to operate as a Super Agent, which means, merchants on Kippa’s platform can offer some financial services such as cash withdrawals and deposits, bank account opening, bills and utility payments, and insurance to their individual customers.

“We have over 500,000 merchants on our app and there’s a lot of opportunities for us to do more for them and provide more financial services,” said Ekezie-Joseph. “The super agent license allows merchants and typical neighborhood shops who already use our bookkeeping app into a one-stop-shop for essential financial services for their customers.”

Kippa said annualized transactions on its platform have already exceeded $3 billion, a milestone for a company of its age that has raised $11 million in a full year of operation.

In anticipation of a future boom, the startup has embarked on a hiring spree. Kippa said it has recruited ex-regulators and senior executives at startups like OPay, BharatPe, Khatabook, TeamApt, OKCredit, NIBSS, and Unified Payments, amongst others. Some of them include Toyin Albert as executive director of payments services, Osagie Alonge as director of marketing and Niyi Ajao, the ex-deputy managing director at Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System (NIBSS) as chairman.

“Our mission is to make it easy for anyone to start and run profitable small businesses in Africa. It is why we are building a full suite of software and financial services that enables this ambition, thereby empowering African business owners. We say this because we’ve spent time understanding their most significant needs,” said Ekezie-Joseph.

This is really embarrassing: some police special constables in Osun State have not been paid for 18 months. ‘The constables gathered at the Oke-Fia roundabout and moved through Alekunwodo to the Olaiya areas of Osogbo, the capital of Osun State. They were dressed in the police uniform and carried placards with inscriptions like “Pay us now,” “We’re dying,” We’re hungry,” “18 months no kobo,” , etc’, Premium Times reports.

But before you go after the police leadership, there is an extended part of this story: the constables are volunteers and what that means is that they are not expected to be paid. And if that is indeed what it is, you have a real problem since bankers, oil and gas engineers, startup founders, etc are not joining this voluntary service. 

In other words, those volunteering  and carrying guns are largely unemployed and the government knows that. So, expecting them to work for nothing over 18 months means we are essentially saying “extort citizens in police uniforms because there is nothing for you here”.  We must fix that loophole if that is what it is; phase the program out, or put them in payroll, because those who can afford to work for government for free, are not likely to wear police unicorns!

The police spokesperson noted that the state government or local government who is capable can finance the constabularies.

“Notwithstanding, the State government or local government where they are serving may decide to give stipends to the members of the special Constabularies recruited by them for this assignment in their State, which does not interfere or change the constitution of the scheme,” Mrs Opalola added.

“The Command hereby state unequivocally that, the Community Policing Constabulary Scheme of the Force is a purely voluntary service which is Federal Government initiative to improve security at the grassroots through training and incorporate individuals with prior paid employment who desire to spend their spare time assisting the police in its simple police tasks within their various communities.”

“It should be noted that the scheme is to promote community partnership in crime control via the presence of respected members of the public, with sources of livelihood, partnering with the Force under the scheme to render voluntary service for better and improved policing within their communities,” she added.

Join me to welcome Victor Ekpenyong Scholars to Tekedia CollegeBoost, a mini-MBA for college students. I thank SAFOUNDATIONNG, Tekedia Institute campus ambassadors and all partners who helped on the selection.

My understanding is that more than 500 applied within hours for only 30 slots we have. The good news is that we have a scholarship for 1,000 students coming up. The team always posts scholarship opportunities at Tekedia Institute; I also try to reshare on my handle. So, keep the channel here.

To all the new scholars, welcome to Tekedia Institute.