In the midst of accusations of fraud and security breaches, Flutterwave is intensifying its efforts to expand its global business operations in the United States and Europe.
Africa’s fintech darling is now generating headlines for its smart business decisions, after a year of being in the news primarily for scandals.
Flutterwave revealed three potential business expansion collaborations in June. The company announced on June 6 that it was working with Token.io, a provider of payment infrastructure, to enable its merchants to reach clients in Europe and the United Kingdom.
June 21: Flutterwave announced that it would offer payment services to Audiomack, a well-known music streaming platform in the United States.
And the business announced the very following day that it had signed a five-year contract with Microsoft to enable Azure transactions throughout the African continent.
The partnership between Flutterwave and Microsoft, which will enable payments to and from Africa, “is an incredible opportunity to impact growth across the continent,” the company stated.
According to CEO Olugbenga Agboola
Flutterwave CEO Olugbenga Agboola stated in an email to Rest of World that the company is now in discussions for further deals of this nature. He remarked, “We have a partnership that will improve international aviation payments for Africans, and we are building something for education payments.”
These two pronouncements come after a year of Flutterwave-shaking scandals. Allegations of mismanagement, administrative errors, sexual harassment, and security breaches have been made against the corporation since April 2022.
Experts, however, feel that Flutterwave—which is practically too big to fail—is likely to overcome the negative publicity and legal challenges because to its size and significance in the African digital industry.
“Flutterwave has established a significant market position that is difficult to rival,” Emeka Ajene, a successful serial entrepreneur and the creator of the early-stage investment firm Afri.capital, stated to Rest of World.
Undoubtedly, the organization and its executives have committed some mistakes. Still, the business generates a lot of value for the fintech and payments ecosystem as a whole as well as its current partners, such as Uber and Netflix.
Former Flutterwave investor Zachariah George is a managing partner at the venture capital firm Launch Africa. He told Rest of World that he thinks the fintech company’s standing and stature in the market helped them land these deals. George stated, “Microsoft needs more retailers in Africa to use Azure.”
Microsoft thus collaborates with Flutterwave to reach these individuals. In the end, it comes down to volume, and Flutterwave has achieved such a large reach over numerous nations.
Undoubtedly, Flutterwave is still reeling from the controversy. A judge in the Kenyan High Court temporarily banned 45 bank accounts and 10 MPesa mobile money wallets owned by Flutterwave in June, concurrently with the company’s announcement of new collaborations.
This came about as a result of a petition that over 2,000 investors filed, alleging that Flutterwave had conspired with 86 Football Technology, a sports betting company, to defraud them of $12.04 million. The claims have been refuted by Flutterwave.
Also Read: 10 Great Business Ideas that Still Make Money
Flutterwave Has Built Such Scale Across Multiple Countries; in The End, It’s a Volume Game.
Rest of World was informed by CEO Agboola that the company’s accounts had been frozen as a formality in a legal lawsuit. He declared, “A baseless and misrepresenting account of the event has been reported by the media.
” Just a year has passed since numerous bank accounts connected to Flutterwave and its affiliated companies, totaling around $200 million, were blocked in Kenya due to suspicions of money laundering. Since then, the court matter has been dropped, and the account lien has been removed.
According to reports, several Flutterwave platform accounts were compromised in February, resulting in losses from consumer payments exceeding $3.6 million. The business refuted this claims, claiming that a review was initiated because its system noticed a “unusual trend of transactions on some users.” However, it later acknowledged in some court filings the security lapse.
African startup public relations professional Victoria Crandall told Rest of World, “For a company that has been vocal about their ambition to go public, they will be shortsighted if they don’t start taking their reputation more seriously and course-correct some of their internal operations.”
“Flutterwave needs to start considering American public opinion if they plan to go public. What will institutional and retail investors think of their governance and culture?”
Also Read: Rajkotupdates.News: What Tax-Saving Strategies Are Available to Small Business Owners?
Rest of World was informed by Ajene that Flutterwave should always be ready to deal with intense public scrutiny because of its position.
According to him, “Flutterwave was and probably still is Africa’s most valuable startup, and many stakeholders on and off the continent view the company as a proxy for Africa’s tech opportunity at large.” “Therefore, the company receives a lot of attention, both positive and negative.”
