Africa’s Largest Fintech Company Acquires YC-Backed Open Banking Startup
Flutterwave, Africa’s largest payments technology company, has acquired Nigerian open banking startup Mono in an all-stock deal valued between $25 million and $40 million, TechCrunch reports.
The acquisition brings one of Africa’s most prominent open banking companies under the Flutterwave umbrella, as the payments giant looks to expand its infrastructure beyond transactions into data and financial services. According to a press release, Mono will continue to operate independently under its existing leadership team.
Mono: Africa’s Answer To Plaid
Founded in 2020 and backed by investors like Y Combinator, Mono builds APIs that allow businesses to securely access bank account data, verify customers, and initiate account-to-account payments. The company is often compared to Plaid, the US open banking firm, because of its role in connecting banks, fintechs, and lenders through standardized data access.
Mono has raised $17.5 million from investors including Tiger Global, General Catalyst, and Ventures Platform. In Nigeria, it has become a key part of the lending ecosystem, reporting more than 8 million bank account connections and billions of financial data points processed.
Access to reliable banking data remains a major constraint for credit providers across much of Africa, where many people and small businesses lack formal credit histories. Tools like Mono’s help lenders better understand who they are lending to by verifying income and financial activity, filling gaps left by limited or underdeveloped credit bureaus.
Flutterwave Expands Its Payments Infrastructure
Flutterwave operates in more than 30 African countries and is best known for enabling cross-border payments for businesses and merchants. By acquiring Mono, the company gains direct access to open banking infrastructure that can be integrated into its broader payments platform.
“Payments, data, and trust cannot exist in silos,” Olugbenga ‘GB’ Agboola, Founder and CEO of Flutterwave, said. “Open banking provides the connective tissue, and Mono has built critical infrastructure in this space.”
According to Flutterwave, the acquisition will allow it to expand into services such as identity verification, risk assessment, and deeper account-to-account payment flows. Over time, this could also support newer payment models, including stablecoin-based transactions, by strengthening compliance and trust layers.
What the Deal Signals for African Fintech
Mono founder and CEO Abdulhamid Hassan said the acquisition supports broader efforts to expand access to credit, particularly as regulators and governments push for more formal lending markets. Better access to standardized bank data, he said, makes it simpler for financial institutions to assess borrowers and meet regulatory requirements.
“We built Mono to unlock Africa’s Open Banking potential,” said Hassan. “Since our first partnership with Flutterwave in 2021 and working together over the years, we’ve seen the power of a coordinated effort towards this goal.”
The deal also highlights a growing shift in African fintech, where large payments companies are choosing to bring data access and compliance tools in-house rather than relying on external providers. According to TechCrunch, the acquisition offers Mono’s early investors returns of up to 20-fold at a time when startup funding has slowed. For Flutterwave, it signals a move toward owning more of the technology behind how money, data, and trust flow across African financial systems.
Image credits: Flutterwave, Mono
