Visa invests in four fintech startups: Oze, Workpay, OkHi, and ORDA

Visa have announced investments in four African fintech startups – Oze, Workpay, OkHi, and ORDA – each offering digital solutions tailored to address key financial and logistical challenges in African markets. 

Having recently graduated from Visa’s Africa Fintech Accelerator programme, meet the startups:

ORDA Africa (Nigeria, Kenya, South Africa): Serving the food service sector, ORDA offers cloud-based software to over 1,500 restaurants, supporting everything from order processing and inventory management to financial services—allowing these businesses to optimise operations and scale more efficiently. ORDA Africa was co-founded in 2020 by Guy Futi, Fikayo Akinwale, Mark Edomwande, Kunle Ogungbamila, and Namir El-Khouri.

Oze (Ghana): Focused on small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), Oze provides digital record-keeping tools and financial products to help African businesses manage transactions, access capital, and grow sustainably. Oze also uses machine learning to improve credit access for SMEs.

Workpay (Kenya): Workpay offers a HR and payroll platform that simplifies employee management, payroll processing, and benefits administration. The platform supports businesses in 35 countries across Africa, allowing them to efficiently manage the employee lifecycle with features like time tracking, performance management, and “employer of record” services.

OkHi (Nigeria): Specialising in digital address verification, OkHi provides businesses with a tool to accurately collect, verify, and navigate customer addresses, which is needed for improving service delivery and expanding access to financial products in Nigeria and beyond.

Following this cohort’s success, Visa plans to host a “Demo Day” for the second group of startups in December 2024, in Cape Town, South Africa, where participants will have the chance to showcase their projects to investors and potential partners. 

Visa’s Africa Fintech Accelerator, launched in 2023, is part of its broader strategy to support African startups from the Seed to Series A stages, and aligns with a Visa’s 2022 pledge to invest $1 billion in Africa by 2027 to strengthen regional financial systems, promote innovation, and deepen partnerships with African businesses.

With backing from companies like Amazon Web Services, which provides free cloud services to program participants, Visa aims to create a support system for Africa’s fintech sector.