If you haven’t heard of Animoca Brands over the last year or so, you haven’t been paying close attention. With a long and growing list of digital entertainment, blockchain, and gaming properties, the eight-year-old, 600-person Hong Kong-based outfit has quietly become one of the most active participants in a world that more and more stakeholders […]
African tech took center stage in 2021
Two years ago, the African tech ecosystem saw newfound attention from global players that translated to the continent’s best year of receiving venture capital. From varying sources, it is estimated up to $2 billion went into African tech startups in 2019. With high-profile visits from the most famous Jacks (Ma and Dorsey), a long-awaited first […]
Airwallex raises $100M at a $5.5B valuation to expand its business banking and payments platform globally
E-commerce and other online businesses are becoming increasingly global in their operations and customer bases, and a startup called Airwallex — which has built a banking solution that addresses the opportunity to provide cross-border financial services — has been seeing a massive surge of activity. To capitalize further on that opportunity, today the company is […]
Airwallex raises $200M at a $4B valuation to double down on business banking
Business, now more than ever before, is going digital, and today a startup that’s building a vertically integrated solution to meet business banking needs is announcing a big round of funding to tap into the opportunity. Airwallex — which provides business banking services both directly to businesses themselves, as well as via a set of […]
African fintech OPay valued at $2B in SoftBank Vision Fund 2-led $400M funding
Chinese-backed and Africa-focused fintech company OPay raised $400 million in new financing led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2, Bloomberg reported Monday, valuing the company at $2 billion. The round, which marks the Fund’s first investment in an African startup, drew participation from existing investors like Sequoia Capital China, Redpoint China, Source Code Capital, and Softbank […]