Participated · Seed · Sep 2022

Kippa provides a bookkeeping and payments platform that lets small businesses track daily income and expenses, create invoices and receipts, manage inventory, and monitor operations over time. Launched by Kennedy Ekezie-Joseph, Duke Ekezie and Jephthah Uche, the app has grown to accommodate over 500,000 small businesses and serves merchants across all 774 local governments in Nigeria. The company reports annualized transactions on the platform have exceeded $3 billion, roughly ten times its volume from the prior November. Kippa has added products such as a fast incorporation service (registering businesses in three days for N15,000) and recently obtained a Central Bank of Nigeria Super Agent licence to let merchants offer cash withdrawals, deposits, account openings, bill payments and insurance. The team has recruited former regulators and senior executives from firms like OPay, BharatPe, Khatabook, TeamApt, OKCredit and NIBSS. Kippa has paused expansion of its credit and lending arm while it builds transactional data to support a healthier loan book, though it holds lending licences in Lagos and Abuja. Kippa is a Nigerian startup offering a finance-management app that lets small business owners record daily income and expenses, create invoices and receipts, manage inventory, and monitor business performance. A key feature is debtor tracking with automated reminders, which the company says helps merchants recover debts three times faster. Kippa launched in June and claims average growth of 126% month-on-month since then, with over 130,000 active businesses using the app. The company says it has recorded more than $300 million in the past five months across its users. Kippa is currently free for businesses and plans to introduce credit, digital payments, savings, and other financial services, monetizing via commissions or interest on lending and working capital. The startup was founded in February 2021 by Kennedy Ekezie, Duke Ekezie, and Jephthah Uche and aims to scale merchant adoption and integrate users into the financial ecosystem.

Led · Seed · Sep 2015

RoomKey supplies hotels with a suite of mobile guest services, including mobile check-in, smartphone-based room keys, in-app concierge chat and the ability for travelers to book stays directly through the app. The company targets boutique properties that typically cannot afford mobile tech used by large chains. Hotels pay RoomKey a flat $800 per month for software access, plus a per-room fee for Bluetooth door-lock hardware that turns phones into keys. Currently the platform is live in about 30 hotels, and management reports more than 100 additional properties in the onboarding pipeline. Future revenue will come from ancillary upsells like last-minute room upgrades and on-property activity bookings. RoomKey also intends to move beyond the boutique segment and is already collaborating with larger brands such as Omni Hotels & Resorts. The recent funding will support onboarding new hotels and expanding the company’s sales team.