PalmPay Funding, Investors & Competitors

PalmPay has raised $140M across 2 funding rounds, most recently a $100M Series A in August 2021.

Last PalmPay funding round

$100M

Series A · Aug 2021

Cumulative funding PalmPay raised

$140M

across 2 funding rounds

Key investors in PalmPay

PalmPay Overview

About PalmPay

PalmPay is a Lagos-headquartered fintech serving 25 million users in Nigeria with digital wallets, money transfers, bill payments, loan services, and savings products. Launched in 2019 by Transsion Holdings, it processes over $1 billion in monthly transactions and holds a top position among mobile money operators regulated by the Central Bank of Nigeria.


Founded

2019

HQ

NigeriaLagos

Status

Privately held

Customer focus

B2C

Revenue model

Commission

PalmPay Funding History

PalmPay has raised a total of $140M across 2 funding rounds.

PalmPay's first fundraising round was a $40M seed round in November 2019. The most recent completed round was a $100M Series A in August 2021.

PalmPay funding rounds

PalmPay funding rounds
DateStageInvestorsRaisedDeal Summary
Aug 2021Series ACyber Creation Ventures (CCV) (lead); Seas Capital; Cretrend Capital; Trust Capital; Yunshi Capital; Changyu Capital; Transsion Holdings; AfricInvest; Chuangshi Ziben; MediaTek$100MPalmPay is an Africa-focused fintech startup providing mobile payments, P2P transactions, cashback rewards, and merchant onboarding services, launched in Nigeria in 2019 with expansion to Ghana. It raised a $100 million Series A funding round on August 30, 2021, matching the specified investors including AfricInvest, Changyu Capital (Chengyu Capital), Chuangshi Ziben (Chuangshi Capital), Cretrend Capital, Cyber Creation Ventures (CCV) as lead, MediaTek, Seas Capital, Transsion (TRANSSION), Trust Capital, and Yunshi Capital. The round was one of the largest equity investments in African fintech that year, alongside deals for Wave, Flutterwave, and OPay. Prior to the Series A, PalmPay had a seed round reportedly around $40 million led by Transsion, enabling partnerships with Chinese mobile brands like Tecno, Infinix, and itel for pre-installing its app on millions of devices, which drove rapid user growth to over 5 million users across Nigeria and Ghana by early 2022. As of June 2021, monthly transaction volume exceeded $100 million. Post-Series A, PalmPay continued expansion plans into markets like Kenya, South Africa, Côte d’Ivoire, Uganda, and Tanzania, building on its total funding reaching $140 million across four rounds by 2023. Later reports in 2025 noted talks for a Series B of $50-100 million to fuel further growth in Africa and Asia.
Nov 2019SeedTranssion Holdings (lead); NetEase; MediaTek$40MPalmPay is an Africa-focused mobile payments startup that launched with a smartphone wallet app offering access to financial services including no-fee installment plans, bill payments, and loyalty rewards. The company was founded with leadership experienced in fintech, including CEO Reeve who previously led mPesa at Vodafone, where he expanded the service to multiple countries and grew its customer base from 11 million to over 30 million users. In November 2019, PalmPay raised $40 million in seed funding led by Transsion (through its Tecno subsidiary), with participation from NetEase and MediaTek. The funding came shortly after PalmPay piloted its service in Nigeria since July 2019 and officially launched in the country in November 2019. As part of the investment, PalmPay secured a strategic partnership with Transsion's mobile brands—Tecno, Infinix, and Itel—to pre-install the app on 20 million phones in 2020, giving it immediate distribution across Africa's largest smartphone brands which collectively held 36.2% of the regional smartphone market share in Q3 2019. PalmPay also partnered with Visa to deliver Visa products through its wallet and provide unbanked users access to the Visa network. The company planned to use the seed funding to expand from Nigeria to Ghana and recruit local teams in both countries, positioning itself to become Africa's largest financial services platform.

Who has invested in PalmPay?

11 investors have backed PalmPay across its funding rounds, including MediaTek, Transsion Holdings, Cyber Creation Ventures (CCV), NetEase, AfricInvest and Seas Capital.

Lead investors include Cyber Creation Ventures (CCV) and Transsion Holdings.


PalmPay Investors

Investors in PalmPay by funding rounds participated
InvestorHQRoundsRoleFirst check
Transsion HoldingsChinaShenzhen2LeadNov 2019
MediaTekTaiwanHsinchu2ParticipantNov 2019
Seas CapitalChinaBeijing1ParticipantAug 2021
Cretrend CapitalChinaBeijing1ParticipantAug 2021
Cyber Creation Ventures (CCV)ChinaBeijing1LeadAug 2021
Trust CapitalJapanTokyo1ParticipantAug 2021
Yunshi CapitalChinaChengdu1ParticipantAug 2021
Changyu CapitalChinaChina1ParticipantAug 2021
AfricInvestTunisiaTunisia1ParticipantAug 2021

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PalmPay Competitors

PalmPay competitors include listed companies like Kaspi.kz, Jio Financial Services, Paytm and Klarna, and private ones like CloudWalk and Upgrade.

Public and private companies comparable to PalmPay
CompanyHQStatusRevenueEBITDAValuationRevenue Multiple
CloudWalkBrazilSão PauloPrivate--$2.1B-
Kaspi.kzKazakhstanKazakhstanPublicly listed$9B$3.2B$18B2.0x
Jio Financial ServicesIndiaIndiaPublicly listed$332M$272M$16B38.1x
PaytmIndiaIndiaPublicly listed$854M$41M$12B11.8x
UpgradeUnited StatesSan Francisco, CAPrivate$1B-$7.5B7.5x
KlarnaSwedenSwedenPublicly listed$3.5B$551M$5.3B1.3x

PalmPay Public Comps

PalmPay is still privately-owned, but its public comps include Capital One, Nubank, Block, PayPal, Adyen, Bajaj Finserv, Shriram Finance, Synchrony, Global Payments and SoFi.

Last FYEV/RevenueEV/EBITDA
RevenueEBITDALast FYLTM2027ELast FYLTM2027E
Capital One$53B-2.3x2.0x--
Nubank$11B-6.3x3.2x--
Block$24B$2.2B1.7x1.6x18.6x9.4x
PayPal$33B$7.2B1.4x1.4x6.6x6.9x
Adyen$3B$1.4B6.5x6.3x13.7x11.9x
Bajaj Finserv$14B$5.9B5.7x5.1x14.0x25.3x
Shriram Finance$2.6B$1.6B16.4x13.5x25.9x22.2x
Synchrony$15B-1.8x1.7x--

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Common questions about PalmPay

When was PalmPay founded?PalmPay was founded in 2019.
Where is PalmPay headquartered?PalmPay is headquartered in Lagos, Nigeria.
Is PalmPay publicly listed?No, PalmPay is a private, VC-backed company.
How much funding has PalmPay raised?PalmPay has raised $140M across 2 funding rounds.
What was PalmPay's last funding round?PalmPay's last funding round was a $100M Series A in August 2021, led by Cyber Creation Ventures (CCV).
Who are PalmPay's investors?PalmPay's investors include Transsion Holdings, MediaTek, Seas Capital, Cretrend Capital, Cyber Creation Ventures (CCV), Trust Capital, Yunshi Capital, Changyu Capital, AfricInvest, Chuangshi Ziben and 1 other.
Which companies are comparable to PalmPay?Companies comparable to PalmPay include CloudWalk, Kaspi.kz, Jio Financial Services, Paytm, Upgrade and Klarna.

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