Nigerian fintech Carbon acquired Vella Finance, launched AI-powered business banking platform
Through its parent company One Credit Limited, the Nigerian fintech startup Carbon has acquired its counterpart Vella Finance. At the same time, it has launched a novel AI-powered business banking platform.
After raising $5 million in debt financing and purchasing Nigerian payments startup Amplify, parent company OneFi, which operated the consumer lending platform Carbon, rebranded itself as Carbon in 2019 and became a comprehensive digital banking platform.
In contrast, Vella was introduced in 2020 and uses cryptocurrencies to facilitate international transfers and remittances without borders. With its acquisition, Carbon has advanced its goal of providing small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) with cutting-edge, easily accessible financial services that take advantage of the most recent advancements in artificial intelligence.
“Carbon spearheaded the consumer finance revolution in Nigeria in 2016. Our goal was to give consumers unprecedented access to finance from their mobile devices,” said Chijioke Dozie, co-founder of Carbon.
“Since then we have provided some loans to SMEs but not in a manner that meets our standards or the customers’ expectations. We have known the Vella Finance team for some time and admired their innovation and understanding of the market needs. We saw in them the same innovative and pioneering spirit that ignited Carbon. They had built an SME platform that we believe is unrivaled in the market and given our aspirations, the deal was a no-brainer.”
The deal is “exciting news” for businesses, according to Mark Afolabi, co-founder and CEO of Vella Finance.
“We are thrilled to join forces with Carbon. These are trying times for businesses in Nigeria and by joining forces, we can provide businesses with a platform that provides AI-driven insights into their transactions, low-cost accessible loans, and the power of A.I models built into the platform to help with any business challenge,” he said.
Vella Finance will move business clients to Carbon Business in the next few days and give personal clients the choice to switch to business accounts.
