Thepeer, an API startup based in Nigeria, has decided to close its operations.
The company, which secured a $2.1 million seed round in June 2022, said it will be returning its remaining capital to investors due to its inability to achieve significant growth and scale its business.
Thepeer’s vision was to interconnect wallets among more than 400 fintech companies across the continent, aiming to facilitate seamless payment processing.
“We embarked on a mission to create something unprecedented, a unique method for transferring money between digital wallets and making payments for goods and services directly from these wallets. Yet, we soon realized that exceptional technology alone wasn’t sufficient,” the company said.
“Our unique service had its challenges, the first being compliance issues that hindered us from launching key wallet providers or maintaining their services.”
Established in April 2021 by Co-Founders, Kosisochukwu Chike Ononye and Michael ‘Trojan’ Okoh, the company aimed to provide infrastructure support primarily for fintech enterprises, ranging from small startups to medium-sized businesses.
According to Crunchbase, ThePeer successfully secured a pre-seed funding round of $220,000 from investors such as Ezra Olubi, Co-founder of Paystack, and Prosper Otemuyiwa, CTO of Edenlife.
One year later, Thepeer successfully raised a $2.1 million seed funding round, with the Raba Partnership leading the investment. Other investors participating in the round included:
- RaliCap
- Timon Capital
- BYLD Ventures
- Musha Ventures
- Sunu
- Uncovered Fund
In 2022, the startup reported that its monthly transaction volume had soared to millions of dollars, accompanied by an average month-on-month (MoM) transaction growth rate of 161%. The company also unveiled plans for expansion into other African nations, including Kenya, South Africa, and Egypt.
“We could not align our product with the market’s needs at our current size and scale. What does this mean for our customers? Thepeer will be placed on maintenance mode for the interim. We’ll work to maintain the platform for as long as possible until we discover a new home for it,” the company said.
