LazerPay, a Nigerian startup specializing in crypto and Web3, has ceased operations due to its inability to secure additional funding.
“Despite our team’s tireless efforts to secure the necessary funding to keep LazerPay going, we were unable to close a successful fundraising round,” Njoku Emmanuel, Founder and CEO of Lazerpay said in a statement published on Twitter.
“We fought hard to keep the lights on as long as possible, unfortunately, we are now at a point where we need to shut down.”
Statement from Njoku Emmanuel, CEO and Co-Founder, Lazerpay. pic.twitter.com/UvBGMlKAgn
— Lazerpay Finance (@lazerpay) April 13, 2023
In November 2022, LazerPay reportedly laid off employees when its lead investor for the seed funding round pulled out due to unfavorable market conditions and disagreements over the terms. LazerPay stated that it was not affected by the FTX collapse in 2021, but its lead investor, NestCoin, had funds stuck on FTX and downsized its workforce to mitigate the impact.
The startup had reportedly raised $1.1 million by April 2022 backed by:
- Shola Akinlade of Paystack
- Nuwa Capital
- Voltron Capital, and
- Nestcoin
LazerPay was established in 2021 and provided a platform similar to Stripe but for cryptocurrencies. The company enabled businesses to accept crypto payments from their customers by integrating a collections widget in their app and collecting payments via a link.
“For example, a Kenyan buyer can send KES to a Ghanaian seller, but the seller receives USDT instead of Cedis, all without going to the bank or speaking to a middleman. People will be able to send USDT through their local currencies, and LazerPay’s role will be converting the local currency to crypto – USDT – so everyone can hold the real value of their monies,” Njoku has explained about his startup in the past.
The startup says it had enabled over 3,000 businesses around the world to accept payments in this way since its inception and allowed more vendors from more than 100 countries to convert crypto to fiat currency and vice versa.
Njoku has advised all LazerPay merchants to withdraw their funds from the platform on or before April 30 2023 using the bank or crypto payout options while also putting its intellectual property up for sale.
“We remain committed to helping our users transition smoothly and to ensuring that any outstanding matters are resolved.”
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