B54, a Lagos-based business-lending fintech organisation, is connecting capital to startups, especially those in the high growth-stage desperately seeking to raise increasingly scarce venture capital.
Co-Founded by Lanre Oyedotun and Babawole Akin-Aina in 2022, B54 is building an alternative and flexible source of funding for businesses in Africa that are powered by technology. This means that they specialise in aggregating idle cash from both wealthy Africans and financial institutions, and lending onwards to fast-growing businesses in West Africa that need working capital.
Typically, B54 acts as a digital private bank that sources funds from cash-rich lenders, and creates credit lines that borrowers can draw on. Investors who lend through B54 may choose to simply let B54 play the role of a fiduciary, or be more hands-on in selecting what businesses their money goes into, through a marketplace system.
Investors (including small banks) are attracted by the potential of maximising returns with attractive interest rates (between 18% – 21% per annum), compared to what they would usually earn from fixed and longer-term traditional investments. For wealthy Africans, B54 presents a double haven for liquidity and higher-than-usual returns on investment.
According to data from Pitchbook, B54 counts Lateral Frontiers, Full Circle Africa, Adamantium Fund, Atlantica Ventures and New York-based Everywhere Ventures as investors in a 2022 $2 million seed round.
Says Oyedotun: “There is a massive gap in the market for platform aggregators whether they are tech-enabled or not tech-enabled.
B54 cites its mission as financing businesses in all 54 African countries. The company is currently active in Nigeria, francophone West Africa, and Liberia, with the goal of taking its model of transaction-backed financing across emerging markets.