OPay

OPay is an African fintech company incubated by Opera, the Norway-headquartered internet company, and launched in August 2018 . It began as a mobile payments provider in Nigeria targeting the country's large unbanked population, and by 2019 had become the country's leading mobile payment service and ride-hailing operator . The company raised $120 million in a Series B round led by Meituan Dianping, Gaorong Capital, and Source Code Capital, with participation from Sequoia China, SoftBank Asia, and others , followed by a $400 million Series C led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2 in 2021 . After 2020, OPay expanded its model toward a "super app" integrating lending, e-commerce, food delivery, and other services, becoming one of Africa's largest unicorns . In 2022, it announced a strategic partnership with Mastercard to expand digital commerce across the Middle East and Africa . As 暗涌Waves described it, OPay essentially "skipped the savings-card era" in Africa to build a local wallet ecosystem, a path enabled by low banking penetration but high mobile phone usage .