Founded by British born Nigerians Jide Odunsi and Ladi Delano, Moove announced that it raised $23 million in a Series A funding round. This brings the startup’s total funding raised to $68.2 million, including $28.2m in equity and $40.0m in debt.
Moove implants its alternative credit-scoring technology onto ride-hailing and e-logistics platforms. This allows access to proprietary performance and revenue analytics of mobility entrepreneurs to underwrite loans.
Moove’s business model is to provide loans to its customers by selling them new vehicles and financing up to 95% of the purchase price within 5 days of sign up. Customers can choose to pay back their loans over 24, 36, or 48 months, using a percentage from their weekly revenue. Customers simply sign up on the Moove app and manage all vehicle financial transactions, and access other financial products on the platform.
The round was led by Speedinvest and Left Lane Capital, with participation from DCM, Clocktower Technology Ventures, thelatest.ventures, LocalGlobe, Tekton, FJ Labs, Palm Drive Capital, Roka Works, KAAF Investments, Class 5 Global, and Victoria van Lennep, co-founder of Lendable.
Moove will use the funding round to build a full-service mobility fintech that democratizes vehicle ownership across Africa. The market opportunity is vast – Africa is home to 1.3 billion people, with 43 percent in urban areas and growing, and in 2019 had fewer than 900,000 total new vehicle sales compared to 17 million in the U.S.
“In a continent full of opportunity, mobility is key to moving economies forward and this funding contributes to our ability to provide revenue-based financing, as Moove empowers Africans to safely become mobility entrepreneurs,” said Ladi Delano, co-founder of Moove. “We help people buy new cars who otherwise couldn’t afford them. And then, using the vehicle as a mobility entrepreneur, they’re able to earn money, which allows them to pay off the vehicle over time.”
Moove was initially bootstrapped by its co-founders with seed-stage funding from Future Africa, an Africa-focused fund led by Iyin Aboyeji, who was a founder at Andela and Flutterwave.
The new Series A funding will allow Moove to grow and expand into new markets as well as develop and launch new products and services. The equity raise follows a year of momentum and success for Moove with the launch of three cities and 60 percent month-on-month growth so far.