#34: Kuda Bank - How Nigeria’s most popular Neobank is scaling to offer financial services to “every African on the planet”

Afrobility: Africa Tech and Business

Overview: Today, we’re going to discuss Kuda Bank - the African neobank. We’ll explore the Kuda story across 6 areas:

1. Neobanks in other emerging markets (Brazil & NuBank)
2. African & Nigerian banking context
3. Kuda's launch, early history, growth over time & fundraising
4. Kuda's product & monetization strategy
5. Competitive positioning, potential exit options
6. Overall outlook

This episode was recorded on July 25, 2021.

Companies discussed: Kuda Bank, Nubank, Carbon, N26, Monzo, Chime, GTBank, Stanbic IBTC, Sparkle, Rubies, Monzo, Xinja, Chime & Chipper Cash

Business concepts discussed: Neobank / Challenger bank / digital bank strategy, consumer FinTech monetization strategy, consumer lending, retail banking strategy, customer segmentation strategy & low-end disruption

Conversation highlights:

• (01:00) - Why we’re talking about Kuda Bank
• (05:50) - Neobanks in other emerging markets - Nubank background
• (18:30) - Africa banking background
• (26:50) - Traditional banks vs Neobanks
• (35:20) - Banking context in Nigeria; Nigeria’s banking sector
• (47:40) - Founding and early history
• (1:02:27) - Seed fundraising
• (1:11:50) - Series A fundraising
• (1:18:40) - Product strategy
• (1:26:30) - GTM & partnerships strategy
• (1:33:47) - Monetization strategy
• (1:50:16) - Competition - Neobanks, traditional banks & other FinTechs
• (2:05:00) - Potential exit options
• (2:10:29) - Olumide’s overall thoughts
• (2:18:18) - Bankole’s overall thoughts
• (2:32:35) - Recommendations & small wins

Olumide’s recommendations & small wins:

• Recommendation: What did I spend my money on after selling twitch (by Justin Kan. Fascinating conversation about wealth, managing money after a windfall, investments, private companies, exits, etc) & The Everything store (by Brad Stone) - Amazing book, amazing story. Amazing company. Favorite part is when author talks about Jeff's most famous insults. Hilarious!
• Small win: NYC trip last weekend - So much fun partying with friends.
• Other content: Monzo is “struggling"
  

Bankole’s recommendations & small wins:

• Recommendation: Where you are is not who you are by Ursula Burns & Justin Kan interview of Conor White-Sullivan (YouTube)
• Small win: I spent the last week in Lagos! New friends, stimulating conversations and catching up with old friends
• Other content: Kudimoney pitch at Startup Bootcamp & 2015 NYTimes article on Amazon’s work culture

We’d love to hear from you. Please email [e-mail] to share feedback or propose topics you’d like to hear.

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