SUBA CAPITAL: Fintech And Nigerian Investors

SUBA CAPITAL: Fintech And Nigerian Investors
By Abbas Badmus

TECHDIGEST – Financial technology (Fintech) is used to describe new tech that seeks to improve and automate the delivery and use of financial services. At its core, fintech is utilized to help companies, business owners and consumers better manage their financial operations, processes, and lives by utilizing specialized software and algorithms that are used on computers and, increasingly, smartphones.

Fintechs generally are on the rise, the world knows that technology is the next oil money. I have seen that foreigners are already positioning themselves to be able to harness that opportunity; I also find out that even the foreigners are coming to Nigeria to invest in companies that are tech-based because they know that this is the next oil money.

Sadly, Nigeria has not taken a position, we are still stuck in the old ways of doing things and that is why Nigerian investors are not seeing the potential even though foreign investors are leaving their country to invest in Nigeria’s tech ecosystem.

Some examples of Fintech companies with foreign investments in Nigeria include; Paga, Interswitch, Piggyvest, Remita, Opay, Kuda, and Voguepay among others.
Notwithstanding, indigenous budding Nigerian fintech with little or no foreign investment is living up to the bill in digital solutions delivery and one of such is SUBA Capital.

SUBA Capital, the latest addition to Nigerian Fintech startup, is the digital application that solves the problem of financial exclusion of small scale farmers and businesses by giving them access to capital to encourage economic growth.

In an exclusive interview with TechDigest, founder/CEO of SUBA Capital, Silas Ozoya, said the company is promoting financial inclusivity to enable small business owners and smallholder farmers access to working capital to fund their operations.

Mr Silas explained that the SUBA Capital App will provide the platform for middle-class Nigerians, at home and in the diaspora, to invest in profitable financial dealings, while also giving small business owners and farmers easy access to working capital.

According to him, there are about 41.5 million small businesses and about 38 million financially excluded Nigerians, mostly smallholder farmers, as at the last Nigerian Bureau of Statistics (NBS) report. On the flip side, there are a lot of middle class Nigerians (about 41million people or 23% of Nigeria’s population) who can currently not afford to buy into traditional investment vehicles because they are high earned or high ticket.

“So what we are doing is simply bringing together and managing demand and supply. Demand being business owners and smallholder farmers in need of working capital and supply being the middle class Nigerians willing to make between monthly micro-investments,” Silas explains.

READ ALSO: SUBA Capital Promises Small Businesses, Farmers Access To Funds

He further stated that SUBA Capital would help subscribers imbibe the culture of saving to raise funds for investment in sustainable and profitable businesses to reduce poverty and bridge the divide among different social classes, “this is why we at SUBA Capital have broken investing in these investment vehicles into micro-investment plans to make them affordable to the average middle-class Nigerian,” he said.

Mr. Silas also maintains that with the help of SUBA Capital services, Nigerians will become more committed to putting some money aside monthly by investing in sustainable, profitable business and agricultural opportunities while providing capital for the business owners and smallholder farmers which translates to job creation, and the reduction of poverty and hunger.

SUBA Capital CEO called on Angel Investors and Venture Capitalists to invest in startups, expressing the readiness of his firm to partner with interested parties.

Being able to leverage technology to reach a much bigger market is a plus for the tech ecosystem, especially in finance, which has become the go-to for the Nigerian middle class that is helping in bridging the gap between the different social classes.

However, as financial technology progresses and solutions are developed, more challenges also appears.

The industry is capable of attracting huge foreign direct investment (FDI) into the country if government and its agency like NITDA creates more enabling environment. Providing an enabling environment for fintech would make the industry more competitive and expand to other markets.
I will also encourage Fintech startups to come up with technical innovative products that could help solve problems in the financial industry and boost financial inclusion.

Abbas, a staff writer with TechDigest, contributes this piece from Abuja