Grey has spent six years serving to Africans receives a commission from overseas. Now it needs to turn into the place the place payday begins.
What occurred? Yesterday at Moonshot by TechCabal, Grey, the Y Combinator-backed cross-border funds firm, launched Paycheck, a wage product for professionals incomes in {dollars}, kilos and euros. Users can obtain and organise wage funds, whereas qualifying clients get larger financial savings charges, bigger transaction limits and precedence assist.
The launch comes as Grey crosses three million customers and practically $5 billion in processed funds. Its fee quantity has additionally grown 170% yr on yr.
Explain like I’m new right here: Grey didn’t begin out making an attempt to handle salaries. Idorenyin Obong and Femi Aghedo launched the corporate in 2020 as Aboki Africa, serving to Nigerians trade overseas forex in domiciliary accounts. The founders quickly realised receiving the cash was itself a much bigger drawback. In 2021, they pivoted to digital greenback, pound, and euro accounts for distant employees and freelancers. Grey joined Y Combinator in 2022 and raised a $2 million seed spherical later that yr.
It had about 100,000 customers in 2022 and crossed a million in 2024. Today, it operates throughout dozens of markets and can also be pushing into enterprise funds.
Between the traces: Receiving overseas funds is not sufficient of a moat. Grey competes with Raenest, Cleva, Afriex, and others providing variations of the identical multi-currency account.
Paycheck adjustments the connection. If a wage lands in Grey each month, the corporate will get the primary likelihood to deal with what occurs subsequent: saving, changing currencies, sending cash, or paying payments. The buyer additionally has one much less purpose to maneuver that revenue instantly to a different monetary app.
Zoom out: Grey Business, launched in February, has already processed practically $100 million. Now Paycheck is attacking the buyer facet of the identical drawback.
Grey constructed its first development part round serving to individuals obtain cash; Obong mentioned it’s concentrating on between 10 million and 20 million customers. Getting to that milestone could rely upon giving them causes to depart the cash there.
