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Nigerian fintech startup Aella Credit has secured $10 million in debt financing from Singaporean company HQ Financial Group (HQF). The startup announced this in a post which appeared on its blog early on Monday.

Launched in 2015 by cofounders Akin Jones and Wale Akanbi, the startup exists to drive financial inclusion by granting microloans to Nigerians.

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Aella provides small businesses with financing for their operations. It also runs an employee network in which employees can apply for loans if their company is registered with the platform. According to the startups’ own figures, it has disbursed more than 300,000 loans in just over four years.

According to the statement on the Aella blog, the company plans to deploy the new investor funds to extend operations over a number of areas.

First, it will be expanding into more parts of Africa and Asia. It currently operates in Nigeria and the Phillippines. It’s hoping that the support from a Singaporean VC will enable it to push into new territories.

There’s also an intention to offer more financial services besides credit. Aella is eyeing the tech-driven savings and investment niche, where startups like Cowrywise and PiggyVest are currently dominant players. It also intends to add bill payments, insurance, and ‘special loans’ to its list of offerings.

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Aella is currently fashioning a blockchain lending product, Creditcoin, which could help improve its creditworthiness assessment and enable it to gain an extra one million customers before the year 2020 runs out.

This funding round is the second that Aella has lapped up. In 2017, it raised seed funding totaling $2 million from a group of US-based VCs and angel investors, including Y Combinator and 500 Startups.

Featured image source: Make Money NG

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This article was first published on 12th February 2020

ikenna-nwachukwu

Ikenna Nwachukwu holds a bachelor's degree in Economics from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. He loves to look at the world through multiple lenses- economic, political, religious and philosophical- and to write about what he observes in a witty, yet reflective style.

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