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

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

Neobanks in other emerging markets (Brazil & NuBank)

African & Nigerian banking context

Kuda's launch, early history, growth over time & fundraising

Kuda's product & monetization strategy

Competitive positioning, potential exit options

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 [email protected] to share feedback or propose topics you’d like to hear.

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