Zepz, formerly WorldRemit Group, raises $292 million, valuing the cross-border payments company at $5 billion

London, Nairobi...Zepz, formerly WorldRemit Group, has raised $292 million (approx. Sh 32 billion) in new primary Series E financing, achieving a valuation of $5 billion (approx. Sh548 billion). Zepz is a digital cross-border payments platform operating two market-leading brands (WorldRemit and Sendwave, acquired in 2021), with over 11 million users across 150 countries. The funding round will allow Zepz to maximise strategic flexibility and drive further growth The round includes new equity investors Farallon Capital among others, as well as backing from existing investors Leapfrog, TCV and Accel. Zepz is revolutionizing the P2P cross-border payments market, an estimated $1tn market opportunity which continues to be predominantly offline and is characterised by high prices and poor customer experience. Zepz reaches over 5,000 money transfer corridors, including emerging markets with high barriers to entry, establishing digital connectivity into geographies that had previously been underserved. WorldRemit and Sendwave brands offer a faster (85% of transactions settled in minutes) and more flexible (digital offering with multiple pay-in and pay-out options) user experience at fairer prices. This superior value proposition has enabled multi-year customer engagement on its platform - most users transact in a frequent, habitual manner - with Zepz’ average customer transacting c.4x per month on the platform. The funding round will allow Zepz to continue to invest in its technology, platform and customer proposition. Zepz sees significant growth opportunities both in its existing markets by driving engagement and deeper market penetration, as well as expanding into new markets and further extending its platform to offer additional value-added services to its users. Breon Corcoran, CEO of Zepz said: “Today’s announced raise is another important step in the execution of our strategy. Following the acquisition of Sendwave we have made significant progress with the integration of the different businesses and are retaining both the Sendwave and WorldRemit brands. In that context we are proud to announce the rebranding of our holding Company to Zepz. The additional funds raised enable us to accelerate investment to prosecute our very sizeable growth opportunity whilst further strengthening our high-quality investor base and our mission to provide fair, fast, flexible payments for our customers”. In 2020, Zepz’ brands enabled over 4.5m monthly transactions on its platform generating almost $10bn of Gross Send Volumes and $338m of revenues.