Kenya’s Workpay Begins Operations in Nigeria

By Ashemiriogwa Emmanuel

A payroll, benefits and compliance software company based in Nairobi, Kenya, Workpay, has spread its tentacles to Nigeria with the mission of enabling businesses across the country to disburse approved salary payments to their employees instantly and securely.

The Software As A Service (SaaS) for B2Bs, via its designed web portal and mobile self-service app, allows Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) to easily manage and pay their employees from anywhere in Africa as they can track time, process a locally compliant payroll, and reimburse their employees.

This is happening a year after the two-year-old company raised $2.1 million in a seed funding round to fully accelerate expansion to other markets, starting with Nigeria, after receiving a  $100,000 investment from Kepple Africa in 2019, the year it was founded.

Led by Kepple Africa Ventures, the round saw the participation from several angel investors including Y Combinator, Soma Capital, Musha Ventures, P1 Ventures.

By expanding into Nigeria, the cloud-based management firm will now offer Core HR, Payroll, and employee record services to organisations in the country.

Speaking on this development, Workpay CEO and co-founder, Mr Paul Kimani, pointed out that Nigeria can potentially be the key to unlocking the wide adoption of this technology solution, not only in West Africa but throughout Africa.

He noted that the software services offered by the startup are designed to address sets of challenges observed in the Eastern hemisphere of the continent.

According to Mr Kimani, “The platform is constantly improving. A few weeks ago, we totally revamped our user interface for a better experience for our customers in terms of navigation, user journey, new features, and an overly nicer look. This has been done based on constant client feedback ensuring their pain points are fully considered.”

“In the next few months we will be progressively growing the team in Nigeria in various roles in business, customer support, and others,” he announced.