Flutterwave, Africa’s leading payments technology company, has acquired Mono, a pioneer in open banking infrastructure across the continent.
The transaction deepens Flutterwave’s long-term commitment to building a connected, interoperable financial system for Africa and positions open banking as a core pillar in the evolution of alternative payment methods across the region.
Mono’s API-driven platform enables secure access to financial data, identity verification, and account-to-account payments—capabilities that are becoming increasingly critical as African markets shift toward more trusted, data-led financial services. As digital commerce accelerates and regulatory scrutiny intensifies, open banking infrastructure is emerging as a foundational layer for enabling secure data sharing, improving transparency, and supporting compliant growth across multiple markets.
Under the terms of the acquisition, Mono will continue to operate independently, with no changes to its leadership structure, team, or day-to-day operations. Flutterwave’s stake enables strategic alignment rather than operational control, allowing Mono to maintain its pace of innovation while contributing its open banking infrastructure to Flutterwave’s broader payments ecosystem. This structure reflects a deliberate approach to partnership-led expansion, prioritising long-term infrastructure development over short-term consolidation.
The acquisition reflects a growing recognition that the next phase of Africa’s payments growth will be driven less by traditional card rails and more by bank-based, authenticated, and locally relevant payment methods. While cards have played a key role in digital adoption, their limitations around cost, accessibility, and cross-border scalability have become increasingly apparent. By integrating Mono’s open banking APIs, Flutterwave strengthens its ability to support faster merchant onboarding, improved customer verification, reduced fraud, and seamless account-to-account payments across diverse African markets.
Beyond immediate operational efficiencies, the collaboration creates a clear pathway for expanding into richer alternative payment methods, authenticated payment flows, and, over time, open banking-enabled stablecoin and programmable payment use cases. These capabilities are particularly relevant in markets where consumers and businesses are seeking lower-cost, real-time, and locally integrated payment options that align with domestic banking systems.
The implications of the acquisition extend well beyond product expansion. Businesses gain access to infrastructure that simplifies compliance-heavy processes such as identity verification and bank account validation, while improving transaction reliability and conversion at scale. Developers and ecosystem partners benefit from a more unified environment where payments and financial data coexist, reducing integration complexity and accelerating time to market. For Flutterwave, the integration enhances vertical depth and platform resilience, reinforcing long-term value creation through stronger margins, deeper platform stickiness, and differentiated infrastructure.
Regulatory stakeholders also stand to benefit. Standardised access to financial data, stronger data protection controls, and alignment with global security frameworks—including PCI-DSS and ISO 27001—support a more transparent and compliant digital payments environment. As African regulators continue to refine open banking and data protection frameworks, infrastructure-led partnerships such as this may play a stabilising role in shaping best practices across the ecosystem.
Commenting on the acquisition, Olugbenga ‘GB’ Agboola, Founder and CEO of Flutterwave, said: “This acquisition reflects how we think about the future of financial infrastructure in Africa. Payments, data, and trust cannot exist in silos. Open banking provides the connective tissue, and Mono has built critical infrastructure in this space. This acquisition allows us to expand what’s possible for businesses operating across African markets, while staying grounded in security, compliance, and local relevance.”
Adding to this, Abdulhamid Hassan, Founder and CEO of Mono, said: “We built Mono to unlock Africa’s open banking potential, and since our first partnership with Flutterwave in 2021, we’ve seen the power of coordinated effort toward this goal. Mono’s capabilities across financial data access, direct bank payments, and identity verification, combined with Flutterwave’s scale and global reach, create something more defensible and comprehensive. This acquisition allows us to build the infrastructure layer that powers the next generation of African fintech at the speed and scale the continent deserves.”
At a time when Africa’s digital economy is demanding infrastructure that is open by design and built for trust, the investment signals a deliberate move toward interoperable, data-driven systems designed to support long-term growth across the continent.
The transaction was advised by The Chrysalis Advisors Africa, led by founder Nichole Yembra, who supported the parties through strategic positioning and execution.
