Apis Growth Fund II, a
private equity fund managed by Apis Partners LLP (“Apis Partners”), a UK-based
asset manager, has announced its proposed investment of €29M (US$31M) in Baobab Payments GmbH
(trading as Peach Payments), a rapidly growing digital payment service provider
that enables online payments in Africa.
According to a statement issued on Tuesday, the completion
of the investment is subject to the approval of the Competition Commission of
South Africa and customary procedural and closing conditions. Peach Payments’
existing investors include UW Ventures, Launch Africa, and AG Ventures.
Apis Partners supports growth-stage financial services and financial infrastructure businesses, and it's the second-largest online payment gateway in South Africa, with
activities in Kenya and Mauritius, and a staff complement of nearly 150
international professionals.
Peach Payments has experienced exceptional growth in recent years, with
revenue increasing more than 650% since 2020, and 80% in 2022 alone. The
company intends to use the investment by the Fund to accelerate its expansion
across new African markets, to deepen its product offering, and reinforce
its core merchant value proposition.
Peach Payments is known for
delivering enterprise-grade products, high end-user conversion, best-in-class
risk management, and actionable insights, backed by the best customer support
experience on the continent, to its merchants.
Apis Partners will leverage
its deep networks and unique experience in scaling leading payment companies to
support Peach Payments’ growth and geographic expansion.
As an ESGI-native investor,
Apis Partners’ sector expertise will help Peach Payments to maximise financial
inclusion by enabling more merchants to participate and grow in today’s
increasingly digital global economy.
“We continue to see significant opportunity in African payments as
strong secular trends that are not related to annual business cycles - such as the conversion from
cash to digital and in-store to online payments - persist across key markets.
We have been impressed by the vision and execution of the management team as
Peach Payments capitalises on these trends to bring more end-users into the
digital economy, a key part of our drive to democratise access across the
continent. We look forward to partnering with Peach Payments to expand its
reach into new markets with innovative merchant solutions,” says Matteo Stefanel,
Co-Founder and Managing Partner, Apis Partners.
“Peach Payments, one of Africa’s most exciting high-growth businesses
with a relentless focus on technology and operational leadership, is at the
forefront of enabling next-generation payments for merchants across the
continent. We are excited to partner with Peach Payments’ fantastic team and
look forward to leveraging Apis’ capital, expertise, and global network to
support new investment in Peach Payments’ infrastructure, products, and people
to consolidate the company’s recent gains and support the next phase of
growth,” says Udayan
Goyal, Apis Partners Co-Founder and Managing Partner.
“At Peach Payments, our mission is to enable African businesses and
entrepreneurs to succeed in digital commerce. We want to be the infrastructure
layer they build their business on. This was our original vision when we
started and is more relevant today than ever,” says Rahul Jain, Co-Founder, and CEO of Peach Payments.
“We’ve witnessed
incredible growth in the past three years driven by fundamental forces and
shifts in consumer and business adoption of digital commerce. Across market
segments – from retail to digital learning, fitness, and even traditional
financial services – we’ve onboarded new clients in almost every vertical.
We’ve built a very strong team with exceptional operators and I am excited to
partner with the team at Apis and take this business to where it deserves to
be. The Apis team brings an incredible wealth of experience in fintech across
the globe and we look forward to exploring exponential opportunities together
with them.”
