Zazu, the first pan-African digital banking platform built exclusively for entrepreneurs and SMEs, has raised $1 million in pre-seedfunding from a group of leading African and European investors to accelerate its rollout in South Africa and Morocco, with plans to expand across the continent in 2026
The round includes Plug and Play Ventures with participation from a high-profile group of angel investors and fintech founders, including Zachariah George (Launch Africa Ventures), Axel Peyriere (Co-founder, AUTO24.africa), Akshay Patel (Founder, Paymentology), Ismael Belkhayat (Founder, Chari), Sophie Guibaud (Founder, Fiat Republic), and several founding members of European fintech unicorns like Qonto and Solarisbank – marking one of the most experienced cap tables in the African fintech ecosystem.
Building Africaʼs Business Banking OS
Founded by Germain Bahri and Rinse Jacobs, both former Solarisbank executives with deep fintech experience in Europe, Zazu is creating a Mercury-style experience for African entrepreneurs. With 50 SMEs already in beta and over 1,000 businesses on its waitlist,Zazu aims to serve Africaʼs 50 million underserved SMEs, combining European fintech expertise with a deep understanding of African business realities.
Traction & Recognition
Zazu is already operational in South Africa and Morocco, where it has integrated with Paystack, Shopstar, and Ozow, and secured over 20 partnerships with ecosystem players. The company has also been selected for the Visa Accelerator Program, named finalist of KPMG Enterprise Innovator of the Year 2025, and listed among PwCʼs Fintechs to Watch.
Why South Africa and Morocco
Rinse and Germain chose South Africa and Morocco as Zazuʼs first launch markets due to their fast growing SME sectors, robust fintech infrastructure, and strategic positioning as gateways to Southern and North Africa. Together, these two countries represent more than 5 million SMEs, a combined market worth tens of billions of dollars in annual business payments, and serve as ideal testing grounds for scalable digital banking models.
Whatʼs Next
Following strong early traction, Zazu will open its Seed round in early 2026, inviting a limited group of strategic investors to support its pan-African expansion and the launch of new financial products tailored to entrepreneurs.
