A San Francisco-based fintech, Elevate, has announced securing a USD 5M equity-debt pre-Series A round led by Negma Ventures.
Khalid Keenan, CEO of Elevate, confirmed the funding in a media release on Friday.
Since its debut earlier this year, Elevate has drawn over 150,000 customers from Asia and North Africa, and the new capital will support its growth into the Middle East and Africa.
Elevate, formerly known as Bloom, claims it enables remote workers to get their paychecks straight into their US bank accounts by providing FDIC-insured bank accounts to its consumers.
according to the company, Debit card users can make purchases and deposit money into their domestic bank accounts using these cards.
These services and goods are offered in collaboration with sponsor bank Bangor Savings Bank.
“Using local products meant many remote workers had large chunks of their earnings eaten away with excessive fees. The solution was obvious. The USD products couldn’t be local,” said Youcef Oudjidane, the founding partner of emerging markets fintech fund Byld Ventures while explaining why the startup was launched.
Fintech, which already offers US-based banking services to non-US citizens from Bangladesh, Egypt, the Philippines, and Pakistan, plans to utilise the money to grow into South Africa, Turkey, and other South and Southeast Asian nations.
Since 2021, Elevate has raised funding in equity and debt from investors, including Y Combinator, Visa, Goodwater, VSQ, and Negma Group, amounting to $10 million.
“The rise of remote work and freelancing is a game-changer for emerging markets in the Middle East and Africa,” said Keenan. “Platforms like Upwork, Maqsam, and Deel have empowered talent from countries like Egypt to earn in USD globally.”
We earlier reported that MNZL, a financial firm based in Egypt, has announced securing a $3.5 million Seed funding round to improve technology infrastructure and expand its market footprint in the Middle East and Africa (MEA) region.
