Orca, a South African startup, has raised $550,000 in a pre-seed round. The startup collaborates with emerging market banks and fintechs to combat all kinds of fraud.
Norrsken22 led the round, in which First Circle Capital, Musha Ventures, Kara Ventures, many key business angels, and family and friends also participated. Amazingly, the round was significantly oversubscribed given the state of the market.
An all-female founding team created Orca. There are not many all-female founding teams around the globe, particularly in Africa. According to data from “Africa: The Big Deal,” between 2019 and 2022, female-only forming teams or single female entrepreneurs received, on average, just 1% of the investment. But by being lean, resourceful, and agile, this team hopes to upend the male-dominated startup scene and guarantee that they reach the growth stages, where dropout usually occurs.
Thalia and Carla have always had a deep enthusiasm for promoting women in engineering. As founders themselves, they now understand how critical it is to have diversity and representation in all facets of their company, from the founding teams to the investors to the future workforce.
Since 2018, the number of fraud instances reported to South Africa has increased by 600% (SAFPS, 2022). Apart from the significant increase in volume, there is a growing challenge in accurately identifying and preventing at a large scale. Instant settlements, which are frequently made possible by the emergence and expanding use of new payment systems (Payshap, mobile money, cross-border payments, e-wallets, etc.), have given rise to new opportunities for syndicates to carry out large-scale fraud.
Numerous AML and fraud protection services are skilled in combating fraud in developed nations. Regretfully, there aren’t many reasonably priced options that are specifically designed to combat fraud in emerging countries like Africa. The many payment methods and platforms, as well as the various socioeconomic environments and legal frameworks, contribute to the diversity of fraud kinds. Africa’s fintechs and banks want modular fraud protection services that can shield them from the negative effects of fraud and shield their users from it as well. Orca offers just this kind of solution. Because South Africa is the global center for cybercrime, Orca is starting its operations here before expanding to the rest of the continent.
Thalia Pillay, co-founder of Orca, says “It has been incredibly useful establishing a network far beyond South Africa where we’re able to connect with fraud players in other markets. There are so many parallels between the types of fraud that we see in various emerging markets. There’s so much fraud to fight that it is a team effort. As we always say, we named ourselves Orca because orcas band together to take down boats. Looking forward to collaborating with our peers to take down fraudsters.”
Orca intends to develop, validate, and improve its fraud and compliance products with the money it has raised, as well as grow its workforce.
In the coming months, Orca plans to expand its workforce to create a top-tier group that will develop in the direction of a future free from fraud.
The funds will be utilized to develop straightforward but efficient fraud protection solutions and to refine them in consultation with South African clients.
Read more on Tech Gist Africa:
Adumo, a South African fintech company, have been acquired by Lesaka for $85.9 million.
Spatialedge, an AI startup based in South Africa, secures $3.1 million in funding
