Nigerian company providing identity verification and anti-money laundering (AML) solutions for banks and startups, Youverify, has secured $2.5 million in funding in a pre-Series A round.
The investment was secured from Elm, which specializes in offering ready-made and customized digital solutions to public and private institutions in Saudi Arabia.
The pre-Series A investment from Elm also includes a strategic partnership to help Youverify streamline AML compliance for businesses, bolster global risk intelligence, and expand its products into new markets.
In August 2022, Youverify had secured a $1 million seed round extension. This was after raising a $1.5 million round in 2020, bringing its total seed raise to $2.5 million.
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What the investors are saying
Commenting on the investment, VP of Elm Investment, Fahad bin Issa Ibrahim Al-Shathry, said:
- “We are excited to partner with Youverify, a company that shares our vision for leveraging technology to solve critical challenges faced by businesses today.
- “This collaboration is a testament to our dedication to collaborating with exceptional founders through investing in a budding technology ecosystem not only in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia but also globally to drive efficiency, security, and trust.”
The startup
Founded in 2018 by Gbenga Odegbami, Youverify has expanded its real-time business verification coverage to 145 jurisdictions across 48 countries.
The platform offers coverage for real-time individual verification, including credit history and national identity numbers, in 46 countries, according to founder and CEO, Odegbami.
The company currently serves commercial customers in only 12 countries. Across these countries, Youverify processes 4 million monthly applications for over 3,500 businesses with 800 active clients.
This marks a significant increase from the 400 businesses and 5 million application processes per year recorded in 2022.
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Additionally, the platform’s capacity to verify IDs has expanded from 400 million to 5 billion people as well as 600 million businesses across various industries such as gaming, travel, healthcare, and telecommunications.
- “Individuals and businesses can verify their identity, registration status and ownership using their government data through Youverify. This is not the generic OCR-based KYC, which uses image recognition to validate the ID presented to it. In addition, we launched our anti-money laundering and risk classification product to address some of these industries,” said Odegbami.
According to the CEO, Youverify’s approach entails utilizing established mathematical models and AI algorithms to assess and analyze risks.
Subsequently, the platform generates regulatory reports for submission to regulators across multiple countries. Other providers in the same space include Smile Identity, Dojah, and Identitypass.
