Nestcoin-owned Onboard expands crypto exchange services into Kenya
The crypto company wants to expand into other markets in the Global South.
Onboard, the self-custodial wallet created by crypto startup Nestcoin, has launched in Kenya. Nestcoin is looking to take the products into other markets beyond Africa.
Quick facts
- According to a press release shared with Mariblock, Onboard launched in Kenya after a successful pilot. The details of the pilot were not specified.
- With the launch, Onboard provides Kenyans a platform to exchange Kenyan shillings for stablecoins (USDT and USDC) and vice versa.
- Kenyans can also fund their USD-dominated Onboard virtual cards with local currency.
- Nestcoin hopes that Onboard can be available in more African countries and expand beyond Africa into Latin America and Southeast Asia.
- Co-founder and CEO of Nestcoin, Yele Bademosi, believes that Onboard can help to make financial services more decentralized and widely available regardless of location.
- He added that Onboard’s on-chain P2P model makes the product easily accessible in several countries without integrating into local payment systems.
Key quotes
- Bademosi said
“We firmly believe that access to high-quality financial services should be universally available, regardless of one’s geographical location.”
- He added:
“Our on-chain P2P model is the key to our ability to scale rapidly, allowing us to bypass the need for direct local payment integration.”
Before now
- Due to the effect of FTX’s collapse, Nestcoin announced that it was pivoting to Onboard, a non-custodial crypto wallet platform offering custodial benefits.
- In an earlier conversation, Bademosi told Mariblock that Onboard is an amalgamation of Nestcoin’s previous offerings, including a crypto wallet and P2P swap control.
- Last September, Onboard raised $1.9 million in a funding round led by Hashed Emergent. Shortly after, it launched its USD-denominated virtual cards, fundable with naira and stablecoins.
Zoom out
- As Nestcoin expands across Africa, it will increasingly compete with more established names like Binance and Yellow Card. The latter recently became Coinbase’s on- and off-ramp partner in Africa.
