Littlefish raises $9.5 million to expand merchant infrastructure platform across african banking networks

The Johannesburg-based fintech integrates directly into point-of-sale devices and core banking systems, enabling financial institutions to deliver digital merchant services to small and mid-sized businesses

Littlefish, a South African fintech company that builds merchant infrastructure for banks, has closed a $9.5 million Series A funding round led by Partech, with participation from TLcom Capital, Flourish Ventures and Proparco. TLcom and Flourish previously participated in the company's 2024 funding round.

Founded in 2021 by Brandon Roberts and Miod Davith Kahwa, littlefish develops software that sits between acquiring banks and the merchants they serve. The platform consolidates point-of-sale applications, back-office customer relationship management tools, merchant portals, payments processing and APIs into a single layer that connects directly to POS devices and core banking systems. The arrangement allows banks to offer digital merchant services without building that infrastructure independently, while giving small and mid-sized businesses access to tools typically associated with larger enterprises.

Current banking clients include Standard Bank, First National Bank and Absa. The company also holds a partnership with Visa, which has integrated the littlefish platform into its small business onboarding process. Since its seed round, the company's monthly recurring revenue has grown 30 times.

The Series A capital will be used to expand the team, accelerate product development and extend the platform's reach beyond South Africa into more than ten additional African markets, including Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Botswana, Zimbabwe and Zambia.

"This raise is a validation of our belief that the best way to serve Africa's small businesses is to work with the institutions they already trust, not around them," said Roberts. "We've proven the model in South Africa, and this capital gives us the runway to deepen those relationships and bring what we've built to millions more merchants across the continent."

Matthieu Marchand, principal at Partech, said the investment was driven by the infrastructure position littlefish had established with major financial institutions. "It has built indispensable infrastructure and convinced Africa's most powerful financial institutions to stake their merchant businesses on it. With the deep trust littlefish has already established in South Africa and a clear path to expansion across more than ten markets, we believe the company is positioned to become the defining merchant infrastructure layer for the continent," he said.