AZA Finance, an established provider of currency trading solutions, has announced the acquisition of Exchange4free, a leading foreign exchange, money transfer and payments technology provider serving over 50,000 private and corporate clients worldwide.
With this acquisition, AZA Finance will more than double its transaction volume to $2.5 billion in 2021 through synergies and leveraging cross-selling opportunities, while extending the company’s reach to 115 countries spanning Africa, Europe, the Middle East, Asia-Pacific and North America.
Exchange4Free’s solutions allow users to send and receive free money transfers 24/7 to 100 countries, accept EFT and alternative payments from friends, family and customers worldwide, as well as send instant airtime to friends and family in over 130 countries. Exchange4Free also provides online trading and execution in over 70 major and exotic currencies, as well as white-label solutions for remittance, FX and payments
AZA Finance is known for its flagship products, TransferZero and BFX, which aim to significantly reduce the cost and increase the speed of business payments to and from frontier markets.
“This acquisition moves us further towards our goal of opening up intra-African and frontier market FX flows,” said Elizabeth Rossiello, CEO and founder of AZA Finance. “Exchange4Free’s ethos and innovative solution is a great fit for AZA Finance in helping to build the digital infrastructure of the future that brings innovation and efficiency to meet corporate treasury and FX needs in frontier markets.”
The acquisition enables AZA Finance to leverage Exchange4Free’s own platform for their services, including its set of APIs that provide companies with the FX, treasury, and regulatory compliance services they need to make cross-border payments into South Africa from more than 100 countries.
According to Mark Lawson, co-Founder and CEO at Exchange4Free, “Exchange4Free has built technology to streamline FX and cross-border payment flows across a truly global transaction network. The acquisition by AZA Finance will enable us to reach the scale we need to optimise this technology to deliver highly customisable solutions for our clients.”
The acquisition follows a combined Series B debt and equity funding round in which AZA Finance raised $35 million for expansion of operations in the Middle East and North Africa over the past 18 months, including a $15 million debt facility with the Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA) to build its activities in the region.
