Raven Bank, one of Nigeria’s licenced digital banks, celebrated its second anniversary on Friday and reflected on its achievements since its inception in April 2021.
Also known as “the People’s Bank of Africa,” Raven Bank has grown from being the country’s newest institution to one of Africa’s most prominent players in the nation’s fintech industry. Following consumer-led survey research in 23 African countries, it was recently named one of “Africa’s 100 Most Valuable Brands.”
Originally set up to assist customers in connecting and managing their different bank accounts on a single dashboard using the bank app, Raven has established itself as a fast-growing digital bank, with nearly a million users across the country in just two years since its inception.
Raven Bank, a consumer-centric virtual bank, distinguished itself by developing products such as “Raven Overdraft,” “Raven Virtual Card,” “Raven Business Banking,” and “Raven Atlas” all of which testify to its position as an all-encompassing banking service provider.
The company’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Uchenna Nnodim, while expressing his appreciation to the consumers and staff, stated that a seamless financial ecosystem has always been at the heart of the company since its start-up, intending to significantly enhance and simplify banking and payment services for customers across the African continent and beyond.
“Our mission became to build a financial ecosystem where every single African across the globe can have access to personalised financial tools that are convenient, fast, reliable, and secure. To achieve this mission, we sat down to identify most of the pressing banking problems faced by the population and give some thought to figuring out the best solution for these problems while paying attention to what already existed,” Nnodim stated.
Nnodim added that the virtual bank is known for its persistent drive toward integrations that connect customers’ daily scenarios, both online and offline.
Raven Bank provides access to customers to personalised financial tools that are easy to use, such as physical and virtual cards, instant money transfers, incredible payment rates, and paperless overdrafts, among others.
For business banking services, Ravens also offers entrepreneurs online and offline infrastructure that helps to seamlessly integrate and customise the payment experience for their customers.
Small business owners can set up and manage multiple accounts, create invoices, track and manage cash flow, use assets as collateral for loans, and manage payroll and salary disbursements.
The bank’s Chief Financial Officer (CFO), Chidinma Onukogu, said Raven has seen significant growth in multiple business metrics in the past two years, noting that in 2022, the company started the year with 150,000 customers and ended it with 470,000 customers, laying a solid foundation for the bank’s future growth.
Onukogu also noted that the company’s transaction volumes have gotten remarkably larger since 2021, and it has recorded enormous success as it transacted nearly a billion dollars, having recorded over 20 million transactions across all our products.
In his address, Chief Marketing Officer Jude Okoharen also described the bank’s achievements as indicators that their customer loyalty and engagement have reflected the stability of the company and that the bank has implemented facial recognition technology for verification as one of its security measures to combat fraud.
As part of its corporate social responsibility in terms of financial inclusion to benefit all, the bank launched the Raven Millionaire Programme (RMP), a project designed to discover and support the underprivileged in society to improve their source(s) of livelihood and boost finances with sound financial literacy training and mentorship.
Looking ahead, the company concludes that it will continue to prioritise its customers and launch more products and services, such as domiciliary accounts and physical MasterCard and Visa cards, to better connect with customers’ diverse daily needs.
