11 African Fintechs to Watch: AI Lessons for Cameroon

African fintech is scaling fast—and the numbers prove it. Fintech captured nearly half of Africa’s startup investment in 2024, and the continent added two new fintech unicorns that year: Moniepoint and TymeBank. That momentum matters in Cameroon because the next wave won’t be won only by who has the most agents or the loudest brand. It’ll be won by who uses AI to acquire customers efficiently, keep them engaged, and reduce the cost of serving mobile-first users.

This post is part of our series, “How AI Is Transforming Telecommunications and Fintech in Cameroon.” I’m using a 2025 watchlist of African fintechs as a practical lens: not to copy-paste their models into Cameroon, but to extract what actually works—especially where telecom distribution, mobile money habits, and cross-border needs shape the market.

The core idea: the fintechs worth tracking in 2025 aren’t just “payments apps.” They’re building distribution engines. And in 2025, distribution is increasingly powered by AI: smarter segmentation, faster content production, automated lifecycle marketing, and better customer support.

What the 2025 fintech watchlist really signals (beyond the hype)

The most useful takeaway from the “fintechs to watch” lists isn’t the names—it’s the repeating patterns.

Pattern #1: Fintech is merging with real-world supply chains. M-Kopa finances smartphones. Moove finances vehicles. These aren’t abstract financial products; they’re directly tied to income generation and daily life.

Pattern #2: B2B infrastructure is eating the consumer narrative. Nala’s Rafiki, Selcom’s integrations, Miden’s BaaS, Mono’s infrastructure—these are plays for being the “pipes” that other businesses rely on.

Pattern #3: Distribution is getting expensive, so marketing has to get smarter. Once everyone is bidding for the same customers on the same channels, the winners are the teams who can:

• Identify high-intent users early
• Personalize outreach without hiring a huge marketing team
• Keep customer support costs under control

For Cameroon, this connects directly to telecom and fintech convergence: telcos already have reach, data signals, and messaging rails. Fintechs have the use cases. AI is how you combine the two without creating a bloated cost base.

The 11 fintechs to watch in 2025—and what Cameroon should learn

Here’s a Cameroon-focused reading of the 2025 watchlist (pulled from across the continent). I’m not assuming each company operates in Cameroon today. The point is to learn from the playbooks that are working in Africa.

1) M-Kopa: asset financing is a data problem

M-Kopa reportedly serves 5 million underbanked Africans and offers “productive assets” via flexible digital micropayments, with around $400M annual revenue.

Cameroon lesson: smartphone penetration and affordability are business strategy, not just “market context.” If you’re financing devices, you’re also financing future digital behavior.

Where AI fits (practical):

• Credit scoring from usage patterns: repayment behavior, device telemetry (where legal), transaction cadence
• Next-best-offer automation: upgrade prompts when repayment probability is highest
• Content automation for repayment nudges: localized SMS/WhatsApp scripts in French/English, tuned by response rates

2) Moove: underwriting is distribution + partnerships

Moove is valued around $750M, reports $115M annual revenue, and finances vehicles for 20,000+ drivers.

Cameroon lesson: partnerships (ride-hailing, delivery, merchants) beat standalone customer acquisition.

Where AI fits:

• Risk models that price loans dynamically based on driver earnings volatility
• Churn prediction to intervene before defaults
• Automated partner marketing kits: AI-generated onboarding materials and training content for driver communities

3) Nala: remittance is becoming a payments infrastructure race

Nala connects payouts across 249 banks and 26 mobile money services in 11 African markets, and it launched Rafiki, a B2B payouts platform. The article notes Africa receives just under $100B in annual remittances, with ~10% long-term CAGR.

Cameroon lesson: diaspora flows are a serious growth lever. But the real defensibility is in payout reliability, compliance operations, and B2B integrations.

Where AI fits:

• Compliance automation: anomaly detection on transfer patterns, faster case triage
• Support deflection: AI chat that resolves “Where is my money?” queries in seconds
• Lifecycle marketing: segment diaspora users by corridor, frequency, and intent to reduce promo spend

4) LemFI: execution wins—volume matters

LemFI recorded $2B annual transaction volume (2023) and processes about $1B monthly volume.

Cameroon lesson: if you can reliably move money across borders at scale, you’ve built trust. Trust compounds.

Where AI fits:

• Personalized fee/FX messaging that improves conversion without racing to the bottom
• Fraud and mule detection using network patterns
• Creator-style content automation for community marketing (diaspora groups, student communities)

5) Yellow Card: stablecoins are increasingly a payments rail

Yellow Card scaled to 1M+ consumers, works with 30,000 businesses, and processes $3B per year, with a stronger B2B focus.

Cameroon lesson: whether or not your product touches crypto, stablecoins are influencing expectations around speed, cost, and cross-border reliability.

Where AI fits:

• Transaction monitoring (AML) with fewer false positives
• B2B onboarding automation (document parsing, KYB checks)
• AI-led education content that reduces fear and confusion—especially critical in regulated environments

6) Selcom: the “quiet giant” advantage

Selcom has 100,000+ merchants and agents, acquired a bank in 2024, and is piloting Selcom Pesa (neo bank).

Cameroon lesson: the biggest opportunities often sit with the companies that already integrate everything: merchants, agents, billers, and banks.

Where AI fits:

• Merchant segmentation (who’s ready for loans, inventory tools, or payments upgrades)
• Agent network optimization (route planning, liquidity prediction)
• Automated merchant comms (campaigns triggered by stockouts, peak seasons, or invoice cycles)

7) Rise: wealth is a retention engine

Rise serves 600,000+ Africans and grew through acquisitions (Chaka in Nigeria, Hisa in Kenya).

Cameroon lesson: investing products aren’t “nice-to-have.” They raise lifetime value and reduce churn by turning users into long-term customers.

Where AI fits:

• Risk-based education journeys (not generic tips)
• Personalized nudges to increase recurring deposits
• Content compliance tooling (reviewing copy to reduce risky claims)

8) Grey: remote work needs cross-border accounts

Grey helps freelancers secure UK/EUR/US accounts and has 1M+ freelancers registered.

Cameroon lesson: talent export is real. If Cameroonian freelancers can get paid faster and cheaper, they’ll pick the platform that makes it painless.

Where AI fits:

• Onboarding assistants that reduce KYC drop-offs
• Dispute triage for payment issues
• AI-driven community content: templates, gig pricing guides, and payout explainers that convert new users

9) Miden: BaaS is how “every company becomes fintech”

Miden (YC-backed) has issued 100,000+ cards and offers embedded finance infrastructure with compliance.

Cameroon lesson: distribution can come from non-fintechs—retailers, telcos, logistics players—if the rails are easy to plug in.

Where AI fits:

• KYB/KYC document automation to onboard partners faster
• API support copilots for developers and partner teams
• Marketing automation for partners: co-branded campaigns generated from a shared playbook

10) Mono: WhatsApp payments show where attention is

Mono evolved from open banking into payments infrastructure and launched OWO to enable faster payments on WhatsApp.

Cameroon lesson: if users live in messaging apps, forcing them into a separate app for every action is friction.

Where AI fits:

• Conversational commerce flows in WhatsApp (payment + receipt + support)
• Intent detection to route users to the right flow
• A/B testing copy at scale to improve conversion in chat

11) Swahilies: SMEs want records before they want credit

Swahilies supports 10,000+ SMEs, with ~10% paying users, and focuses on transaction recording, inventory, and credit scoring.

Cameroon lesson: most SME lending fails because the lender doesn’t have clean data. Start by helping businesses run better, then offer finance.

Where AI fits:

• Receipt/invoice parsing from photos (mobile-first bookkeeping)
• Cashflow insights that feel like a “smart assistant” for traders
• Automated retention campaigns tied to business cycles (market days, holidays, school season)

The Cameroon playbook: 5 AI moves that actually drive leads

If your goal is lead generation (and not just “brand awareness”), these are the AI moves I’d prioritize for telecom and fintech teams in Cameroon in 2026 planning.

1) Build an AI content engine for mobile-first acquisition

Answer first: AI should produce localized, compliant, conversion-tested content every week.

What to produce (and measure):

• Short SMS + WhatsApp scripts (CTR, reply rate)
• Two-language landing pages (conversion rate)
• Help-center articles (support deflection rate)
• Agent training scripts (time-to-activation)

2) Use AI segmentation that marketing can act on

Answer first: Segmentation is useless unless it changes what you send, when you send it, and how often.

High-impact segments in Cameroon often include:

• Salary earners vs. informal income
• Frequent cash-out users vs. digital-first users
• Diaspora recipients vs. senders vs. occasional users
• Merchant clusters by category (pharmacies, mini-markets, fuel, transport)

3) Automate lifecycle messaging, not just campaigns

Answer first: Campaigns spike installs; lifecycle automation keeps accounts active.

Lifecycle flows to automate:

1. Onboarding completion (KYC + first transaction)
2. First value moment (bill pay, transfer, savings)
3. Dormancy prevention (7/14/30-day triggers)
4. Upsell (merchant tools, credit, international transfers)

4) Put AI in customer support to protect margins

Answer first: Support is a growth channel when it’s fast and consistent.

Do this well and you reduce:

• Refund costs
• Agent escalations
• Social media complaints that kill trust

Start with the top 20 ticket types (“reversal,” “failed transfer,” “wrong number,” “KYC rejected”) and automate resolution steps.

5) Treat telcos as data + distribution partners

Answer first: Telecommunications infrastructure is the shortest path to scale in a mobile-first economy.

The opportunity isn’t only USSD or airtime. It’s:

• Behavior signals (top-ups, device types, location patterns)
• Messaging rails (SMS, USSD prompts, WhatsApp support)
• Retail distribution (agents, shops)

When AI sits on top of these rails, you can lower CAC while improving personalization.

Snippet you can hold onto: The winning fintech in Cameroon won’t be the one with the most features. It’ll be the one with the lowest cost to acquire and serve a customer—without losing trust.

People also ask: “Which African fintech trends matter most for Cameroon in 2025–2026?”

Remittance infrastructure, SME operating tools, and embedded finance matter most because they map cleanly to Cameroon’s realities: diaspora corridors, informal commerce, and mobile-first behavior.

AI’s role is straightforward: it reduces the cost of growth (content + segmentation), reduces the cost of service (support automation), and increases conversion (personalization).

What to do next if you’re building in Cameroon

If you’re a fintech, telco, or agency supporting either, here’s a practical next step for Q1 planning:

1. Pick one funnel (acquisition, activation, retention, or support).
2. Instrument it with three metrics (conversion, cost per active user, churn/support load).
3. Deploy one AI workflow (content automation, segmentation, support bot, KYB/KYC automation).
4. Run four weeks of tests and keep only what improves the numbers.

If you want, I can help you turn this into a Cameroon-specific execution plan: which data you need, what tools to start with, and what a realistic 90-day rollout looks like for a fintech or telecom team.

Where do you see the biggest bottleneck right now in Cameroon—customer acquisition, KYC drop-offs, merchant activation, or support overload?