Last week’s announcement by the Chinese-owned Nigerian-based e-commerce and payments company OPay to suspend four of its services (ORide, OTrade, OCar, OFood) caught a lot of people by surprise. After raising an impressive $170 million in a Series B funding round last fall from some of China’s hottest VC and tech companies, OPay was among the most well-funded fintech start-ups in Nigeria’s burgeoning tech sector.
Just over half a year later, the company said in a statement on Twitter that due to the worsening economic conditions brought on by the COVID-19 outbreak, the company needs to restructure its business away from transportation and mobility in order to focus on its already successful payments operations.