Cardtonic Secures $2.1m Funding to Transform Business Spending with Pil
Nigerian fintech startup Cardtonic has successfully closed a $2.1 million seed funding round to build and launch Pil, a standalone business spending and expense management platform designed for startups and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) across Africa. The capital raise marks a strategic pivot for the Lagos-based company from primarily consumer-facing products toward essential infrastructure tools that solve real business finance challenges.
Founded in 2019 by Faturoti Kayode and Balogun Usman, and currently led by CEO Emmanuel Sohe, Cardtonic (operating under The Tonic Technologies Ltd.) has steadily grown its suite of digital financial services, including virtual dollar cards, gift card exchange, eSIM offerings, bill payments, and an online gadget marketplace. Over the years, these consumer services helped the platform scale to serve more than 1.5 million users across Nigeria and Ghana, establishing a foothold in the region’s competitive fintech ecosystem.
Why This Funding Matters
The $2.1M seed round — reportedly backed entirely by angel investors rather than institutional venture capital — represents a milestone in Cardtonic’s evolution from a bootstrap-driven retail fintech into a provider of core financial tooling for businesses. This is notable at a time when seed-stage funding in Africa has remained conservative, especially for companies focused on infrastructure solutions rather than consumer apps.
According to company insiders, Pil was born out of Cardtonic’s own operational challenges — particularly difficulties with managing subscription payments, advertising outflows, and international transactions using traditional virtual card infrastructure that offered limited oversight and frequent failures. These pain points inspired the development of an internal solution that has now grown into a fully fledged product built specifically to help businesses manage corporate spending with greater control, visibility, and efficiency.
What Pil Offers
Pil is positioned not just as a digital wallet or card product, but as a comprehensive business spend operating system. Key capabilities of the platform include:
- Multi-card issuance with labelled controls that allow businesses to allocate cards to teams with tailored permissions.
- Real-time transaction monitoring and reconciliation tools that give CFOs and finance managers clear visibility into spending activity.
- Multi-currency funding support, enabling users to load and manage funds in Nigerian naira, Ghanaian cedi, and even stable coins — a nod to the increasing adoption of digital assets in corporate finance.
The platform is also slated for integrations with major accounting and ERP systems such as QuickBooks and Xero, underscoring Cardtonic’s ambition to embed Pil deeply into the broader financial workflows of African businesses.
Strategic Implications for the Fintech Landscape
Cardtonic’s shift towards B2B financial infrastructure mirrors a broader trend emerging across the African fintech ecosystem — where startups are moving beyond basic consumer products into building foundational tools that address enterprise needs and operational complexities. This trend has also been seen in other leading fintechs expanding into deeper financial rails, API-first platforms, and embedded finance solutions that support business growth at scale.
For the Nigerian and African markets at large, Pil’s launch could help close a persistent gap: reliable, locally built expense management solutions tailored for the unique operational realities of African businesses — including volatile currency environments and inconsistent cross-border payment rails.
What’s Next
With its seed funding secured, Cardtonic plans to roll out Pil publicly ahead of its January 2026 launch. As it does so, the company will be closely watched by investors and peers alike, not just for its product innovation but for how effectively Pil can improve financial control and transparency for SMEs — a sector that underpins economic growth across the continent.
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