The announcement of Okra, the Nigerian open banking startup once hailed as “the future of African fintech,” shutting down operations is still surreal for many who are enthusiastic about the prospects of the African tech ecosystem.
There are more questions than answers. How could a startup with so much promise go under?
Just a few years ago, Okra was the golden child of African tech. Backed by Silicon Valley giants and flush with investor confidence, the company had built a powerful API product that allowed banks, fintechs, and even government institutions to securely connect financial data, essentially laying the rails for open banking in Nigeria.
But by mid-2025, that dream unravelled. And now, the fall of Okra is becoming one of the most critical cautionary tales in African startup history.
The Rise of Okra
Co-founded in 2020 by Fara Ashiru Jituboh, a brilliant engineer, and David Peterside, a sharp business mind, Okra attracted talent from global brands like Google, Disney, and Mastercard. It raised over $16 million, including a hush-hush $12M Series A led by U.S.-based Base10 Partners.
At its peak, Okra was powering financial data flows for UBA, Access Bank, Interswitch, MTN, Paga, Bamboo, Trove, and more. Its $1 million annual recurring revenue (ARR) milestone came within just a year.
Its go-to-market (GTM) team was known to be ruthless and precise. They even beat out rival startup Mono, which had insider connections for deals like Interswitch. Okra was both leading and setting the pace for the market.
Cracks begin to show
By late 2022, cracks began to emerge. Friction between the founders intensified. Peterside believed engineering wasn’t keeping up with the GTM team’s momentum. The contracts were coming in fast, but the product team struggled to execute, partly due to a fragile infrastructure still heavily dependent on screen scraping, an outdated and error-prone technique.
“The GTM team kept delivering contracts, but engineering just couldn’t keep up with implementation,” an inside source said. “We kept missing the final shot,” the source said.
Then, Peterside left. His departure crippled the GTM machine. Meanwhile, macroeconomic conditions worsened – naira devaluation, higher server costs, and rising inflation put pressure on profitability.
In a bid to survive, Okra pivoted to cloud infrastructure with a product called Nebula. But adoption lagged, and the business model couldn’t absorb the heavy cost base.
By mid-2025, it was over.
“The company made the decision to wind down operations in May. It was an incredible journey; we built impactful technology, worked with some of the biggest brands across the continent, and helped pioneer open banking in Africa,” Fara Ashiru confirmed the shutdown in a statement, but didn’t give reasons.
However, in a later update, she hinted that Okra may not be entirely dead. The company, she said, is undergoing restructuring and could relaunch with a narrowed focus on payments infrastructure, a segment where Okra had shown strength before its pivot.
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Key takeaways
Industry experts point to four major issues behind Okra’s collapse:
- Co-founder misalignment: When key leadership falls out, execution often suffers, especially in high-growth companies where timing is everything.
- Overextension + premature pivot: The move into cloud infrastructure (Nebula) was too expensive, especially without the demand to match it.
- Macroeconomic headwinds: Currency devaluation, rising costs, and a tight fundraising market turned Okra’s burn rate into a ticking time bomb.
- Execution gaps in engineering: While GTM was aggressive, product development didn’t scale at the same speed, leading to missed delivery deadlines and lost clients.
Lessons for founders and stakeholders
- Alignment – No amount of venture capital can fix misalignment at the top. Founder synergy, especially between product and business, is non-negotiable in fast-growing startups.
- Don’t pivot without proof – Moving into a new business line (especially one as capital-heavy as cloud) requires deep market validation. A pivot without traction is just a distraction.
- Respect the macro – Naira devaluation, regulation delays, and infrastructure gaps are not background noise; they’re existential threats. Founders must hedge early, bake in local realities, and diversify risks.
- Legal hygiene is not optional – Tech lawyer Favour Ibe warns that African startups often fail due to weak legal structures: “Messy cap tables, unfiled shareholder agreements, and poor IP practices disrupt exits and damage investor confidence.”
- Celebrate the pioneers, even when they fall – “Okra didn’t fail. They experimented boldly, and they opened the door,” said Paul Ogunedo of AWI Energies. “Without pioneers, there is no starting line.”
What’s next for open banking in Nigeria?
With Okra out and Mono pivoting to a consumer app (OWO), Nigeria’s open banking infrastructure is on shaky ground. But there’s hope. The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) is expected to launch a complete open banking policy framework by August 2025.
Analysts believe this could reinvigorate the sector if it comes with more explicit rules, data security mandates, and support for local infrastructure.
