Crypto payments startup Due Network expands into Nigeria with its stablecoins offering

Due Network, a crypto payments start-up has announced its expansion into one of the largest crypto markets in Africa, Nigeria. In a press conference that was held on Tuesday, November 14, executives of the company highlighted the solutions Due Network will be offering to Nigerians. 

Established in 2022, Due Network is a London-headquartered fintech startup which recently announced its $3.3 million Seed round to further develop and expand its fiat currency connectivity to more markets.

With a vision to reshape international payments through stablecoins and blockchain technology, Due Network provides multi-currency accounts, global transfers/remittances and merchant acquiring for businesses and individuals.

What Due Network intends to do in Nigeria 

Co-founder/CEO Robert Sargsian and Co-Founder/CTO, Alex Popov, are joined by a global team spanning London, Lagos, Munich, New York, Sofia and Mexico City. The team brings experience from renowned companies including Revolut, Uber, Binance and Bolt.

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According to Sargsian, the team intends to be a driving force in transforming how the global economy runs:

“Our vision is a future where money is truly global, permissionless and inclusive.”

With the Nigerian launch scheduled for later this month, Due Network will be providing cross-border remittances, payment acquiring and borderless virtual asset accounts for businesses and individuals in Nigeria. The platform will be leveraging stablecoins (USDC, USDT) and blockchain rails like Ethereum L2s to provide businesses with accessible, fast, and cheap payments globally. 

Powered by open and interoperable decentralised ledger protocols, Due Network will enable Nigerian businesses to use Naira to add/hold digital US Dollars and Euros in their accounts. This can then be used to send/receive funds across Sub-Saharan Africa, the UK, EEA and the US. 

In practical terms, with Due Network, a Nigerian company will be able to use NGN via NIP to pay their vendor in Europe. The vendors can then receive the payment in EUR via SEPA — instantly, at near-zero costs and with a few clicks from a single interface.

In the words of Robert Sargsian:

“The global payments ecosystem is riddled with inefficiencies. Receiving funds from overseas, paying international vendors or even moving intracompany funds across countries is expensive, slow and hard to access. We are here to challenge and change that.”

Additionally, Robert Sargsian says one of the outstanding features of Due Network is that it offers clients direct control over their assets, being a decentralised non-custodial platform. 

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What this means is that clients maintain complete control and custody over their funds on the platform. No intermediaries (not even Due) can access the client funds in any way, providing the account holders with direct and unobstructed access without any restrictions or dependencies, per the CEO.

What is next?

The waitlist to request priority access is now live, with the initial launch in Nigeria scheduled for later this month. Sub-Saharan Africa, the UK, EEA and the US are the priority corridors, with expansion into Latin America (e.g. Mexico, Brazil) and Asia-Pacific (e.g. Hong Kong, Singapore) scheduled for Q1 2024. 

Also, Due Network is reportedly working to integrate digitised Real World Assets (e.g. tokenised US Treasuries) to provide more markets with wider access to yield-bearing assets.