Orca, a South African fintech startup developing fraud prevention software for emerging markets, has raised a $2.35m seed round. The fundraise is notable as one of the largest seed rounds secured by an all-female founding team on the African continent.

The round was led by pan-African venture capital firm Norrsken22, which previously anchored the company’s $550,000 pre-seed round in early 2024. Other participants include One Day Yes, Enza Capital, and CV VC Africa.

The problem As financial inclusion accelerates across Africa, largely driven by mobile money and e-wallets, cybercrime has followed suit. According to an Interpol report, South Africa was the most cyber-attacked country on the continent and the third most globally in 2021. Data from the Southern African Fraud Prevention Service (SAFPS) also showed a 600% surge in fraud incidents between 2018 and 2022.

Despite this localized threat, traditional, Western-built fraud detection tools are often incompatible with African payment infrastructure. Existing compliance products largely fail to cater to the nuances of mobile wallets, widespread merchant networks, and agent-led banking, leaving regional financial institutions vulnerable.

What Orca does Founded in January 2024 by former Stitch software engineers Thalia Pillay (CEO) and Carla Wilby, Orca provides localized fraud detection and compliance tools built specifically for alternative payment methods in emerging markets.

Pillay, whose background includes roles at Investec Bank and Aerobotics, and Wilby, who previously founded the edtech platform Zomila, built the platform after conducting over 200 interviews with regional fraud teams.

Since its launch 18 months ago, the startup claims to be processing between $4bn and $5bn in transaction volume monthly across more than 70 countries. Its client base currently includes telecommunications companies, enterprise merchants, and banks.

The investors

• Norrsken22: A pan-African venture capital firm headquartered in Stockholm, supported by teams in Kenya, Nigeria, and South Africa.
• One Day Yes: An early-stage investment firm.
• Enza Capital: A multi-stage venture firm backing founders building category-defining technology companies in Africa.
• CV VC Africa: The African arm of the Swiss-based venture capital firm.

Market context Orca’s successful capital raise highlights a rare milestone for gender diversity in the region’s venture ecosystem. Historically, female founders have struggled to secure institutional backing; data indicates that between 2019 and 2022, only 1% of venture funding in the African tech sector went to female-only founding teams.

What’s next While Orca still held the majority of its pre-seed funding, the company opted to accelerate its seed raise due to faster-than-anticipated enterprise demand. The new capital will be deployed to expand its engineering capabilities, scale the platform to handle increasingly complex, localized fraud patterns, and continue market expansion.