Vendease
“Can a B2B food procurement marketplace become the embedded financial and operating system for African restaurants?”
Founded2020
HQLagos, Nigeria
FoundersTunde Kara, Olumide Fayankin, Gatumi Aliyu, Wale Oyepeju
Total raised~$33.2M+ (disclosed)
Latest roundSeries A, 2022
IndustryVertical SaaS / Restaurants
The story
Vendease launched in 2020 as a B2B food procurement marketplace connecting African restaurants directly to farms and manufacturers. It quickly pivoted from pure middleman to a stocking/aggregator model and layered embedded financial services — most notably a Buy Now Pay Later product — on top of supply. After macro pressure on Nigerian logistics economics, Vendease restructured in 2024-2025: it cut 44% of staff and repositioned as a software-first operating system for restaurants (POS, Restaurant Manager, marketplace, wallets) with BNPL as the core financial product.
Product timeline
2020
Founded in Nigeria as a B2B food procurement marketplace connecting restaurants to suppliers· launch
2021
Backed by Y Combinator (W21 batch); raised $3.2M seed· funding
2022
Raised $30M Series A (equity + debt) to expand financial services and operations across Nigeria and Ghana· funding
2024
Launched/scaled Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) product for restaurants and food businesses· lending
2024
Launched Restaurant Manager (back-office OS) and Point of Sale hardware/software for restaurants· pivot
2025
Restructured business — cut ~44% of workforce, shifted from logistics-heavy to software-first model (BNPL + Restaurant OS)· pivot
Same company
Vendease was analysed under more than one name on the same domain, so its stack is split across these dossiers. Each was analysed independently and may name providers the others do not.
The stack
2 layers disclosed in Vendease’s embedded-finance stack
Payments / PSP
Vendease POS (self-operated)Vendease Wallet (self-operated)
Lending
in the full report
Accounting gap: significant
2 more providers across 1 layer, with confidence-scored evidence and source URLs, are in the Embedded Finance Index report.