sendit.money

Born and raised in Lexington, VA, Julie has a diverse background and pursued a career for many years as a professional dancer before changing careers to become involved in start-up operations. Julie currently works as the Chief Operating Officer at sendit.money. She has a demonstrated history working with early stage start-ups, creating operational processes to enable the businesses to succeed and scale. In addition to this, she understands the importance of community and creating lasting relationships within teams and stakeholders of all levels. Julie is passionate about making a positive impact in the world and welcomes the opportunity which sendit.money has given her to help fight financial exclusion in the developing world. 

We look to solve the problem of financial exclusion in the emerging markets. From clunky insecure platforms and apps to high exchange rates, poor customer service and hidden fees, remittance is broken. We are committed to building a new type of remittance, created specifically for the people who need it most, immigrants all over the world. Our unique solution is our technology,  building new infrastructure on Blockchain using a wallet-to-wallet system. We are confident that our innovation and services will give the poor more access to financial services, thus contributing to their welfare and helping to reduce social inequality worldwide. Our technological innovation would enable a channel through which global wealth can be redistributed, promoting an equitable distribution of income and development opportunities at the international level, taking effective action on international cooperation on tax, cross‐border financial flows, migration and remittances.

We are looking to solve the problem of financial exclusion in emerging economies. We plan to launch initially in Nigeria where we have strong contacts and partnerships on the ground. Nigeria is the largest community transferring remittance back home. Its current population comprises 206 million people (2.64% of the total population worldwide). The remittances sent from the UK to Nigeria are the highest of any other African country, amounting to over 11 Billion USD in 2018 alone. Globally, we look to help over 400 million people worldwide with the global remittance market of $624 billion. 

Sendit.money will be a mobile platform, designed and tested to work on entry-level phones, which are common in the African market. It will have an intuitive UI that is localized to the many languages around the world and will provide modern banking interaction common to the first world, to the developing worlds which we are looking to support. You will be able to easily view money in your wallet, send money instantly to loved ones anywhere in the world as well as track and reverse transactions as needed. This system will ensure that our customers are getting the best available transfer rates at all times. The foundation of the technology will incorporate the benefits of smart contracts available to us within the blockchain infrastructure enabling instant transfer using the wallet-to-wallet system. 

Our solution is built specifically for immigrants from emerging markets. Our CEO and founder, Michael Lawal, is a Nigerian immigrant living in the UK who has experienced firsthand the problem which we look to solve. We will launch our product initially between the UK and Nigeria and from our initial market exploring phase, where we asked for the opinion of 1.000 potential users, more than 950 gave positive feedback about our innovative product. Initially, we plan to perform a feasibility study that reveals an evident need for the product, presents the cultural expectations, attitudes and local conditions in the UK and Nigeria. We will be focusing on gaining further knowledge about the users, consumers' pain points, stakeholders and market conditions, to tailor our technology and address the societal challenges of the immigrant community. We aim to scale our platform across the rest of Europe and Africa after the feasibility study is completed and the product is launched.

We believe that we are the right team for the Elevate Prize as our problem affects millions of Africans who throughout modern history have been extorted, taken advantage of and defrauded by financial systems and institutions who do not have a progressive socio-economic agenda. Our project incorporates some of the most innovative financial technologies available today. The combination of our motivation and the tooling with which we will challenge the problem will foster financial equity for a nation's people that has been traditionally left behind. 

The idea was originally born with a desire to have a positive socio-economic impact on the community which Michael (CEO, sendit.money) is from. Having direct experience of the economic hurdles experienced by migrants both sending money from developed countries and receiving money from developing countries, Michael saw the opportunity to create a platform built for the people who need it most with their social ability in mind. Because of Michael’s history in the financial services industry as well as a deep understanding of blockchain technology he saw a solution to the problem that he and so many of his co-nationals face on a daily basis. The idea genesis began in early 2019 and the company was incorporated shortly after in June 2019. 

There are various alternatives today, but they fail to address the customers' main needs from technology and cost perspectives. This is primarily due to a lack of proper local insights and an omniscient view of the Nigerian market. Our CEO is a Nigerian immigrant, a permanent resident in the UK; and often sends money back home. This Innovation was born out of the numerous frustrations experienced both by him and his co-nationals. The immigrant communities feel powerless in the hands of the shark remittance operators. Their families lose money to fraud and they experience delays in the payout. Furthermore, when problems arise, there are no local customer service agents to assist. We are very well aware of the realities of life there and fully understand the complex nuances of our users. Our innovation is not only solving the challenges of remittance to an emerging country, but it will also serve as an infrastructure for other innovations. As the world is adjusting to the new "normal" after COVID-19, it is likely that the immigrant communities will be more desperate than ever to find alternative means of sending money from the UK to Nigeria.

Founder and CEO Michael has worked in the financial services industry for 13+ years and has successfully fundraised over $2M for previous projects. Being a Nigerian himself he has a deep market understanding, contacts already placed within the communities that we look to help and networks that we will be able to tap into upon launch. On the team, I am well versed in all aspects of early stage business development and operations. I understand the importance of building relationships with stakeholders of all levels to develop a deep understanding of what we need to deliver and how best to do so. Our Director of design has over 8 years of experience where he helped organizations large and small create elegant and intuitive, human-centric user interfaces.

Until recently we did not have a design director for the project which meant that we outsourced the very early stages of our MVP to pre-graduate resources in order to be cost effective pre funding. While the MVP represented the core journeys, all of the design aspects and user journeys were locked up inside of a UX/UI tool called Figma. When we were ready to engage with our development partner to realize our MVP, the previous designers did not do a proper handover. Thus I had to work directly with our newly appointed director of design to reverse engineer the assets from the design tool that they were locked within. This then gave us a starting point for the conversation with our development partners to progress from. In the process of re-documenting the user journeys we uncovered new requirements and customer needs which were then worked into the deliverables for our development partner. 

I previously managed a large co-working space in west London, in partnership with Imperial College London in their Translation & Innovation Hub. In essence, I was in charge of the space and therefore had the responsibility to make sure 40+ SMEs had what they needed in order to progress their businesses. I saw the value in community, enabling different companies to come together and help each other progress. I curated and organized an series event for the entire Translation & Innovation Hub sharing what all the different companies in the building (not only the floor which I managed) did as well as companies from the surrounding neighborhood, enabling people to meet resources that they needed for problems they were facing as well as a myriad of partnerships which were formed and continue to this day creating opportunities the businesses to thrive and grow. I saw an opportunity, connecting like minded individuals and created the event, including all organization, funding, space rental, marketing etc. to get the event off the ground and really make a difference to start ups, scale ups and enterprise alike.

Our innovation solution is our technology. We will be building a new infrastructure on blockchain using a wallet-to-wallet system. This will help to stop the exchange rate rip off which is one of the biggest problems that our target customers face today. Users will be able to track their money, which is the first in the world. With quick onboarding and no need for traditional banks, our customers will be able to shorten the time it takes to send and receive money from their loved ones. We will tap into existing agent banking networks of our partners so that if a recipient does not have an account with us, the sender will be able to use more traditional channels of mobile money and agent payment. Our platform will be intuitive and easy to use, making it easier than ever to send money in and out of Africa. 

From clunky insecure platforms and apps, high exchange rates to poor customer service and hidden fees, remittance is broken. We decided to build a new platform that would challenge the bigger players and reinvent how people send and receive money in emerging markets. Our target markets include the growing middle class, immigrant workers living in the UK, international students from developing nations living in developed nations and companies from Africa buying goods from the UK & US. We are building new infrastructure on Blockchain using a wallet-to-wallet system to help stop the exchange rate rip off and many other problems consumers face today. Money can be tracked on our e-wallet, the first in the world. We will build a transparent platform where customers can see live exchange rates and can track transactions. They will be able to receive money sent instantly and transactions are secured against fraud. We will bring about change by breaking the link between economic and social exclusion and we will maximize our strategies related to leaving no one behind agenda. Positive economic impact on immigrant families living in Africa. Our innovation will make it possible for our key audience to receive more money and in return will improve their working conditions and quality of life. The services will give the poor inhabitants more access to the financial services, thus contributing to their welfare and reducing social inequality. This contribution will break the link between economic and social exclusion. We will enable a channel through which global wealth can be redistributed; promoting an equitable distribution of income. Our platform will provide financial inclusion for many Africans as our technology will utilise wallet payment system which will also serve as a banking app for many. It will help Africans save enough to farm and trade, helping to lift them out of poverty. Moreover, it will also ensure healthier lives, end hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition. They will thus afford to buy bottled water and more food.

We currently have 2k research participants, of which 95% agree that the pain points we have ID’d are problems that they currently face. There are 650 million families worldwide and 400 million living below the poverty line in Africa. Of those, 50 million alone are in Nigeria which saw $2.9 billion lost to money transfer fraud in 2019. In our first year we will look to onboard 100k users and within 5 years we project that we will have 10 million users worldwide. Every user that we onboard will have the opportunity to send money to their families at the lowest possible cost, ensuring that their loved ones receive more money thus helping their quality of life improve overall. 

By 2030, we want to improve the work and economic opportunities for many Africans, specifically those living in poverty, currently measured as people living on less than $1.25 a day. By building our platform, we will be supporting both the African immigrant workers, living in the UK, as well as their families back home, by giving them fairer exchange rates. Those who are able to start their own businesses in part due to the money saved by using our platform will have a multiplying effect for job creation in the local communities across different countries in Africa. Our purpose is to create career and business opportunities in the African economy. More notably, we aim to ensure access to safe communities for those in poverty and vulnerable situations, including infants and children. The use of our product will help the demographics listed above to receive more money, through fairer exchange rates and reduced transaction fees. Moreover, this will create more opportunities within families and local communities, which is the bedrock of building resilient societies.

Year 1: COVID-19 has already slowed the fundraising landscape - angels are concerned and it has changed our roadmap to date. We also have legal barriers including change in the PDS2 license which now includes a data protection layer which institutions need to work against money laundering. We already have a compliance consultant in place to ensure that we have all compliance strictly in order before our launch. A further concern is the potential for political instability in Africa. As Michael our CEO is from Nigeria and has previous experience doing business in Africa, this is something he will be able to negotiate through. 

5 Year: Similar barriers to year one including licensing and compliance changes. Scaling up could be a challenge and barrier during this time and it will be of utmost importance that we make sure we have the right people, right fit for our company in order to scale effectively. 

We currently have 3 partners on the ground in Africa that we will be working with. This will enable us to tap into existing agent banking networks which will be key in off-boarding funds for people who don't have phones. 

Our business model is B2C & B2B2C. Our initial target market is direct to consumers, meaning a transactional revenue model, charging 1-3%. By letting our customers send money with fairer exchange rates than other products on the market, we are providing value to them while also creating a revenue generating business model. Our innovative solution will enable the poor in Africa to receive money instantly, for less than £2 in commission fees. This is significantly less than what all other competitors are currently charging. The senders will pay lower fees and the receivers will get higher amounts, due to our competitive exchange rates. As a result, it will help the immigrants’ families living in Africa to save enough to start their own SME businesses, thus lifting them out of unemployment and reducing the rate of inequalities. However, as the global economy continues its downward trend due to the Coronavirus pandemic, this further reiterates the need to find transformative commercial solutions in Africa, to address the widening social and economic inequalities in the country. We will also partner with organizations in Africa who will do the finance settlement for us, using a profit share model to help reach customers who want more traditional ways of sending money. 

Based on our minimum success criteria of $10MM per year, with a pricing model of $5.00/month, an expected customer lifetime of 2 years, an expected acquisition rate of 61% and a customer referral rate of 30%, we will need to attract at least 365 new visitors every day after year 3 just to maintain our business model at 166,667 customers.

Our ideal partnerships would be with global banks, financial partners and existing Fintech companies.