The South African company handling R22 billion every year with only 360 employees

Payments giant iKhokha processes over R22 billion in transactions every year across 50,000 merchants with only 360 employees. 

This extraordinary efficiency and the company’s strong growth have seen it get snapped up by Nedbank for R1.65 billion in December 2025. 

With early-stage integration done, Nedbank recently held a showcase event for investors and analysts where it explained the rationale behind this acquisition and that of Eqstra. 

iKhokha has grown into a formidable business, enjoying deep penetration in the small-business and informal-trader markets. 

These are areas where Nedbank has historically lacked a presence, with it hoping to leverage the iKhokha brand to begin capturing value from these parts of the economy. 

iKhokha CEO Matt Putman explained that the company initially launched with a laser focus on solving payments for small businesses. 

“We started out 14 years ago trying to solve one specific pain point for small businesses, which is the acceptance of card and digital payments,” Putman said. 

“Banks were not set up to deal with smaller merchants. They were doing a good job with tier one and tier two clients, but further down, they were kind of nowhere.” 

Being bank-agnostic was key for iKhokha. This gave it access to the entire market and ensured it could build and own the entire technology stack. 

“We could move quickly, leverage the power of technology, and ride the wave of smartphone penetration to onboard customers easily,” Putman explained. 

“iKhokha could onboard and service clients at a fraction of the cost of traditional banks. This was a great opportunity to meet a need in South Africa.” 

The business has gradually expanded its offering since then, moving beyond payments into business management software and credit. 

iKhokha lends working capital to business owners based on their transaction data, providing them with relatively easy access to credit. 

The business has scaled from a handful of merchants to over 50,000, and now processes R22 billion in payments annually. It has extended R3.5 billion in working capital. 

All of this is currently being serviced by a team of 360 people, with iKhokha retaining its own management team and operations after the Nedbank acquisition. 

The operating system of small businesses

“We have evolved into far more than just being an in-person payments provider or card machine provider. The ambition is to be the operating system that small businesses use,” Putman said. 

iKhokha is planning to leverage Nedbank’s financial might to become this operating system, using the bank’s balance sheet to significantly grow its lending book. 

This is coupled with integrating into the bank’s payment and operating systems to offer enhanced services to clients. 

Chief among these is the potential to enable near-real-time payment for customers with Nedbank bank accounts. 

This solves a key issue for small businesses with digital payments, giving them significantly more control over their cash flow. 

In ordinary circumstances, small business owners purchase stock and then sell it, using the proceeds to purchase the next batch of stock and so on. 

Waiting a day for payments to come through does not work in this case, as business owners require immediacy to function. 

By tapping into Nedbank’s payment systems, Putman expects iKhokha to offer twice-daily settlement to the bank’s clients. This means these clients will be ‘paid’ twice a day, giving them near-immediate access to cash. 

Another exciting development is the potential to turbocharge iKhokha’s business management software operations. 

In this regard, it is looking to offer stock management and payroll software. This will make for a close-to-full suite of business banking services. 

Nedbank’s managing executive for business and commercial banking, Andiswa Bata, explained that its aim is for iKhokha to provide businesses with a starter pack. 

This starter pack was referred to as “banking lite” by Putman, as it gives clients most of the functionality at a low price point. 

As businesses scale and become more complex, they will increasingly tap into Nedbank’s business banking offerings and, at the high end, potentially commercial banking. 

“Really, this is why we get out of bed every day. We believe we can bring more of these 2.5 million small businesses into the digital economy,” Putman said. 

“We want to give them a digital footprint and access to capital through more formal services like banking. This should have a big impact on moving the needle on growth and employment.”