Fragmented business registries across Africa can make verification more difficult for banks, fintech companies, investors and other businesses operating in multiple markets. Information is generally held by national authorities, with formats and access procedures varying by country.
Fylings is a business data verification platform focused on African companies. Launched by a Nigerian startup founded by Precious Okeke, it aggregates information from registries and public sources to help users identify and verify companies across several countries on the continent.
The platform says it currently covers 20 African markets and links each data point to its source, verification date and a confidence indicator.
The service is built around three main features. The first allows users to search for a company by name or other available information. The second, called “Verify,” checks a company’s existence and status against available records. The third, “Monitor,” allows users to track changes to a company’s information.
The monitoring feature may be particularly relevant to teams responsible for Know Your Business, or KYB, the process used to verify companies and their business partners. Financial institutions and other companies use KYB checks to assess their business relationships.
Fylings also offers an application programming interface, or API, that allows other companies to integrate its data into their own systems. The platform is also gradually broadening its coverage to include public procurement, shipping and mining data.
The company says it has records on more than two million African businesses and more than one million beneficial owners. Those figures and its coverage claims are based on information provided by the startup.
By bringing data from different national sources into one place, Fylings is seeking to address a growing challenge for companies operating across the continent: making it easier to identify, verify and monitor business partners across African markets.
Adoni Conrad Quenum