Flutterwave Dismisses 3% Of Its Employees

Flutterwave, a major fintech company in Nigeria, has reduced its workforce by 24, or 3% of all employees.

Declaring that the exercise was a part of a strategic reorganisation centred on its primary enterprise payments and remittance businesses, the corporation made this announcement on Monday.

This puts the wave of tech layoffs by multinational tech giants that began last year and continued into the first quarter of 2024 closer to home.

Olugbenga Agboola, CEO of Flutterwave, announced the layoffs and stated that the company had decided to refocus resources on enterprise payments, which is its primary business, after considering data. The company has also promised to expand its efforts in the rapidly expanding remittance sector through the Send App.

He said, “As a result, we have rebuilt the teams to more efficiently utilize the opportunities in these markets. Consequently, we’ve made the difficult decision to support the transition of 24 Wavers accounting for 3% of our workforce.”

Severance package

Agboola provided a detailed severance package to support the affected employees, acknowledging the impact of the layoffs. He claims that this entails receiving at least three months’ worth of gross pay, making money off of unused vacation time, and having a year’s worth of access to tools for professional growth.

“We will pay an average of 3 months gross salary, depending on the country where the employee is based. We will also be monetizing your unutilized accrued leave days.

“You will continue to have free access to our professional training platform for 12 months after your transition. We will be providing you with free outplacement service for 3 months.

Adding, “For Wavers with stock options, we will support you with an additional vesting period of 6 months. You will have 3 months of free healthcare.

“You will continue to have access to our mental health and career coaches for 3 months post-transitioning. We hope this softens the impact this sudden transition has on you personally and professionally,” he added.

Flutterwave has announced a company-wide compensation review for its remaining staff members. The review includes a new performance-based bonus structure that is linked to both individual and team performance metrics, as well as a base salary increase for most employees that is aligned with the market.

According to Agboola, this was done in response to recent employee input and a careful examination of market trends.

“A thorough market analysis was conducted to ensure that we are competitive within our industry and so a majority of you will see an upward adjustment to your base compensation.

“The new discretionary bonus structure will tie directly to individual and team performance and will be based on specific, measurable KPIs that align with our strategic goals,” he said.

Based on their new organisational structure, the company says they are now positioned at the market’s 95th percentile for junior employees and 85th percentile for senior employees.

What you should know

Even though Flutterwave is cutting employees in Nigeria, the business revealed in May that the Bank of Mozambique had given its approval in principle for a payment aggregator licence.

With this clearance, Flutterwave is now authorised to offer its payment services in Mozambique and extend its operations into markets in southern Africa.

Continuing, Flutterwave stated last week that it would be building and outfitting a cutting-edge Cybercrime Research Centre in collaboration with Nigeria’s Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), as seen on the digital news platform.

Flutterwave stated in the midst of the layoffs that it is taking advantage of a tremendous opportunity to accelerate its development, innovation, and growth. In order to support its main operations, it is aggressively hiring for important roles in risk, compliance, engineering, data, and finance.

However, Flutterwave is investigating methods to customise its business payment solutions and extending Sendwave, its remittance service, into new area