Inside the Fintech Betting That Africa’s Next Unicorns Will Be Creators, Not Startups

I recently watched a riveting interview on one of my favorite African podcasts, Afropolitan. The guest was Yele Bademosi, founder of Onboard, and the conversation touched on something I believe could transform how we build businesses across the continent.

What started as a discussion about creators and money became a much deeper exploration of how Africa’s next generation of entrepreneurs might rise.

The Founder’s Core Thesis: Creators as the Next Conglomerates

Yele Bademosi believes Africa’s next billion-dollar companies won’t come from banks or conglomerates — they’ll come from creators.

Not influencers chasing brand deals, but builder-creators: entrepreneurs turning their audiences into distribution engines and their income into leverage.

His company, Onboard, sits at the intersection of that vision. It’s a finance app designed to give creators and digital entrepreneurs the freedom to transact globally — to hold stablecoins, convert currencies seamlessly, and operate beyond the limits of local banking.

Phase 1 and 2: From Payments to Credit

Right now, Onboard’s first mission is simple: make it easy for African creators to get paid globally — fast, reliably, and in stable currencies.

That’s Phase 1: build the payment rails and asset custody infrastructure for global creators.

But Phase 2 is where things get bold. Onboard’s long-term play is to help creators not just earn, but access credit — loans, advances, or financing — using their verified payment history as proof of reliability.

Africa’s biggest fintech gap isn’t just payments; it’s access to fair, data-backed lending.

Why Creators, Why Now

Bademosi argues that the timing couldn’t be better.

“We’re at the inflection point of the creator economy. The costs of creation are collapsing while distribution channels are flattening.”

He outlines a structural shift that’s hard to ignore:

• Television era → centralized control of distribution.
• Google & Facebook era → platform control of distribution.
• Creator era → personal control of distribution (YouTube, TikTok, Substack).

Distribution has been progressively decentralized — and power has followed it.
Where once creators sat at the bottom of the media chain, they now command the top of attention.

The New Small Business: Creators as Micro Enterprises“The beautiful thing about being a creator,” Bademosi says, “is that you don’t need to raise capital first. You can start with a phone, a story, and a following.”

Creators are default small businesses:

• Revenue: ads, brand deals, subscriptions, merch
• Assets: content, brand equity, data
• Distribution: direct followers

Startups spend years chasing users; creators start with them.
And when creators earn community trust, they gain built-in product–market fit.

Community as a Venture Platform

It’s not about millions of followers; it’s about a loyal, mission-aligned base that trusts your judgment.

With that kind of audience, a creator can:

• Launch products with zero marketing cost
• Test ideas instantly
• Build insights about real demand

That community becomes a venture platform — capable of validating and scaling businesses faster than traditional startups.

Creators can bootstrap early, monetize intelligently, and then layer in capital strategically.
It’s the inversion of the startup model: from community → company.

The Creator Leverage Model: From Content to Companies

This idea isn’t theoretical.

“MrBeast isn’t just a YouTuber,” Bademosi said. “He’s a distribution network that can launch anything — burgers, chocolate, games — and make it succeed because he already owns the audience.”

That’s the creator leverage model — where community precedes company.

Steven Bartlett is another example: he owns his IP (Diary of a CEO), controls his audience, monetizes through authenticity, and reinvests via ventures like Flight Story and Thirdweb.

It’s a replicable playbook — if Africa builds the rails.

What African Creators Lack — The Missing Infrastructure“African creators have the same storytelling power,” he says, “but not the same rails.”

The three systems creators need:

1. Banking: receive, store, move money globally (Onboard’s core).
2. Credit: access loans or advances using verified income (next phase).
3. Management: handle taxes, contracts, analytics, brand deals.

Without these, creators can’t scale influence into enterprise.
The infrastructure gap, not the talent gap, is what’s holding them back.

Onboard’s Playbook: Building the Rails First

That’s why Onboard starts with payments — enabling global transactions in stablecoins, and then using that data to unlock credit.

But the focus now is depth, not mass adoption.

“We want to work with a few creators who can become our proof points — success stories that show how creators can scale, bring capital, and drive users into the Onboard ecosystem.”

Distribution through influence, not ads.

“If one creator grows from 50,000 to 500,000 followers while using Onboard, that growth brings users, capital, and credibility for everyone involved.”The Moat — Why It’s Hard to Copy

Onboard’s defensibility comes from three interconnected systems:

1. Regulatory Integration: early licensing and compliance partnerships across African corridors.
2. Data Flywheel: every payout enriches its on-chain credit graph — a growing moat of verified earning data.
3. Network Effects: integrations with creator collectives, agencies, and APIs make Onboard the default backend for cross-border creator finance.

Together, these create a compound advantage — compliance-driven trust, proprietary insight, and ecosystem lock-in.

Building the Ecosystem — Just Like Tech Founders Did“Between 2010 and 2020, we built an ecosystem around founders — VCs, accelerators, media — and out came Flutterwave, Paystack, Andela.”

Now, he says, the same must be done for creators.

A full-stack ecosystem that gives them:

• Finance (through Onboard)
• Partnerships (distribution and monetization)
• Infrastructure (banking, credit, analytics)

Just as tech entrepreneurs powered Africa’s digital decade, creator-entrepreneurs will define the next one — if given the rails.

The Scale of Impact — Unlocking $5B in Creator Credit

If Onboard converts even 10% of Africa’s unserved creator-credit market, it could unlock $3–5B in new lending capacity within five years.

Each financed creator becomes an employer, investor, and local multiplier.

The Closing Vision — Building Freedom Into the System

Bademosi’s endgame is simple but profound: freedom.

“The same way tech infrastructure made it possible for African founders to build billion-dollar startups, creator infrastructure will make it possible for African creators to build billion-dollar businesses.”

In his world, freedom isn’t abstract — it’s programmable.
And Onboard is writing the code.

Inside the Fintech Betting That Africa’s Next Unicorns Will Be Creators, Not Startups was originally published in Coinmonks on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.