This profile has not been claimed and data may not be accurate.
89th percentile
YC founder who sold Sendwave for $500M, now CEO of Wave, Francophone Africa's first fintech unicorn
Credibility
Traction · 90th percentile
- Wave closed a $200M Series A at a $1.7B valuation in September 2021, becoming Francophone Africa's first fintech unicorn.
- Sendwave was acquired by WorldRemit for $500M.
- Past founder of Sendwave, the international remittance company acquired by WorldRemit.
Relationship Matrix
Most Complimentary
Founder score
- 99%Probability of being accurate (99%)Sendwave was acquired by WorldRemit for $500M.
- 99%Probability of being accurate (99%)Current founder and CEO of Wave Mobile Money.
- 99%Probability of being accurate (99%)Y Combinator W12 alum (both Sendwave and Wave are YC Winter 2012 companies).
- 99%Probability of being accurate (99%)Past founder of Sendwave, the international remittance company acquired by WorldRemit.
- 99%Probability of being accurate (99%)Wave was co-founded with Lincoln Quirk, confirming co-founders.
- 97%Probability of being accurate (97%)Wave closed a $200M Series A at a $1.7B valuation in September 2021, becoming Francophone Africa's first fintech unicorn.
- 95%Probability of being accurate (95%)wave.com ranks #82,916 on the Majestic Million (global domain prominence).
- 40%Probability of being accurate (40%)Identified Stack Overflow account for Drew Durbin.
What you likely need
You're a repeat founder with a unicorn-scale exit under your belt, now running Wave toward what looks like an IPO or major growth round — the events that will move the needle for you are high-trust rooms with late-stage fintech investors, Africa-focused operators, and the YC network you've already earned credibility in. You need warm introductions to Series B/C lead candidates and IPO-readiness advisors, not general networking. The most valuable Festival moments for you are small, closed-door dinners where the other people in the room already know what $157M ARR in Francophone Africa means.
Would you attend these IRL Festival events?
We will tune and customize your Founder Festival experience to make sure you get invited to the events that would be most valuable to you.
- fundraisingA closed dinner with investment bankers from Goldman, Morgan Stanley, and Citi who have led emerging-market fintech IPOs, to pressure-test Wave's $157M ARR story and assess public-market readiness
- fundraisingA roundtable with Sequoia Heritage, Ribbit Capital, and Founders Fund partners — your existing Series A backers — to workshop the Series B narrative around Wave's 46-country footprint and 2,068-person team
- introsA private dinner with Stripe and Founders Fund portfolio founders operating in payments or remittances to explore warm distribution partnership intros across Wave's Francophone Africa markets
- positioningA YC W12 alumni-hosted mentorship night for African founders in the YC network, where you anchor the room as the most credentialed Francophone Africa operator in the ecosystem
- hiringA hiring roundtable with operators who have built or recruited Chief Regulatory Officers at multi-country fintech unicorns — Flutterwave, Chipper Cash, Airtel Money — to de-risk Wave's 46-country regulatory surface area
- positioningA small workshop with high-output technical founders who publish prolifically — Paul Graham network, YC alumni with strong engineering blogs — to build a publishing cadence that strengthens Wave's employer brand for senior engineering hires
- tacticalA candid dinner with founders who have navigated post-layoff culture stabilization at scale — post-June 2022 Wave cut of 15% — to share playbooks for retaining top performers and rebuilding growth narrative internally