Nigerians in the diaspora can now support their loved ones back home with daily needs ranging from grocery shopping, utilities, and medical support, amongst others without having to be physically present, with just a click using Cowriecrowd.
Cowriecrowd is a US-Based cross-border marketplace platform founded in 2024 by Olusola Adun, a US-based lawyer who is the CEO and Temitayo Odetayo who doubles as the Co-founder/COO and a Financial Adviser.
The founders, both serial entrepreneurs, realised that Nigerians could easily receive money from loved ones abroad through various cross-border channels. However, they believed that these individuals could benefit even more. They decided to create a marketplace where they could access a variety of products and services delivered to their families on their behalf.
This comes when the Central Bank of Nigeria has stopped the dollar cash payout by the international monetary operators in Nigeria.
All payout to beneficiaries will be carried out based on the prevailing market rates at the nation’s official foreign exchange market rate.
Cowriecrowd, the self-service fully integrated platform connects the diaspora more intimately to the needs of their family and dependants in ways simply sending money can’t.
Odetayo, who is the co-founder said the platform focus is on essential areas such as food security, access to affordable healthcare, assistance with core utilities, education, and medical support among others.
According to him, the platform eliminates or reduces the need to always send money directly as users now have 100 percent control of how, in what amount and for what items the remittance dollar they send home is used.
He said, “We have a grocery store servicing large population centers like Lagos, Abuja, Port Harcourt and Ibadan environs, where from anywhere in the world they reside, the Nigerian Diaspora can now select basic food items, add on to a cart and check out; similar to shopping on Walmart or amazon and those items will be delivered within 24-48 hours to any provided address in these initial launch cities.”
According to him, the platform also enables Nigerians in the diaspora to contribute to the education and medical needs of dependants, family members or loved ones back home.
“With Cowriecrowd, you can now pay directly to the school or hospital, eliminating any doubts and guaranteeing that your support is directly addressing what it was intended to do,” he said.
Odetayo added that the platform also offers health insurance purchase enabling users get HMOs for their family members thus solving at least for the insured period the need for urgent medical remittance.
In terms of utility, he said the platform empowers the diasporan to purchase electricity units for the pre-paid power meters of their dependants and families in Nigeria, directly from the Power Distribution companies, as well as phone credit and data units directly from the telecom providers to the phones of family and other dependents and a whole lot more.
To achieve these services, Cowriecrowd has partnered with brands like Hygeia HMO, Healthtracka, Pricepally, SPAY business solutions and Cuepay and will be onboarding more partners in the nearest future.
Read also: Here are five influential diaspora Nigerians in business
Responding to what payment processor the company leverages on, the CEO said that the company processes payments using PayPal, Amazon Pay amongst other highly secured payment processors for its diaspora customers while for Nigeria it uses CuePay/SPay business solutions leveraging Interswitch for seamless transactions.
Regarding how secure the platform is, Adun reiterated that the company’s international processors are Paypal and AmazonPay with Stripe incoming. Adding that ‘Cowriecrowd doesn’t have access to the customers’ cards, and all transactions are being integrated from the processor end.”
Responding to why the company stands out, he said that its ability to also provide business for our partner companies. For example, Hygeia HMO, Pricepally, Cowriecrowd exposing them to a different international and direct client base.
“Being the first Sub-Sahara company offering a marketplace for varieties to the diaspora, Cowriecrowd is faced with limited competition,” the CEO said.
Also, the founders said they are looking to grow the platform organically and add more partners, more vendors and more service providers for Nigeria, so as to provide an even more attractive array of solutions for Nigerians in diaspora.
“We are currently identifying credible partners in some selected African countries as we hope to scale into a Pan-African solutions company,” they said.
