SoshoPay, a Zimbabwean financial technology and data platform formed in 2022, operates an integration system that uses hardware metrics to underwrite loans for informal businesses. Founders Simbarashe Gwenzi and Shirley Gwenze launched the software after facing challenges securing capital for their own small businesses.
The platform connects financed solar energy equipment and productive assets to banking networks, tracking energy consumption and repayment patterns. This architecture converts hardware operation metrics into credit signals, allowing banks, microfinance institutions and asset sellers to monitor risk without modifying their core lending systems.
Financial institutions across the continent report a micro, small and medium enterprise financing gap estimated at $330 billion. While more than 40 million small businesses operate informally in Africa, fewer than 10 percent secure formal credit. Lenders struggle to underwrite these entities due to a lack of standardized financial records.
“While financial institutions want to serve this market, they are constrained by limited visibility into business performance, weak monitoring tools, and high recovery costs,” Gwenzi told news publication Disrupt Africa.
The system functions as an intermediary layer between hardware operators and lenders. SoshoPay generates revenue by charging partner institutions technology fees, which include integration support, subscription costs and specific asset usage charges.
“SoshoPay was created to address this by using energy access as a proxy for creditworthiness. By financing essential solar assets and tracking real-time energy usage and repayment behavior, the platform converts everyday business activity into reliable, continuous data that lenders can trust to extend and manage credit,” Gwenzi said.
The company operates primarily through self-funding and has facilitated over $720,000 in credit through its live integrations with financing and payment partners. The platform maintains a 98 percent recovery rate for these distributed funds.
Operations currently run in Zimbabwe, where the developer has onboarded over 600 small businesses through deployments with financing partners Zimbabwe Microfinance Fund and YEC Fund. The software provider has also established a pipeline of solar nanogrids and productive-use energy assets awaiting financing that is valued at approximately $3.5 million.
SoshoPay plans to expand operations across Southern and East Africa by establishing new partnerships with financial institutions and retail energy providers. Target expansion markets include South Africa and Zambia, alongside Mozambique, Malawi, Angola, Uganda and Tanzania. Deploying the platform requires the company to manage physical hardware installations alongside software integrations.
“Key challenges have included navigating regulatory environments, integrating with legacy financial systems, building trust with institutional partners, and educating the market on asset-based, data-driven lending models. Managing hardware deployment alongside software development has also required careful coordination with hardware retailers and installers,” Gwenzi said.
