Mobile money has come to stay in Nigeria. Mobile money is a financial service inspired by tech which allows users transfer and receive money with their mobile phones. This service is one of the tenets of Central Bank’s recent cashless policy.

One of the pioneers and leading provider of mobile money in Nigeria is Paga. Launched in February 2011, Paga have been facilitating the transfer of funds among Nigerians. Since launching to the public, Paga has processed over 276,000 transactions worth more than N2.6 billion. On June 4 2012, Paga achieved a major milestone and crossed 100,000 unique users. According to Paga’s website, Paga has about 127,717 users.

Paga enables any person with a mobile phone or Internet access to send cash to anyone in Nigeria, buy or send airtime credit, pay bills, pay both online and physical retail stores (without cash notes or a debit card), and perform a variety of other transactions. Individuals can also perform these transactions in their communities by visiting any agent in Paga’s growing network, comprising of more than 850 agents currently located in 19 cities.

On its path to providing better services to more Nigerians, Paga has just secured new investments from Adlevo Capital, Omidyar Network, Acumen Fund, Capricorn Investment Group, and current investors Goodwell West Africa Microfinance Development Company.

Commenting on the purpose of the investment, Paga’s founder & CEO, Tayo Oviosu, said “The business opportunity for Paga is huge, and it follows that the capital requirement to achieve our mission is also significant. A key requirement for success in our industry is having investors who share our vision and have the financial fortitude for such an undertaking. To date, we have been funded by individual investors and Goodwell. We are humbled by the interest we continue to receive from both local and international institutional investors. This investment will enable Paga to scale our operations across Nigeria and allow us to build upon our front-runner position. We have carefully chosen our investors for their track record and the immense value they will bring towards accomplishing our mission.”

According to Oviosu, “Paga is a home-grown solution that overcomes a core challenge in Nigeria – how to transfer money or pay for anything without physically carrying cash. Imagine a day you walk into your local provision store, to buy provisions for the weekend and you don’t need to carry cash, or even your wallet! Simply, all you have is money in Paga. The storeowner processes your transaction via Paga and now has his money in the bank. The opportunities abound and this is why investors have put their weight behind our team to help us achieve our mission.”

As at the time of publishing, the monetary value of the investments has not been disclosed to the public. However, with these new investments, Paga’s services can only get better. Looking at the strides Paga has made since inception, one can conclude that Paga has done much with little. With more money in the bank and a bigger investment consortium behind Paga, Paga can expand its network and maintain its position as the leading Mobile Money provider in Nigeria.

It may interest you to know that Paga has an audacious goal to provide financial access to 40 million Nigerians by 2015. So, should we care much about this? Is this one of those unrealistic goals set merely to attract investors? Well, with access to large funding and an enabling environment (thanks to Central Bank’s cashless policy), we can watch Paga achieve its goal by 2015.