Interview with Atsu Davoh, Founder of Bitsika, on Creating a Payment App in Africa

In the pioneer Founders Connect video, I have a chat with Atsu Davoh, Founder & CEO of Bitsika. Bitsika is a payments app for Africa where users can send, spend, issue visa cards, buy airtime, buy and sell crypto and so much more. It has expanded to accommodate 80,000 users and more and has partnered with big names in the entertainment industry like John Dumelo and Nigeria’s own Davido.

We discuss his background; how he was sent to study in the US where he acquired a love for coding and dropped out from the university to pursue coding full time. Then returned to Ghana to build tech-based projects, ten of which failed but which also laid the blueprint for his founding Bitsika.

Davoh shares his experiences, mistakes made and lessons learned, he also lays down his philosophy on life and success which relies heavily on aggression towards achieving one’s goals. With candidness and humour, he offers valuable advice to entrepreneurs looking to get into the tech scene and shares future plans for the company.

Watch the video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_RXXeLZxkc

Video timestamps

1:54 - Atsu talks about himself 2:50 - How he got into Tech 4:17 - Why he dropped out of University 6:39 - Business ideas he worked on when he came back to Ghana, how they failed, etc. 8:36 - At what point did he know when something failed and moved on to the next idea/ project? 10:08 - How going to Kenya changed things for him 11:11 - At what point did the idea of Bitsika come out? 17:48 - At what time did Bitsika move from USSD product to the Cashapp for Africa? 22:24 - What have been the biggest highs and lows of Bitsika? 24:45 - At what point did Sammy come into the picture as Co-Founder? 26:27 - What is your perspective on Hiring? 28:31 - How they got Davido on the Team of Bitsika. 34:12 - Biggest lessons? 35:45 - Fun questions!