Building the Infrastructure for African Small Businesses, Vant Is Powering Cross-Border Trade

  News report on  Building the Infrastructure for African Small Businesses as Vant Is Powering Cross-Border Trade

African small and medium-sized businesses produce goods that the global market wants. From fashion and food to manufactured and creative products, demand exists well beyond local borders. Yet for most African entrepreneurs, international trade remains out of reach, not because of quality or ambition, but because the infrastructure required to trade globally has never been built with them in mind.

Vant, a Nigeria-founded technology company, is working to change that.

Vant was co-founded by Paul Akolade (Chief Executive Officer), Raphael Abayomi (Chief Technology Officer), and Ayomikun Okorodile (Chief Operating Officer), a multidisciplinary founding team combining strengths across business strategy, engineering, and operations. Together, they are building a cross-border commerce platform that enables African small businesses to sell locally and globally through export-ready digital storefronts, embedded payments, and operational tools designed for scale.

“For many African entrepreneurs, the problem is not demand,” says Paul Akolade, CEO and co-founder of Vant. “The problem is access to trusted storefronts, international payments, reliable records, and the infrastructure that global trade requires. Vant exists to remove that friction.”

For most small businesses across Africa, selling internationally means navigating disconnected tools, one for storefronts, another for payments, another for foreign currency management, and another for record-keeping. This fragmentation increases costs, delays payouts, and exposes businesses to unnecessary risk. As a result, many remain stuck in informal or local markets despite having globally competitive products.

Vant collapses this complexity into a single platform.

Under the technical leadership of Raphael Abayomi, Vant’s Global Storefront infrastructure enables merchants to create professional, export-ready storefronts, list products online, accept both local and international payments, and sell to customers across Africa, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Transactions are processed seamlessly, allowing businesses to receive funds transparently without relying on informal intermediaries or workaround solutions.

“Our focus has been to build infrastructure that works in real conditions across borders, currencies, and regulatory environments,” Abayomi explains. “Small businesses shouldn’t need a patchwork of tools to trade globally. The technology should simply work.”

Operationally, the platform is supported by systems and processes led by Ayomikun Okorodile, COO and co-founder, who oversees execution, internal operations, and coordination across product, compliance, and customer support. Her role ensures that the platform not only functions technically but operates reliably at scale for thousands of small businesses navigating complex trade environments.

By embedding payments, transaction records, and financial visibility directly into the commerce experience, Vant enables small businesses to operate with the structure, credibility, and clarity required for cross-border trade.

Small and medium-sized enterprises account for over 90 percent of businesses in Africa, yet they contribute only a small fraction of global exports. The gap is not talent or production capacity; it is infrastructure.

Without access to reliable digital commerce systems, many African businesses are unable to meet the operational standards expected by international buyers. Vant is designed to bridge this gap by making global trade operational, not aspirational.

Since launch, the platform has processed over ₦1.4 billion in transactions, supporting thousands of users, many of whom are engaging in structured digital trade for the first time. For these businesses, selling beyond borders is no longer a distant goal; it is part of their day-to-day operations.

The platform also unlocks access to working capital. By transforming trade activity into structured, verifiable data, Vant enables businesses to gain clearer insights into revenue, manage cash flow more effectively, and position themselves for growth financing.

Vant was designed by a founding team with firsthand experience working alongside African entrepreneurs, particularly in underserved and informal markets. Rather than building from assumptions, the platform was shaped by real operational challenges encountered by small businesses attempting to scale, formalise, or export.

Beyond product development, the founding team is actively involved in ecosystem building and mentorship. Paul Akolade is a recognised startup ecosystem leader and community organiser, while the team collectively engages with accelerators, innovation programmes, and entrepreneurship initiatives across Africa and internationally.

“Our goal is not to replace African entrepreneurs’ ambition,” Akolade adds. “African businesses are already capable. What they need is infrastructure that allows them to compete globally on equal footing.”

As global trade becomes increasingly digitised, platforms like Vant play a critical role in ensuring African businesses are not left behind. By lowering barriers to entry and formalising cross-border commerce, Vant is helping transform local enterprises into globally competitive businesses while opening new markets for international buyers and partners.

The company’s long-term vision is to become foundational infrastructure for African trade, enabling millions of small businesses to participate in global commerce with confidence, transparency, and scale.

For African entrepreneurs looking beyond borders, Vant represents more than technology. It represents access.