Dear Koraites,

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It is our culture for me to write every start of the year and as we step into 2026, I want to share a message with a simple theme:

Beyond Africa 2026.

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Before I explain what that means for Kora, I want to introduce someone many of you may not know, the one who stirred the passion for Africa early enough — Mother Aize Obayan.

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She was my mentor during some of my most formative years in University. To the public, she was a Vice Chancellor. To me, she was a builder of people — the kind of leader who looks at students and sees nations, looks at young men and sees world leaders, looks at potential and refuses to let it die.

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In one of our last meetings, she did something I’ve never forgotten. She showed us a map of Africa with patches of light scattered across it. Then she showed us the rest of the world — full of light. She looked at me and my friend and she gave us a mandate that has followed me ever since:

“Go and light up Africa”.

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That sentence is not poetry to me. It is instruction. It is my responsibility. And if you have ever wondered why Kora exists—even in underserved African corridors—or why The Curve, which has trained thousands of slum children and less-privileged youth in the most remote communities with technology skills, exists—this is the reason.

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What we’ve built so far

For the last seven years, we have done the hard, unglamorous work of building in Nigeria— learning our market, earning trust, building resilience, and creating the foundations of a payment platform that can serve real businesses in the real world.

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And then, between 2024 and 2025, we began scaling that foundation across the continent: Ghana, Kenya, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, South Africa, and Egypt.

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Each new market has demanded more maturity from us:

• stronger compliance

• stronger partnerships

• stronger infrastructure

• stronger people

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And you have delivered.

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What “Beyond Africa” means — and what it does NOT mean

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Let me be clear:

Going beyond Africa does not mean leaving Africa behind.

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It does not mean we are “graduating” from our roots. It means we are fortifying those roots — and then extending their reach.

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In 2026, we will deepen our African footprint further with expansions into: Tanzania, Rwanda, Zambia, and Ethiopia.

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But more importantly, Beyond Africa 2026 means we take our first deliberate step to bridge global financial services and Africa-based financial services at an infrastructure level.

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That bridge looks like this:

From an infrastructure standpoint, Kora will make USD, GBP, EUR, CAD, and Yuan (CNY) available so businesses building from African markets can create truly global, borderless financial products — without needing to incorporate abroad or step a foot outside Africa.

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This is a direct move toward our mission:

“To connect an interconnected Africa to the world”.

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The future we are building

Our vision is to create a future where financial services barriers are reduced to the lowest possible level.

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A future where:

• A business in Nigeria can collect payments from the US or Europe and settle instantly in Naira or Kenyan Shillings.

• A conglomerate in America can enter Egypt or Ghana, collect locally, and settle instantly in USD or GBP.

• A startup in Lagos, Nairobi, Kigali, or Addis can build world-class products that feel native everywhere — because the infrastructure underneath is world-class.

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This infrastructure is long overdue.

And 2026 is our year to build it.

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Our Flywheel and our people

As big as this vision is, the truth remains:

The only product we truly have is our people.

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And the only way we achieve “Beyond Africa 2026” is by reinforcing the three core principles of our Flywheel:

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1. Leadership at every seat

Leadership is not a title. At Kora, leadership means fulfilling the purpose of your role with excellence, because every role is connected to our grand vision. We have to build an organization where every single person is a leader.

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2. Relentless execution with world-class standards

We will not win because we have ideas. We will win because we deliver —consistently, securely, compliantly, and with quality that travels globally. Excellence isn’t doing what is required of us but surpassing that consistently.

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3. Trust as the foundation

In payments, trust is the product. Trust is compliance. Trust is reliability. Trust is how we earn the right to connect Africa to the world.

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So as we enter this next chapter, I’m asking each of us to think bigger — not just about markets, but about what it means to build infrastructure that history can’t ignore.

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Mother Aize’s mandate still stands:

Go and light up Africa.

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In 2026, we will light it up even brighter — and we will connect that light to the world.

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Let’s build.

Dickson