In the developed world, almost anyone can get financing for, say, a car lease. But in an emerging economy like South Africa, the only people who own cars or can even get a car lease are the people who already have something to collateralize, or a payslip to work off.
As a result, small businesses, especially in Africa, have a $5.2 trillion financing gap, according to the World Bank.
Untapped Global wanted to re-think this situation by allowing small businesses to use their ongoing revenues as collateral and enable that by being able to track their assets.
So, for example, if an African entrepreneur wanted to buy a water treatment system for a new business, they wouldn’t normally be able to afford it. Instead, they could use the Untapped platform as collateral to get a machine, and Untapped would take a share of the revenue of the water they sell. So now they can start a business and start earning revenues without going through the process of doing a traditional lease of a machine.