The South African-founded platform Spaza Market has been strategically repositioned to directly benefit its users, shop owners, and small medium enterprises (SMEs) with a suite of powerful new tools.
The upgrade from Spaza Eats to the Spaza Market super-app is designed to answer a critical question: How will this directly benefit a spaza shop owner?
According to founder Talifhani Banks, the answer lies in new tools, new revenue streams, and unprecedented access to capital.
“A spaza shop can sell online, an SME can manage digital payments, and both can qualify for loans based on real-time trading data,” Banks explains. “We’re not just digitising businesses — we’re levelling the playing field so they can compete and grow.”
With advanced services like insurance, peer-to-peer wallets, and branded bank cards on the roadmap, a key strategic question emerges: which area does the company see becoming the largest driver of revenue in the next 3-5 years? Banks argues fintech will be our growth engine.
“While commerce is the base, the largest drivers of revenue will be peer-to-peer wallets, SME lending, and insurance,” he explains. “Spaza Pay and Spaza Capital, in particular, will dominate because they address the biggest structural gaps in emerging markets: payments and access to capital.”
This vision is now operational. The platform has secured a National Credit Regulator (NCR) licence, approved to offer loans through Spaza Capital to fund its merchants. The growing adoption of Spaza Pay also paves the way for future offerings like Spaza Insurance.
This NCR approval is a game-changer for the Spaza Market model. Banks argues that the NCR approval is transformative.
“It allows us to fund SMEs and merchants directly, unlocking access to working capital where it’s needed most,” he explains. “For our business, it means diversifying into high-value financial services. For the markets we serve, it means fuelling sustainable growth in enterprises that form the backbone of Africa’s economy.”
The entire ecosystem is powered by data. Every transaction on the platform generates valuable information that fuels Spaza Capital, enabling it to offer smart, data-driven loans. Banks argues: “In return, those loans drive more commerce, creating a self-reinforcing cycle that makes our ecosystem both sustainable and defensible.”
So, how will Spaza Capital work in practice? Banks states that Spaza Capital exists to help SMEs and traders grow.
“Qualification is based on digital trading activity — sales volume, transaction history, repayment patterns. With this, businesses that have never accessed formal finance can now secure capital to expand. The impact is immediate: more stock, stronger supply chains, and accelerated growth for emerging market enterprises.”
This process is designed to be radically accessible. “Our process is designed for speed and inclusion. Instead of weeks of paperwork, SMEs and merchants with consistent digital sales can qualify for cash advances almost instantly,” said Banks. “We’ve partnered with financial institutions to underwrite and finance these loans, ensuring they’re fast, compliant, and scalable.”
The founder, Talifhani Banks of Makhado, Limpopo, leveraged his background in Statistics and Econometrics to identify this gap in the market when he founded Spaza Markets through AnalyticsX in July 2023.
Data is the core of this entire operation. Banks said: “Our parent company, AnalyticsX, was built on data, and that is our edge. We use data to assess credit risk, forecast demand, and optimise supply chains.
“For corporates, we offer visibility into markets that were previously informal.
“For SMEs and township businesses, we provide insights that reduce risk and drive growth. “Data is the backbone of how we turn opportunity into scale.”
Beyond capital, the platform is committed to providing holistic support. “We support SMEs with risk management, financial modelling, and data insights. For example, we can flag when a product is trending or when stock is running low,” said Banks. “Beyond funding, we give enterprises the intelligence they need to expand sustainably.”
