Former World Bank tech guru David Wachira and his co-founder Hempstone Maroria, both Kenyans living abroad have launched Wayapay; the first digital banking app in the USA, targeting the African Immigrant community.

The fintech was launched on Friday in Washington DC.

Wachira expressed his happiness at the launch, revealing the duration of the app's development in a tweet.

“Nothing is more powerful than idea whose time has come! After three and half year of building, we're happy to announce that we've officially launched @Wayapay thank you to my co-founder @OneMaroria for walking this great journey with me, stride by stride,” Wachira said.


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Maroria invited people to their platform, which he said offers cheaper, faster, efficient and hassle-free money transfer services.

“We invite you to join us on a march to freedom from high fees, complexities, inefficiencies, and the difficulties immigrants face when accessing banking and other financial services and, most notably, when sending money back home,” Maroria said.

Kenya’s ambassador to the United States Lazarus Amayo graced the launching occasion of WayaPay.

Amayo lauded the contribution of the Kenya diaspora in the United States.


Kenyan Ambassador to Belgium and European Union Bitange Ndemo also delivered a keynote address albeit virtually.

According to Wayapay’s website, the firm aims to provide unlimited financial access and opportunities to everyone across the board, while paying more attention to people living abroad.

“Wayapay’s goal is to provide unlimited financial access and opportunities to everyone, especially those that are underserved, overlooked, and misunderstood by the traditional banking systems globally, with an initial focus on people living and working outside their home countries,” Wayapay website reads.


Wayapay boasts of a secure system hosted on the IBM Hyper-protected cloud to protect client data and information.

“Our platform is hosted on the most secure cloud infrastructure, the IBM Hyper-protect cloud, enabling the protection of your data and information,” Wayapay says.

The platform allows money transfers to recipients’ bank accounts or mobile wallets. 

The platform currently supports all banks in Kenya and MPESA wallets.