---
title: "Why OyaPay shut down"
description: "Nigerian offline-payments startup OyaPay shut down in February 2019 after a months-long, unresolved dispute between founder Abdulhamid Hassan and his uncle (the company's sole family investor) over equity dilution needed to bring in outside capital."
canonical_url: "https://liners.com/graveyard/oyapay"
markdown_url: "https://liners.com/graveyard/oyapay.md"
type: "graveyard"
language: "en"
image: "/graveyard/oyapay/certificate.png"
published_at: "2026-07-31T17:41:07.836Z"
updated_at: "2026-07-31T17:41:07.836Z"
---

# Why OyaPay shut down

Nigerian offline-payments startup OyaPay shut down in February 2019 after a months-long, unresolved dispute between founder Abdulhamid Hassan and his uncle (the company's sole family investor) over equity dilution needed to bring in outside capital.

## Breadcrumbs

- [Graveyard](/graveyard)
- [OyaPay](/graveyard/oyapay)

## Summary

Here lies OyaPay. It let offline Nigerian businesses take payments and forward orders, with or without a smartphone. When outside capital was needed, the founder and his sole family investor spent months unable to agree on diluting one stake. The impasse never settled, and in February 2019 he called it quits.

Nigerian offline-payments startup OyaPay shut down in February 2019 after a months-long, unresolved dispute between founder Abdulhamid Hassan and his uncle (the company's sole family investor) over equity dilution needed to bring in outside capital.

## Product history

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Fate | ShutDown |
| Primary cause | FounderTeam |
| Stage at shutdown | Seed |
| Lifespan in days | 761 |

## Autopsy report

## What the product attempted

OyaPay, launched December 1, 2017, built a mobile point-of-sale/payments platform so offline Nigerian businesses could accept payments and take forward orders with or without a smartphone, competing with the likes of Paystack and Flutterwave.

## Early warning signs

Founder Abdulhamid Hassan deliberately avoided external capital until achieving product-market fit; when the company needed to raise external funding, months of unresolved disagreement with its sole family investor (an uncle) over stake dilution followed.

## What happened

Hassan had funded OyaPay's early growth with a small seed investment from a family member rather than outside investors. When the company later needed to raise external capital, the family investor refused to allow dilution of his stake. The impasse went unresolved for months until Hassan, frustrated, decided to shut the company down in February 2019, promising refunds of user wallets and merchant balances; some staff, including Hassan, subsequently joined Paystack, though Paystack said this was not an acquisition.

## Sources

- [OyaPay shutdown: A sad case of family investment gone wrong](https://techpoint.africa/2019/02/19/oyapay-has-shutdown?ref=startupgraveyard.africa): Techpoint Africa
- [CEO discloses how family affair shutdown OyaPay's operation](https://nairametrics.com/2019/03/05/ceo-discloses-how-family-affair-shutdown-oyapays-operation/): Nairametrics
- [Family Feud: Nigeria's OyaPay closes over investor dispute](https://www.finextra.com/newsarticle/33423/family-feud-nigerias-oyapay-closes-over-investor-dispute): Finextra
- [Nigerian paytech OyaPay is no more](https://www.fintechfutures.com/paytech/nigerian-paytech-oyapay-is-no-more): Fintechfutures

## Related pages

- [OyaPay alternatives](/oyapay/alternatives)
- [Liners Graveyard](/graveyard)

## Access and citation

- [Canonical HTML page](https://liners.com/graveyard/oyapay)
- [Markdown route index](/sitemap.md)
- [Agent access guide](/llms.txt)