Wave
wave.com
Actively hiring
Payment Processing & Gateways
Money Transfer & Remittances
As featured in
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Overview
News
Technologies
Salaries
Products
People
Growth
Offices
Jobs
Financials
Funding and backers
Total raised
$337M
2 rounds on record
Latest round
$137M
Series B · 2025 · 15 mo ago
Team
501-1000
employees, estimated range
Hiring now
53
+18 posted in 30 days
Backers
4
Y Combinator, Kleiner Perkins
The money's age
Due for its next round
15 months since the last round · and hiring
Momentum
39/100
hiring for its size, a new city, in the news
Last sign of life
this month
a posting or a news item
The story so fareach stage dated by its source: the company's releases, the press, registers, filings
2025
Raised a round Series B $137M
Mar 25, 2022
On the Hacker News front page A case study in early-stage startup execution · 110 points
2021
Raised a round Series A $200M
2018
Founded
Jan 2012
Went through Y Combinator
Tractionpublic signals, read monthly
Web presence
top 0.02%
of 133.2M domains by links, Common Crawl
Hacker News stories
10
best: 110 points
Funding rounds
| Round | Date | Amount | Investors | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Series B | 2025 | $137M | — | |
| Series A | 2021 | $200M | — |
Founders and leadersfrom filings, registers and the company's site
Drew DurbinCo-Founder & Chief Executive Officer
Lincoln QuirkCo-Founder
Backed byfrom the funds' portfolios and accelerator catalogs
Y Combinator 
Kleiner Perkins 
Founders Fund 
Glynn Capital Investors in similar startupsfunds that back the companies most like this one
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How Wave hires
Truth index
B 83/100
Median time to fill
64 days
Ghost roles
0%
Stale roles
50%
Reposted roles
0%
Wave scores B on the Alion truth index (A is best, E worst), measured over 8 open roles re-checked against its own hiring board: 0% look like ghost listings, 50% have gone stale and 0% are the same role posted again. Its roles close in a median of 64 days. It measures how much of what this employer publishes turns into a real, finite search - not the employer as a workplace. How the index is computed
Overview
Wave is a mobile money company founded in 2018 that is rebuilding financial services for West Africa around a flat one per cent transfer fee and free deposits and withdrawals. Customers use a smartphone app or a QR card at a dense network of local agents to send money, pay bills, receive salaries and buy airtime, undercutting the incumbent telecom operators that historically charged several times more. Operating in Senegal, Cote d'Ivoire, Mali, Burkina Faso, The Gambia and Uganda with its operational base in Dakar, the company has become one of Africa's most valuable startups and serves millions of monthly active users.
News
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Michael Tamblyn (@mtamblyn) on Threads
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One company is at the center of a wave of rogue AI attacks
Mistakes at Israeli startup Irregular sent Anthropic, OpenAI, Meta, and Google agents after real-world targets.
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Expert ratings are ignoring signs of a blue wave
Assuming we're in a roughly neutral political environment doesn't make sense given the history of the midterms, $4.50 gas or Trump's dismal approval ratings.
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Tesler's Law - Complexity and AI
Explore Tesler's Law through Hokusai's Great Wave. Decide who handles the complexity that remains when AI changes how a job gets done.
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Oracle's Cold 6 AM Layoff Emails Hit Staff Amid New Wave of Cuts: 'Today Is Your Last Working Day'
Oracle has launched another round of layoffs, with early-morning termination emails sent to employees as the company raises its fiscal 2026 restructuring estimate to $2.8 billion.
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Show more news
Tech stack
Technologies named in job postings at Wave over the last 12 months, by layer, with the share of postings for each.
Technologies in use
59
Postings analysed
51
Stack modernity
74/100AI adopter
Languages
Python18%
Kotlin10%
Swift10%
TypeScript10%
Frameworks & libraries
Jetpack Compose10%
SwiftUI10%
React.js6%
OpenTelemetry2%
Databases
PostgreSQL12%
CockroachDB6%
Redis6%
Cloud & platforms
Adjust63%
Kubernetes12%
GCP10%
Looker4%
AI & ML
LLM2%
Sign in to see how your skills match this stack
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Full Wave tech stack
59 technologies · by team · pay by technology · changes · similar stacks
Salary insights
Compensation ranges based on this company's open jobs
Median
$186k
Typical range
$115k – $357k
Open positions
5
5
Jobs
Middle
20%
Senior
60%
Architect
20%
| Level | Jobs | Median | Typical range |
|---|---|---|---|
| Middle | 1 | $126k | $126k |
| Senior | 3 | $186k | $115k – $236k |
| Architect | 1 | $357k | $357k |
Highest paying role
Chief Technology Officer
$357k
Normalized to USD per year
All salaries at Wave
By role, level and city, against the market · 5 jobs with pay
Products
Bill Payments
Bill payments let customers settle utilities, school fees and airtime from their balance. It turns the wallet into a general-purpose payment instrument rather than only a transfer tool.
wave.com
Business
Wave Business gives companies bulk disbursement, salary payment and collection tools on the same rails. Employers and NGOs use it to pay people who have no bank account.
wave.com
Agent Network
The agent network is the physical layer where customers convert cash into digital balance and back. Agents earn commission and are supported by dedicated tooling and float management.
wave.com
Mobile Money App
The Wave app lets customers hold a balance, send money and pay merchants at a flat one per cent fee. Deposits and withdrawals at agents are free, which is the core of the company's pricing pitch.
wave.com
People
Drew Durbin
Co-Founder & Chief Executive Officer
Drew Durbin co-founded Wave and leads it as chief executive. He and his co-founder built the business out of an earlier remittance company they started together.
Lincoln Quirk
Co-Founder
Lincoln Quirk co-founded Wave and led much of its early product and engineering work. He previously co-founded the remittance service Sendwave with Drew Durbin.
Names and roles come from public filings, company registers and the company's own site. Is this you? Correct or remove · How we handle this data
Growth
Hiring Momentum
73/100
Growing
Open positions
53
15 opened / 20 closed in 30 days
Median time-to-fill
60 days
faster than 24% of the market
ATS activity
Every ~4 hours
Today
Hiring Dynamics
+100%
Hiring Focus
The percentage next to each role is its share of the company's job openings over the last 90 days; the arrow shows the shift versus the previous period.
Finance
18% ▼
Operations
14% ▲
HR
9%
Marketing
9% ▼
Administrative
7% ▲
Management
5%
Actively hiring for Operations (+4 in 30 days)
Activity Timeline
New location: United States
Sep 2026
Added Sentry to stack
Sep 2026
Added Pyroscope to stack
Sep 2026
Added Prometheus to stack
Sep 2026
Added Platform Engineering to stack
Sep 2026
Added OpenTelemetry to stack
Sep 2026
Added Loki to stack
Sep 2026
Added Jaeger to stack
Sep 2026
Added Honeycomb to stack
Sep 2026
Added Grafana to stack
Sep 2026
Added Datadog to stack
Sep 2026
Added WhatsApp to stack
Sep 2026
Offices
Where the company hires and what each office is for
Cities
15
Hiring now
9
Countries
10
Busiest office
Dakar
Loading the map
Headquarters
Builds here
Office with open vacancies
No open vacancies right now Tap a pin for the office
Dakar
Senegal
HQ
Senegal (SN)
5 open roles 6 posted in 90 days 50-200 est. staff
hires for Administrative, Finance, HR
Abidjan
Ivory Coast
Corporate office
Cote d'Ivoire (CI)
9 open roles 13 posted in 90 days 50-200 est. staff
hires for Finance, Management, Marketing
Niamey
Niger
Corporate office
Niger (NE)
6 open roles 3 posted in 90 days 50-200 est. staff
hires for Finance, HR, Legal
Kinshasa
Democratic Republic of the Congo
Support & operations
Democratic Republic of the Congo (CD)
5 open roles 6 posted in 90 days 50-200 est. staff
hires for Operations, Administrative, HR
Ouagadougou
Burkina Faso
Corporate office
Burkina Faso (BF)
5 open roles 3 posted in 90 days 50-200 est. staff
hires for HR, Finance, Management
Bamako
Mali
Corporate office
Burkina Faso (BF)
5 open roles 4 posted in 90 days 50-200 est. staff
hires for HR, Legal, Management
Banjul
Gambia
Sales office
Gambia (GM)
5 open roles 5 posted in 90 days 50-200 est. staff
hires for Sales, HR, Marketing
Freetown
Sierra Leone
Support & operations
Sierra Leone (SL)
4 open roles 3 posted in 90 days 50-200 est. staff
hires for Operations, Legal, Marketing
Conakry
Guinea
Support & operations
Guinea (GN)
2 open roles 1 posted in 90 days 10-50 est. staff
hires for HR, Customer Success
Mbarara
Uganda
Regional office
Mbarara, Uganda
1 posted in 90 days 10-50 est. staff
Kampala
Uganda
Regional office
Uganda (UG)
Bobo-Dioulasso
Burkina Faso
Regional office
Bobo-Dioulasso, Burkina Faso
Lira
Uganda
Regional office
Lira, Uganda
Mbale
Uganda
Regional office
Mbale, Uganda
Bouaké
Ivory Coast
Regional office
Bouake, Côte d'Ivoire
Jobs
$88k – $126k per year (gross) • Remote (United States, United Kingdom, Belgium, Canada, Kenya, UTC-8 – UTC+4 hours) • 3+ years exp • Bachelor's Degree
GDPR
Analytics
Power BI
Looker
Microsoft Excel
Management
Zapier
Google Sheets
Stripe
Service Desk
Apply
up to $186k per year • Remote (Ghana, UTC-5 – UTC+4 hours) • 7+ years exp • United Kingdom • Kenya • Spain • Ghana
Python
JavaScript
Kotlin
TypeScript
Swift
Mypy
Databases
PostgreSQL
AI/ML
Model Context Protocol
AI Agents
LLM
LLM Guardrails
Frontend
GraphQL
React.js
Mobile
Jetpack Compose
SwiftUI
DevOps
Terraform
GCP
Kubernetes
Cybersecurity
ISO 27001
PCI DSS
SIEM
Management
Stripe
Apply
$131k – $236k per year • Equity • Remote (United States, United Kingdom, Kenya, Spain, Ghana) • 5+ years exp • Bachelor's Degree
Python
SQL
Machine Learning
Analytics
A/B Testing
Management
Stripe
Apply
up to $357k per year • Equity • Remote (United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Spain)
Python
Kotlin
TypeScript
Swift
Mypy
Databases
PostgreSQL
Redis
AI/ML
AI Agents
Frontend
GraphQL
Mobile
Jetpack Compose
SwiftUI
DevOps
Terraform
GCP
Kubernetes
Management
Stripe
Apply
≈ $68k – $134k per year (Estimated) • Remote (Canada) • 5+ years exp • United Kingdom • Canada • Spain
Python
PostgreSQL
Redis
CockroachDB
Frontend
GraphQL
DevOps
Jaeger
Loki
OpenTelemetry
Datadog
Prometheus
Kubernetes
Grafana
Platform Engineering
Pyroscope
Honeycomb
SLI/SLO/SLA
Management
Stripe
QA
Sentry
Apply
≈ $110k – $243k per year (Estimated) • Equity • Remote (United States, United Kingdom, Kenya, Spain, Ghana) • 5+ years exp
Python
Embeddings
AI Agents
Speech Recognition
RAG
Feature Store
Text-to-Speech
LLM Guardrails
Voice Agents
Management
Stripe
Apply
≈ $125k – $290k per year (Estimated) • Remote (likely Burkina Faso, Gambia, Mali, Senegal, UTC-8 – UTC+4 hours) • 10+ years exp • Bachelor's Degree
Stripe
Apply
Financials
Total raised
$337M
Latest round
Series B
Funding rounds
2
Investors
4
Funding rounds
| Round | Announced | Amount | Valuation |
|---|---|---|---|
| Series B | 2025 | $137M | — |
| Series A | 2021 | $200M | $1.7B |
Key Investors
Ribbit Capital
Ribbit Capital joined Wave's Series A round. The firm invests exclusively in financial technology worldwide.
ribbitcap.com
Stripe
Stripe invested in Wave as a strategic backer of African payment infrastructure. It had earlier acquired the Nigerian payments company Paystack.
stripe.com
Founders Fund
Founders Fund co-led Wave's Series A financing in 2021. The firm backs companies building physical and financial infrastructure.
foundersfund.com
Sequoia Heritage
Sequoia Heritage co-led Wave's Series A, the largest ever raised by an African startup at the time. The fund invests long-term capital across markets.
sequoiaheritage.com