Flutterwave is changing the executive overseeing its global finances as Chief Financial Officer Mitesh Popat steps down from the role to pursue a new entrepreneurial venture.
Popat, who joined the African payments company in September 2024 after serving as Citi’s Chief Financial Officer for the Middle East and Africa, is leaving the day-to-day role to co-found Next Communications, a telecommunications technology company focused on making mobile connectivity available to businesses through APIs.
Flutterwave founder and CEO Olugbenga Agboola announced the transition on September 22, 2026, saying Popat had helped build a more disciplined financial foundation for the company during his two years as CFO. Popat will remain involved with Flutterwave as a strategic adviser.
He will be replaced by Morounke Olufemi, who previously served as Flutterwave’s Chief Financial Officer for Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA).
The appointment brings a familiar face into the global role. Olufemi joined Flutterwave in 2025 and worked alongside Popat on the company’s financial strategy before taking over the broader finance function.
From Citi to Flutterwave, and now entrepreneurship
Popat joined Flutterwave at a significant point in the company’s expansion. Before moving to fintech, he spent about two decades in financial services across North America, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. His most recent role before Flutterwave was CFO for the Middle East and Africa at Citi, where he oversaw finance operations across 29 countries.
Flutterwave said at the time of his appointment that his responsibilities would include overseeing corporate finance, supporting the company’s growth plans, allocating resources, and improving operational efficiency.
Popat also said his objective was to help optimize Flutterwave’s business model for sustained profitability.
Two years later, Agboola says that financial discipline has become an important part of the company’s operating model.
Flutterwave had already placed profitability and sustainability at the center of its strategy in 2025. In its half-year review for that year, the company said it was focusing on cost optimization, revenue realignment, improved efficiency, and stronger unit economics.
Flutterwave reported that its monthly margin had doubled by June 2025 compared with its 2024 average, although the company did not disclose enough information in that update to independently establish its overall profitability.
Popat’s next move is another fintech-adjacent venture.
Popat’s departure is not a move away from technology. He is becoming a co-founder of Next Communications, a company building infrastructure that allows businesses to embed mobile connectivity into their digital products.
The company’s model, which it calls Airtime-as-a-Service, uses APIs to abstract mobile-network infrastructure so businesses can integrate connectivity into products and customer experiences without having to build the underlying telecommunications infrastructure themselves.
Next Communications says its platform currently connects to more than 600 carrier networks across more than 200 countries.
The company describes its proposition as doing for mobile connectivity what companies such as Stripe did for payments: turning a complex infrastructure layer into an API that businesses can integrate into their own products.
Popat is already listed among the company’s team members, alongside co-founders and executives including Gert-Jan Huizer, Gaurav Mehta, and Parimal Galal.
His move therefore creates an interesting transition: an executive who spent two years helping build financial discipline inside a major African fintech is now applying his experience to building another technology company.
Morounke Olufemi takes over global finance
For Flutterwave, however, the bigger immediate issue is continuity. Olufemi takes over the global CFO role after serving as the company’s EMEA CFO since joining in 2025.
Her appointment also brings significant experience from traditional financial services into a fintech that increasingly operates across payments, financial services, and multiple regulatory markets.
Before Flutterwave, Olufemi was Group Chief Financial Officer at Access Holdings. Access Holdings’ 2023 annual report lists her as Group CFO, while its 2024 annual report also identifies her in the same position.
During her time at Access Holdings, Olufemi was involved in major capital and corporate transactions. Access Holdings launched a ₦351 billion rights issue in 2024 as part of a wider capital-raising programme targeting up to $1.5 billion. The company said the capital was intended to strengthen its financial position and support growth across its banking and non-banking businesses. Access Holdings subsequently announced that the rights issue had raised ₦351.01 billion after receiving regulatory approvals.
That background is particularly relevant to her new role at Flutterwave, where the company says capital discipline, margin growth, and sustainable profitability will remain key priorities.
Flutterwave says its strategy remains unchanged.
Agboola said the change in CFO will not alter the company’s strategic direction. According to the announcement, Flutterwave’s priorities around capital discipline and its long-term financial goals remain unchanged.
That distinction matters because the transition is taking place as the company continues trying to move beyond simply growing payment volumes and towards building a sustainable financial infrastructure business.
In 2025, Flutterwave said it was deliberately prioritizing profitability and sustainability rather than pursuing growth at any cost.
The company also reported expanding its regulatory footprint during the period, including securing additional US Money Transmitter Licenses and regulatory approvals in several African markets.
The appointment of Olufemi therefore represents an internal succession rather than a change in the company’s stated financial direction.
A leadership transition that says something about African tech companies
There is another element to the announcement that is easy to overlook.
Agboola described Popat’s move as part of what Flutterwave calls its “Flutterwave Mafia,” former employees who have gone on to build businesses or take senior roles elsewhere.
That idea reflects a broader question facing African technology companies as they mature: Can they become institutions that produce senior executives and future founders, rather than simply companies that hire talent?
In Popat’s case, the answer is now visible in his transition from CFO to co-founder.
At the same time, Flutterwave is retaining his institutional knowledge through his new role as strategic adviser while handing its global finance function to an executive who has already worked within the company.
For Flutterwave, the immediate challenge is to maintain the financial discipline it says it has established while continuing to expand across markets and products.
For Popat, the next challenge is different: turning his experience in global financial management and African markets into a new company in the increasingly competitive connectivity infrastructure space.
The two moves are happening at the same time, but they point to the same reality: as African technology companies mature, their most consequential transitions are increasingly about leadership, capital discipline, and the ability to create the next generation of founders.
