Inside the mind of Omotayo Babatunde, the loyalty pioneer building a reward ecosystem that stretches from African banks to global airlines.
In a digital economy crowded with fintechs, payment startups, and cross-border solutions, one critical layer has been left behind: loyalty infrastructure. While startups chase payment flows and lending margins, very few are asking how to keep users coming back.
This is the story of RewardHub, a Lagos-based loyalty and rewards platform turning everyday spend into cross-border redemption opportunities. Founded by veteran loyalty executive, Babatunde, RewardHub is quietly building the most complete loyalty infrastructure layer in Africa.
How RewardHub’s Founders Went From Loyalty Consulting to Infrastructure Building
Before launching RewardHub, Babatunde had already spent a decade in the loyalty trenches. He began with Dubai-base Infinia, where he served as Regional Director for Africa, led the business development and launching programs for major banks including Access Bank (Nigeria), KCB (Kenya), Ecobank (Nigeria), and AFRAsia Bank (Mauritius). His work and his co-founder also extended to the Middle East and the South East Asia markets.
When Infinia was acquired by Singapore-based Giift, Babatunde continued in his role. But the writing was on the wall: global acquirers didn’t understand Africa. They underestimated the market. And they had no plans to put boots on the ground. “We were only scratching the surface,” he recalls. “There was a clear opportunity to build a locally rooted platform that could scale with African institutions.”
So he left. And with Infinia’s former colleague, RewardHub was born.
Why Loyalty Infrastructure Is Africa’s Missing Fintech Layer
Today, RewardHub helps banks, fintechs, and property firms reward customers across every product and channel, not just debit and credit cards. While most platforms remain card-centric, RewardHub offers enterprise-wide integration:
- Savings, current and investment accounts
- Lending, mortgages, and fixed deposits
- Mobile banking, utility bills, bank transfers, and more.
Every profitable customer behavior can be rewarded, says Babatunde. “And that changes everything.”
In today’s climate of reduced disposable income, RewardHub redefines loyalty as a financial asset, turning routine actions like maintaining balances, timely loan repayments, and daily transactions into real, redeemable value.
The result? Enhanced customer acquisition and retention, greater loyalty and engagement, reduced churn, and ultimately, increased revenue and profitability.
Inside RewardHub’s Redemption Engine: Points, Not Promos
RewardHub isn’t offering feel-good badges or inaccessible point totals. It’s offering real assets. Its redemption engine includes:
- Over 800 global airlines
- Half a million hotels worldwide
- 150,000+ car rentals
- Airtime, data, utility tokens, and POS redemption.
- Destination experiences (Formula 1, golf, private lounges) for HNIs.
Unlike traditional banks that issue end-of-month points with little utility, RewardHub ensures every point earned with our partner banks has real, meaningful value.
The platform is API-first, enabling flexible integrations with financial institutions, merchants, and telcos. A standout feature is Point Transfer, where users will soon be able to move points across brands and platforms (e.g. RewardHub Points to Global Airlines and Hotels reward programs) for instant booking and usage.
In short, this isn’t a promotion. It’s a currency layer.
A Loyalty Platform With Global Ambitions
Babatunde’s roadmap goes far beyond bank partnerships. In the near future, RewardHub plans to:
- Integrate directly with POS terminals to enable retail in-store redemptions
- Enable remittance in points, allowing African diaspora to transfer reward points to loved ones who can spend them at local merchants
- Launch a real estate rewards engine, particularly targeting global property purchases in the sub Sahara Africa, Middle East and Europe.
The company is also a portfolio startup of Founder Institute, with a growing partner ecosystem across payments, retail, and travel
Babatunde sums it up simply: “Loyalty isn’t just rewards. It’s infrastructure. And it will define who wins the next wave of customer trust in African fintech.”
The Fintech Differentiator Everyone’s Ignoring
Too often, loyalty is confused with seasonal promotions or raffle-based campaigns. Babatunde critiques this sharply:
“If a bank runs a promo where 10 out of 10 million customers win a fridge, that’s not loyalty. That’s luck.”
True loyalty programs, he argues, are behavioural reinforcement engines. They drive stickiness. They create aspiration. They turn every spend into a future benefit. In a fintech ecosystem where 10 startups are chasing the same customer, the one with loyalty program wins.
It’s not just retail customers, HNIs care too. While the rewards may differ, golf access over airtime top-ups, the principle is the same. RewardHub’s flexible, segmented rewards model is designed to serve both mass-market and premium users with equal impact.
RewardHub and the Future of Spend
Africa’s loyalty economy is still nascent, but RewardHub is making the case that it shouldn’t be. Loyalty is not a marketing line item, it’s customer retention infrastructure.
With an API-powered architecture, founder-led domain expertise, and an expansive redemption network, RewardHub is positioned to become the Avios of Africa.
Building for Africa’s rising middle class?
RewardHub is the strategic partner that turns everyday transactions into lasting customer loyalty and lifetime value.
