Payportz

Inspiration

What it doesAbout the Project — PayPortz

Inspiration

While researching African importers, I discovered how difficult and risky it still is to pay overseas suppliers. Businesses sending $50K–$500K for goods often lose time, money, and trust due to:

High bank fees ($2,500+ per wire)

Delays (5–10 business days)

Hidden exchange rate deductions

Zero payment visibility or delivery protection

I wanted to build a system that lets an African business pay a supplier in seconds — securely, transparently, and with delivery assurance. That’s how PayPortz was born — inspired by real-world importers still moving cash in suitcases just to complete international transactions.

What We Built

PayPortz is a B2B payment platform for African importers making high-value cross-border payments. We combined blockchain technology and smart escrow automation to enable instant, secure, and milestone-based settlements.

Core Components:

On-ramping of large volumes of money

Smart Escrow Contracts — split payments (e.g., 30/70) and release based on delivery confirmation.

How We Built It

Frontend: Next.js + Starknetjs + Viem

Smart Contracts: Cairo on Starknet

Database: Supabase for transaction metadata

On/Off-Ramp: NGN ↔ USDC integration for fiat access

What We Learned

Building for real-world financial flows requires deep understanding of local regulations and business behavior.

Combining AI and blockchain can drastically reduce friction in enterprise payments.

Account abstraction on Starknet makes user experience simpler — gasless, secure, and non-custodial.

Designing for CFOs (not consumers) means UX needs to be trust-driven, not flashy.

On average, a business using PayPortz saves around $2,400 per $50K payment and 5–7 days of waiting time compared to traditional banks.

Challenges We Faced

On/Off-Ramp Integration: Connecting NGN ↔ USDC liquidity with reliable APIs was difficult due to fragmented banking access.

Escrow Logic: Designing milestone-based releases that account for partial deliveries and multi-signature approvals.

Network Abstraction: Managing cross-chain payments while keeping the UX chain-agnostic.

Compliance: Ensuring KYC/AML processes were smooth without creating friction for enterprise users.

Despite these challenges, we successfully deployed a working MVP that handles high-value payments in under 30 seconds.

What’s Next

Expand pilot to 25 Nigerian importers ($5M+ monthly volume)

Add AI fraud scoring and predictive routing

Extend integration to Kenya, Ghana, and South Africa

Build SDK for developers to integrate PayPortz payments into enterprise tools

Closing Thought

Our mission is simple — to make African businesses as fast and trusted in global trade as any Western company. Blockchain can make that happen.

How we built it

Challenges we ran into

Accomplishments that we're proud of

What we learned

What's next for Payportz

Built With

• cairo
• nextjs
• starknetjs