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FollowingCLEA launches supplier payment feature to streamline cross-border transactions
For most African companies, paying overseas suppliers is still much more cumbersome than expected: a wire transfer, a currency exchange, and days of waiting before the invoice can be finally settled.
CLEA believes it has found a shortcut to this long-standing problem. The Lagos-based stablecoin-driven cross-border payment platform has launched a "supplier pay" feature that allows corporate customers to pay directly through their CLEA accounts to international suppliers, vehicle auction platforms and shipping companies without having to leave the platform to initiate separate transfers.
This feature is only six months after the startup ends stealth mode in December 2025. During this period, the company said it had processed more than $20 million in transaction volume. According to the company, the "supplier payment" function that has entered trial operation has been adopted by more than 50 companies, which initially indicates that supplier payment is exactly the pain point that CLEA's existing customer base hopes to solve.
Supplier Payments: Streamlining Cross-Border Payments
How CLEA Supplier Payments Works
The specific operation process is as follows: the customer selects a supported supplier, enters payment reference information (such as buyer number, batch number or invoice number), and then authorizes the transaction. Because supplier information is pre-configured on the platform, CLEA says payments can be completed instantly, without waiting days like traditional cross-border transfers. Vehicle auction platforms Copart and IAA were the first suppliers to support, reflecting that their early trading volume may have come mainly from Nigeria's car import trade-although the company did not disclose complete data used by suppliers.
CLEA founder and CEO Sharif Addokun sees the launch as part of a broader vision: expanding from payments to comprehensive trade infrastructure. "African companies trade increasingly frequently across borders, but managing payments from international suppliers remains too fragmented. CLEA is not just building payment platforms, we are building the financial infrastructure companies need to trade confidently around the world. Supplier payments are another step on this journey, providing companies with a faster, simpler and more transparent way to pay to trusted suppliers and trading partners while focusing on growth for their own business."
Currently, the vendor payment feature is limited to qualified, verified CLEA corporate customers and only supports U.S. dollar payments to selected U.S. suppliers. Customers recharge their accounts with Naira, obtain foreign currency through the platform, and complete international payments-a process the company calls a single experience that integrates into one three to four steps that typically involve independent foreign exchange and transfer service providers.
The company said it plans to gradually expand its supplier network and add more suppliers and payment destinations, while also launching tools such as supplier discovery, invoice management and processing regular international payments. Whether this expansion can move beyond the U.S. market and beyond the auction and shipping segments where supplier payments currently focus will be a key test of whether CLEA can extend the stablecoin track into a true trade infrastructure business.
CLEA is not the only company chasing this vertical. In the past year, a group of African stablecoin payment startups, including Ivorypay and pawaPay, have made similar bets, believing that stablecoin settlement can surpass traditional agent banking models in speed and cost and be suitable for cross-border corporate payments.
Supplier payments provide CLEA with a more specific and solid entry point for entering the market: Rather than positioning itself as a general foreign exchange or remittance tier, it targets the recurring pain point of paying specific suppliers-a segment where preconfigured supplier tracks can create higher stickiness if adoption rates are maintained beyond the 50 companies in the pilot run.
