Vula Finance
A self-service finance platform helping South African small businesses organise financial information, prepare statements, and work towards funding readiness.
The product story behind the prototype or platform.
Vula Finance was built around a practical observation: many small-business owners are expected to keep records, understand cash movement, prepare documents and prove that the business is fundable while also running the business itself. The evidence shows that this is not a niche problem. Stats SA's 2023 Survey of Employers and the Self-Employed estimated 1.9 million people running non-VAT-registered businesses. About 72% of these businesses did not keep financial records, and 74.4% did not have a bank account. Vula Finance is an attempt to make the basic financial-administration layer simpler and more understandable rather than assuming every owner already has an accountant.
Small-business owners can be expected to manage transactions, documents, statements and funding information while also running the business. Language and digital access can add another layer of friction.
Can the basic financial-administration work around a small business be made easier to understand and manage without assuming the owner already has an accountant?
These figures are included to ground the product story in published evidence. They describe the wider problem context; they are not claims about the impact of the platform itself.
1.9 million
people running non-VAT-registered businesses in 2023
Statistics South Africa — SESE 2023 ↗72.0%
of informal businesses did not keep financial records in 2023
Statistics South Africa — SESE 2023 ↗8.7%
reported English as the main household language nationally in Census 2022
Statistics South Africa — Census 2022 ↗55.5%
of Limpopo households reported Sepedi as the main household language
Statistics South Africa — Census 2022 ↗The problem
The challenge is not simply access to finance. It is the administrative work required to turn everyday business activity into usable financial information: recording transactions, keeping documents, understanding financial position and preparing information for funding or decision-making. Language can add another layer. Census 2022 found that English was the main household language for 8.7% of South Africans, while Limpopo was predominantly Sepedi (55.5%), Tshivenda (17.4%) and Xitsonga (17.3%).
The product
A self-service finance platform for business profiles, transaction tracking, financial understanding, statements, documents, goals and funding readiness, with multilingual accessibility as part of the product design.
Who it is for
South African small-business owners, mentors, programme managers and funders working with businesses.
What we're testing
We are testing self-service financial records, statements, document organisation, funding readiness and multilingual accessibility.
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