Roger Bukuru studied mathematics at the Cape Academy of Mathematics in Cape Town, and got his Bachelor of Science in computer science, finance and mathematical statistics from the University of Cape Town in 2018.
During his studies, Roger Bukuru has done several internships: at Yalidev where he developed PHP websites, at VASTech where he worked with Elasticsearch, and at SMSPortal where he built an application monitoring system,.
After graduating from the University of Cape Town, Roger Bukuru worked part-time for a year at Nisa Finance, a SME Invoice financing tool for financiers, where he built a loan-demand platform. He also worked part-time at Kabura Travel and Tours, a tourist guide system where he developed basic digital solutions.
Starting in 2019, Roger Bukuru cofounded Lipa Pay with Thando Hlongwane. Lipa, which means “pay” in Kiswahili, is a mobile payment solution that enables small merchants and online merchants to faciliate payments through a payment platform connected to all the major banking and mobile wallet platforms, and also through a tap-to-pay mobile-to-mobile solution. Lipa Pay has raised 650,000 dollars from Imlo Ventures, With Lipa Pay, Roger Bukuru and cofounder Thando Hlongwane aim to create a low-cost mobile payment solution for low-end phones to enable more small merchants and modest consumers to jump onboard the mobile payment game. For this purpose, Lipa developed a Bluetooth-based tap-to-pay system for phones that do not have near-field capabilities.
