Accelerate
iRecharge initially served both everyday users and merchants within the same app, and it worked for a while…until it didn’t. So we decided to separate the experiences, which led to the birth of Accelerate, and the newly improved iRecharge 3.0 (see case study). At its core, Accelerate is a comprehensive business platform designed for businesses that want to receive payments, manage financial operations, and offer bill payment services to their customers.
CONTEXT: THE CHALLENGE
The original iRecharge app served both B2C and B2B users in one environment, and over time, this created friction. As more merchant businesses onboarded, their needs became more complex. Merchants weren’t just topping up airtime or paying bills; they were running daily transactions, managing branches, onboarding sub-users, integrating APIs, and offering bill payment services to their own customers.
Squeezing these complex B2B workflows into a consumer-first app started to feel like running a company from a personal bank account. So the decision was made to split the experiences. iRecharge evolved for everyday users (see case study), and Accelerate was born as a dedicated merchant platform designed specifically for businesses that wanted to receive payments, manage operations, and offer bill-vending services at scale.
As Design Lead, I shaped the design strategy for Accelerate, working closely with product and engineering while guiding a team of designers to build a platform that felt structured, powerful, and built for growth.
P.S. - You might notice I use "merchants" and "businesses" interchangeably throughout this case study. They mean the same thing 😅
THE PROCESS
Understanding the Merchants
One of our early design discoveries was that not all businesses use Accelerate the same way, and they shouldn’t all have the same experience.
At a basic level, some merchants simply wanted to offer bill payment services right from the dashboard, without building anything themselves. On the other end, there were businesses with development teams ready to embed payment capabilities and bill services into their own apps and websites, automate collections, and unlock tools like payment links and virtual accounts.
So rather than building a one-size-fits-all experience, we designed around account types that actually reflected real commercial behaviour. Startup businesses got a clean, focused dashboard with essential bill payment services and everything they needed to get started. Registered business accounts unlocked access to APIs, integration capabilities, and a broader set of payment tools.
Registration form showing the 2 business types
Bill Payments and Commissions
At its core, Accelerate turns businesses into utility hubs. Through the platform, merchants could offer their customers bill payment services, including airtime, data, cable TV subscriptions, and electricity, while earning commissions on every transaction processed. This could be done directly from the Accelerate dashboard for businesses operating in-store. For those who wanted to go further and embed bill payments into their own platforms, it was also available through the API.
Snapshot of a registered business’ dashboard
Payment Gateway
Through the Accelerate payment gateway API, merchants can integrate directly into their own platforms and start receiving payments via bank transfer, card, USSD, QR code, POS, OPay, PalmPay, and a range of other payment methods. The goal was to give businesses real flexibility in how they collect payments from their customers.
Snapshots of the payment gateway (swipe/drag to view)
RESULTS & IMPACT
What started as a strategy to separate merchant workflows became something bigger. Accelerate gave businesses a space that actually reflected their day-to-day reality. By supporting both dashboard workflows and API integrations more businesses could adopt it in ways that worked for them, this expanded revenue opportunities, and created a scalable foundation for the future growth of the product.
It's worth mentioning that Accelerate is a big platform with a lot of moving parts, so this case study is a very summarized version of the journey and the core design thinking that shaped it. If you want to dig into the full experience, you can explore the experience via the web app or check out the product documentation.
RETROSPECTIVE
Leading design strategy on this project was a very stretching experience and a growth moment for me. It required a lot of going back to the drawing board, re-evaluating decisions, and making sure we weren't building something technically impressive but practically confusing.
What I came away with most is a much deeper appreciation for designing with context. Knowing who your users really are, what they're actually trying to accomplish, and where they're operating from makes every design decision easier.
