Do you believe that a Nigerian crypto platform can rival Binance?
Meet the 25-year-old with a mission bigger than himself: “to prove that African innovators can build at a global level and create systems that change lives.”
Moore Dagogo-Hart is the co-founder and Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of Zap Africa, Nigeria’s pioneering non-custodial crypto exchange. Zap is the fastest-growing crypto exchange in Nigeria, and Moore is one of the key minds who has played a pivotal role in making this possible.
The Early Genius
Before co-founding Zap Africa, Moore had already demonstrated a knack for building groundbreaking technology. From a young age, he was gifted with the ability to understand and design complex systems. He believes technology is the closest thing we have to magic. That it is a tool that can rewrite economic realities, create wealth, and break down barriers.
In 2018, he built a top-charting mobile game, Color Match, at just 18 years old which charted #2 on Play Store and #4 on the App Store. He also developed an AI-powered risk detection model to detect sexual predators in chatrooms in 2020.
As a high achiever, Moore placed 3rd at Facebook’s #Hackathon4Justice in 2019 and was the winner of the Goldman Sachs’ University Hackathon in 2020.
From Goldman Sachs to Building Africa’s Future
Moore’s career officially began in 2021 as a software developer at Goldman Sachs. Here, he contributed to their financial security systems and gained firsthand experience in high-risk and high-stakes financial modelling. This was when realised his passion lay in building entirely new systems, not maintaining already existing ones. So, he quit.
He left Goldman after a couple of months to start his own company. He went on to co-found Solarsoft, where he built Africa’s first ever fully functional NFT wallet, Nebula. This development pioneered Web3 and digital asset ownership adoption in Africa. However, despite its success, the app was later removed from the App Store by Apple due to Apple’s crypto regulations.
This marked a key moment in Moore’s journey. When many would have seen this event as a failure, Moore took it as a lesson in decentralization, compliance, and the challenges of building blockchain-based systems in a centralized tech world like ours.
The Birth of Zap Africa: Africa’s First Non-Custodial Crypto Platform
The year was 2022. Many Nigerian crypto platforms were collapsing, one after the other, and trust was at an all-time low. Moore and his childhood friend, Tobiloba Asu-Johnson, then came together to form what would become Zap Africa.
They watched as friends, family and everyday people saw their life savings disappear overnight, and they knew there was a better way. So, they decided to create a solution. In less than three years, Zap Africa has emerged as Nigeria’s fastest-growing crypto platform under Moore’s leadership, processing ₦2 billion in transactions within its first three months.
Moore engineered Zap’s financial model, ensuring automated revenue generation, liquidity optimization, and scalable trading infrastructure. This basically means that he designed Zap’s financial system to work automatically, making sure the company earns money efficiently, has enough funds available for users to trade without delays, and can handle a growing number of transactions smoothly.
He was also heavily involved in executing a historic marketing play leveraging the $TRUMP coin, which brought in 10,000 users in 6 hours, marking the biggest growth spike in Zap’s history.
Moore’s vision for Zap is not restricted to Nigeria only but to the entire continent and beyond. He wants Zap to redefine Africa’s financial landscape, making wealth creation, decentralized finance, and borderless transactions a reality for all.
Beyond Crypto: Engineering Africa’s Tech Future
Moore is a man with many skills under his belt. In 2022 as well, he also founded Syx Labs, a deep-tech company solving complex problems in AI, blockchain, and fintech. Syx Labs is not your average software company; it’s an innovation lab designed to engineer Africa’s technological future.
They specialise in AI-driven financial models and fraud detection systems as well as blockchain-powered authentication and security solutions. They describe themselves as the “next-gen real estate and fintech platform tailored for the African market.”
Zap into the Future
Zap is on a mission to redefine the continent’s financial landscape by making wealth creation accessible to all and borderless transactions a reality.
Growing up, Moore witnessed the economic inefficiencies and limitations that hold Africa back firsthand, and he also recognized the unmatched potential of Africans. Now, he is determined to drive change and foster real economic freedom.
Zap isn’t waiting for permission. They are building the future.