Group items tagged

M-PESA was cheaper than banks, and safer and more convenient than handling cash. The financial inclusion driven by M-PESA has greatly led to the growth of Kenya’s digital economy.

M-PESA”: that is a name in global fintech history that can never be erased. Not that anybody would want to. Forever it will be the perfect example of a viable financial ecosystem based on rules unthinkable before

The fund is backed by some of the largest family offices and business leaders from Egypt and the MENA region​.​The strategy is the first of its kind in Egypt, utilizing local know-how and private capital to support & build solid foundations for its portfolio.FV has Lead and Co-Lead four highly sought after deals during its initial deployment, investing in two Fintech companies, Capiter & Nowpay, one in consumer internet/entertainment, Minly, and one in logistics (operating in stealth).

The financial services industry today is characterized by change. Investor interest and capital is pouring into fintech companies – digital banks, insurtechs, wealthtechs, proptechs and every option in between are shifting how financial services are created, offered and evaluated. New changes, new challengesThis shift has spurred many traditional financial institutions to take action. Yet, changes aren’t always straightforward. Financial institutions know they need to embrace innovation, and they also have to find better ways to understand and respond to their customers.At the same time, the shift has put a spotlight on a new area of opportunity for big tech companies like Alibaba, Apple, Google, Tencent and others. These companies have incredible reach, deep roots into their customers’ lives, and robust customer data. Big techs are also constantly looking for ways to provide their customers with more value, to enhance customer loyalty by providing a more integrated ecosystem. Most already offer payments solutions, so extending their offerings to include financial products makes sense. However, there are no strong indicators that the big tech companies want to become banks. The regulatory burden is so far considered too high for their appetite1. Forging strategic alliancesBig tech and financial institutions are already investing in fintechs to help advance their strategic goals. For example, Tencent led a $35 million investment in open banking focused TrueLayer in the UK this year2.What they are realizing that partnerships don’t have to be limited to start-ups – working together with established institutions can create value. Over the past 6 months, there have been a number of strategic business relationships announced, such as Google’s partnership with Citibank and Stanford Federal Credit Union, to offer smart checking accounts3 and Apple’s announcement of a partnership with Goldman Sachs to offer the Apple Card credit card4. These will likely only be the beginning. 

M-Pesa was launched in 2007, and it’s still going strong. The concept of a phone-based money transfer service originated back in 2002, when researchers realized the popularity of the market for phone airtime — individuals in a handful of African nations often transferred it to friends and family for subsequent use or resale.

When M-Pesa (launched by Safaricom) made its debut a few years later, it had initially been conceived as a solution for microfinancing — allowing institutions to distribute and collect loan payments without the hassle of cash. However, during this pilot, its widespread adoption in a myriad of alternative use cases caused the company to reconsider and relaunch with a focus on ensuring individuals could send money to their families and execute payments.

Cyber Security Africa held its 5th Ethiopia Banking and ICT summit of the year, “The 5th Ethiopia Banking & ICT Summit 2018” hosted in Addis Ababa Ethiopia attracting more than 150+ participants from all over the world.

"EthioPay – the Unifying e-Payment Platform for Ethiopia"

"EthioPay – the Unifying e-Payment Platform for Ethiopia"

According to Ezinne Obikile, SystemSpecs Executive Director, Infrastructure and Payments Gateway; “SystemSpecs is committed to driving financial inclusion and providing payment convenience to all, which underscores this strategic partnership with Paga to extend a wide range of financial solutions and services to customers everywhere, even at a time as this.”

Also commenting, Jay Alabraba, Co-founder and Director of Business Development, Paga said: “In our commitment to make payments easier for all Nigerians and businesses, we are pleased to collaborate with SystemSpecs. Our goal is to always provide an improved experience to our customers everywhere, by leveraging digital technology. This collaboration would further help us meet the needs of individuals who seek to make various bill payments, including those in emerging markets.”

Applications were submitted by companies across the region. The 10 finalists include: Artis Technologies, LLC – modern financing made simple through an embedded financial services platform for digital lending and real-time payments EnrichHER – offers funders the best selection of vetted investment opportunities in companies that have women in leadership roles, while cultivating a thriving ecosystem of New Majority businesses Ethiopay – safe and convenient way to pay loved ones’ bills from anywhere in the world Finosec – IT and cybersecurity management platform for the banking industry Griffin Technologies – customer intelligence platform that provides banks modern day context on new and existing customers Immediate – helps businesses recruit, engage, and retain employees by providing a financial wellness solution that delivers on-demand access to earned pay InvestGuard – technology-enabled exchange for independent PE sponsors Lendsmart AI – AI-enabled technology platform transforming the homebuying process Ryze – Bitcoin-first financial institution, starting with the most powerful way to save and accumulate Bitcoin VIVA Finance – improving employees’ financial well-being through an affordable lending program and financial education

At the conclusion of the program, the startups will present to a panel of investors during Fintech South’s Investor Preview event on Monday, Oct. 5. The top three companies will hit the virtual conference’s main stage for a chance to win $25,000.

Since 2017, AgroCenta has successfully completed two rounds of funding to the tune of $750,000 to expand operations in Ghana. In 2017, AgroCenta won the Seedstars Global Competition against other 72 startups from emerging markets across the globe. AgroCenta has grown its farmer base to 45,000 providing additional services of access to finance for smallholder farmers, bringing smallholder farmers onto the financial sector to enjoy services such as crop insurance, micro lending/input financing, mobile payments through mobile money and finally pensions schemes targeted at farmers and beneficiaries in the informal sector with special attention to women and youth. Since 2017, AgroCenta has helped over 28,000 farmers sell over 20,000MT of commodities to large, medium and small scale buyers across the country.   In December 2018, AgroCenta won a grant of $250,000 from GSMA Ecosystem Accelerator Fund to further build its financial inclusion platform AgroPay targeted at rural smallholder farmers.

Our work breaks new ground by including many customers that have never accessed formal financial services before. This is exciting, but also means we have a significant responsibility to make sure their first formal financial services experience is positive and empowering. That’s really important to us, so we’re open to testing, learning, sharing and collaborating – it’s a part of our contribution to building the digital financial services ecosystem.”

As a result of their potent blend of trail-blazing technology and disruptive innovation, FinTech players have the ability to accelerate the digital transformation of financial services in Africa and, in turn, further spur the major existing banks to rapidly ramp-up their own innovative approaches to meet the financial needs of under-served markets across the continent. FinTech players are increasingly becoming an important part of the fabric of Africa’s financial services industry. In addition, the leading banks on the continent are now harnessing innovative technology to meet market needs and are also collaborating with FinTech start-ups to better connect with under-served consumers, improve financial inclusion and provide a platform to scale much faster.

Over seven million customers and businesses in Kenya will now access SimbaPay’s international money transfer service to send money to China’s WeChat Pay from Family Bank’s PesaPap mobile banking application and USSD service. Non-customers too will enjoy the service via a dedicated PayBill number 261059 on MPESA.

Nigerian fintech firm Carbon — an early-stage financial services startup based in Lagos — has posted on its website financials audited by KPMG.This comes four months after the company obtained a credit rating as a pre-IPO venture. Carbon — which recently rebranded its OneFi holding company and PayLater product titles into one name — plans to continue releasing its financial results on an annual basis, co-founder and CEO Chijioke Dozie told TechCrunch.This may not be totally unheard of in other global tech markets, but for startups in Africa’s big tech hubs — such as Nigeria — it’s a rarity.One of the first glimpses into startup financials in Nigeria came when Jumia shareholder Rocket Internet went public in 2014, which required it to include limited Jumia data in its annual report. The accompanying prospectus to Jumia’s listing this year on the New York Stock Exchange offered the most expansive financial data to date on a tech venture operating in Africa.Prior to this — and still for the most part — companies in the continent’s (mostly) pre-public (earlier-stage) startup hubs — such as Nigeria — provide little to no financial performance info.“Typically, in the local market, we have not seen a lot of voluntary transparency or the availability of data,” said Lexi Novitske — a Lagos-based VC investor at Acuity Venture Partners.“Most startups are concerned such disclosure could expose losses, give market intel to competitors or attract unwanted attention from regulators. It could also lead to negative negotiation leverage if partners saw that they were making good returns.”So why’d Carbon go to the trouble of putting its pre-public accounting out in the open for anyone to see?

Clients and recruiting were two reasons. “From a customer perspective, we are trying to get people to trust us with their financial services…so they can see this is the institution I’m dealing with and this is their financial position,” explained Carbon’s Dozie.Carbon has evolved from its original focus as an online lender to offer a broader array of mobile-based financial services — including payments, investment products, credit reports and business banking services. In March, the company acquired Nigerian payment solutions company Amplify for an undisclosed amount.By stats offered by Briter Bridges and a 2018 WeeTracker survey, fintech now receives the bulk of VC capital and deal-flow to African startups, many of which are attempting to reach the continent’s large unbanked and underbanked populations.Carbon fits into that category and its CEO believes being upfront about the startup’s financial position will attract top talent. “From a recruitment perspective, we want recruits to know we have good prospects — that this is a company that’s doing well and wants to keep doing well,” said Dozie.That impression is buoyed by Carbon’s initial results, which were fairly positive for a Series A-stage startup. The company had revenues in 2018 of $10 million, according to its online annual report, and turned a profit of around $500,000.It’s helped with recruiting interest, according to Dozie, who said he’d marked an increase in candidates inquiring about open positions since the results were posted.

we don’t get considered because investors don’t really think that you can get the results or this performance in the markets that we’re in,” he added — noting that Carbon has operations in Nigeria, Ghana and South Africa and is considering expansion in Senegal, Côte d’Ivoire, DRC and Egypt.Investor Lexi Novitske thinks Carbon offering financial performance data is a good thing for Africa’s tech ecosystem. “The move builds trust from clients, partners or investors in a market where there is not a lot of openness,” she said. “I am encouraged to see how other companies will react. My hope is that more will openly report their own metrics…”Dozie says the company will continue to post audited financials on an annual basis, even if they show losses. If the startup continues to expand, attract capital and talent and grow revenues, other Nigerian fintech firms may follow suit.

Vodacom’s joint M-Pesa/Safaricom platform boosts monthly transactions to $20bn

This is the outcome of free peer-to-peer M-Pesa transactions, a feature introduced at the onset of COVID-19, the South African network operator said in its latest update to the market on its interim results for the six months that ended on 30 September 2020.

The M-Pesa initiative supported rapid platform growth and customer adoption of digital channels “to the point where the M-Pesa ecosystem now processes $20.5bn a month in transactions across our international markets, including Safaricom, and contributed R8bn in revenue in the period.”

JUMO partnered with Uber to create JUMO Drive, a first-of-its-kind digital vehicle asset finance product for rideshare drivers.

JUMO partnered with Telenor and Telenor Microfinance bank to launch the first commercial product in Asia.

The first funding partner was introduced to the operating platform. JUMO’s partnership with Letshego Bank in Ghana enabled payment and capital providers to work together to build products.

The startup aim to deliver productive digital loans and lay away savings products to smallholder farmers and EWB Canada said the investment will allow the startup to scale to $13 million of loan

EWB Canada’s acting director of investments Elena Haba said the startup has the potential to fill the credit gap between creditors and underserved small business owners like smallholder farmers.

FarmDrive’s Bosire said the startup intends to create shared value by increasing agriculture portfolios in Africa from its current four percent of total lending to 25% and onwards.Said Bosire: “We are going where banks haven’t reached and are creating a trust ecosystem in the most unstructured sector in sub Saharan Africa – Agriculture”.

AgroCenta has hosted and provided over 500 farmer engagement sessions and trainings since launch. Skilled professionals deliver these sessions in farming communities and methodologies are continuously updated to reflect state-of-theart farming practices.

The rise of Fintech challenges established financial centres and incumbent financial institutions to rethink their strategies to remain obligatory passage points in the age of digitizing finance. To appreciate these changes, it is important to maintain theoretical interchange between developments in financial geography and economic geography, its parent discipline

As you may know, Ethiopia well Africa, in general, has skipped the laptop and computer phase of technology straight into the mobile phase of technology this is commonly known as the leapfrog model.

Our platform plans to use the leapfrog model to leverage our technology and give the 45 mill users around Ethiopia a new way to manage bills and provide the over 2.5 million Ethiopian diasporas in the United States a way to help their families