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Producers Ag Insurance Group, Inc., doing business as ProAg, provides crop insurance products and services to farmers. The Company offers multiple peril crop insurance that covers loss of crop yields from various types of natural causes including drought, excessive moisture, freeze, and disease.

It combines instant messaging, social media and mobile payments into one App which will be available for download on Google Play and iOS app stores from 1 August 2019. A similar social payments platform model is already active in Asia, where payment apps are bundled with e-commerce, chat and ride-hailing services offered by firms such as Alibaba and Tencent in China. Imagine a WeChat of Africa!

Lumkani, a Johannesburg-based startup that leverages proprietary hardware and a tech-enabled agent network to provide customers living in informal settlements within South Africa with insurance products that protect against loss of life, shelter, and assets in the case of a home fire. Lumkani, which means ‘be careful’ in Xhosa, originally began as a hardware company, deploying its first fire detector in late 2014. Within the first 18 months, they were able to prove that their technology “in 73 percent of cases was able to reduce the spreading of fires [beyond] the first home.” But it was not enough just to alert the community and stop the spreading of fires.

Destructive fires are a regular, and potentially devastating, occurrence for the approximately 10 million South Africans that live in informal settlement communities. These townships are particularly susceptible to the threat of fires due to the use of flammable building materials, the ubiquity of open flame fires, limited space between dwellings, and a lack of road infrastructure for adequate emergency response.

According to the World Bank, Ghana is the fastest-growing mobile-money market in Africa. Mobile operators MTN, AirtelTigo and Vodafone currently lead the industry. Banks are pushing digital banking in Ghana, but with less success, according to a report from Tellimer in September. Banks such as Ecobank, Fidelity, Zenith and Standard Chartered can use Ghana’s improving digital infrastructure to widen inclusion, Tellimer says. But the firms points to downside for banks through possible loss of deposits and lower margins on digital products due to the competition. Mobile money may lead to the “cannibalisation” of some banking products, Tellimer says. “Banks will have to fight for transactions and deposits.”

MTN is the dominant player with about 90% of mobile money transactions.

It will take other players a “lot of marketing and effort or very innovative strategies” to compete with MTN,

MTN has launched its Mobile Money (MoMo) services in South Africa in partnership with Ubank.

“It is a great privilege for us as a bank to partner with a renowned brand such as MTN in working on a product which will create value for consumers in the under-serviced and under-banked segments of the market.”

That’s how mobile money accounts first came about. Mobile money apps don’t require a brick-and-mortar bank, but they otherwise end up functioning a lot like a bank account and debit card would for an American — meaning your average person in Kenya with such an account now has access to most of the same financial services a person in the US does. Mobile money got off the ground early in the developing world, where people used texting-based services before smartphones became common. There were early attempts to set up such systems in the 2000s in South Africa and the Philippines. But the breakthrough was the extraordinary early success of Kenya’s M-Pesa, which actually predates apps like Venmo. (“Pesa” is Swahili for money; the “M” stands for “mobile.”) The project that became M-Pesa started in 2002 when phone companies noticed that they had unintentionally invented something that almost resembled a currency.

Balancing software development of system functionalities for both native iOS and Android, simultaneously, is quite challenging.

Beginning with our Product Discovery Workshop, we collaborated with Paga's product and marketing teams to help identify new core features and areas for improvement.

UN Capital Development Fund (UNCDF) is pleased to announce that JUMO has won their Sprint4Women Design Competition for women’s financial inclusion in Zambia. JUMO was one of three finalists competing for a grant to roll-out digital financial services (DFS) solutions for the rural women of Zambia, alongside Fenix Zambia and Hobbiton Investments.

This milestone has been reached just over 18 months after crossing the US$1B mark in 2019, and indicates exponential growth in the access to and availability of working capital for customers, with an average customer default rate of less than 5%. Andrew Watkins-Ball, Founder & Group CEO, said this achievement is evidence of the success of JUMO’s unique business model, its ability to reach unbanked populations and to provide market-leading infrastructure for financial services.

Latest figures put the value of the cryptocurrency market at almost $240bn in 2019, nearly double the 2018 figure of $128bn. Could this mean that the global crypto market is starting to move into the mainstream? Significantly, the sector is enjoying rapid growth globally, with the UK, Nigeria, Australia, Canada, Mexico and India all experiencing a recent surge in users. Crypto is also starting to attract interest from institutional investors, which see it as possible insurance against the global rise in quantitative easing.

The big banking brands have shown little interest in cryptocurrency to date. In part, this is due to their general aversion to high levels of risk and an institutionalised culture ill suited to digital change and innovation – but there is also a legitimate fear that they will fall foul of financial regulators. 

It stands to reason that cryptocurrency exchanges are well positioned and strongly motivated to exploit the narrowing gap between crypto and fiat – because they have first-move advantage. Having already built huge cash reserves and crypto-familiar customer bases, it would be relatively straightforward technically for them to add on banking services. 

Zambia's Investrust Bank launched InvestMobile, its mobile banking service. The product will be rolled out to existing account holders before being extended to unbanked communities. InvestMobile works from the handset, providing an account summary of the last seven transactions and supporting payment of bills to various utility companies such as Lusaka Water and Sewerage Company and MultiChoice. Customers will be able to view status on accounts such as term deposits, loan statements and positions on cleared or uncleared cheques and make transfers within the bank and to external accounts at

In addition to this, motor insurance providers have had to contend with cases of double insurance, fake insurance certificates, and stolen insurance certificates. Research carried out by Bismart showed that 12% of insurance policies do not exist in the underwriters’ databases even though the motor vehicle owners have paid for their premiums. 22% of the motor vehicle insurance policies surveyed cannot be validated.

ZEEPAY is planning to use the finance to continue to scale and roll out its services across the continent and extend its global reach by launching in the UK in 2021.

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.

Neobanks emerged — young banks licensed (often from a traditional institution) and a modern core banking system that allowed them to operate and scale faster while spending much less on customer service. Neobanks started to grow like startups — building only relevant products, nailing marketing. The rebundling phase was under way.

The next wave currently underway is niche fintech. Due to a dramatic reduction in the cost of launching technology startups (500 times in 20 years), focusing on product group for very specific user personas (teens, retirees, SMEs) became possible. Thanks to their precise relevance, these fintechs enjoy higher customer loyalty and satisfaction.

The app has since evolved and, today, SnapScan allows users to make quick and easy payments using their smartphones, thus eliminating the need to carry cash or cards.

In its infancy, SnapScan flourished in coffee shops and at weekend markets. The founding team had extensive experience in banking and mobile money, and they knew that payments for these merchants could be vastly improved