Electronic payment network provider Fawry For Banking Technology And Electronic Payment was the best performer in the index, adding 4.4%.

We are at a stage where it is no longer optional for banks to go all in on digital. Banks that want to lead the market will have to do a lot more than just embracing digital. A few days before 2020 ended, NBE announced the acquisition of a 24 per cent stake in Aman, similarly, Fawry and Banque du Caire have set up a joint remittance service while Banque Misr has partnered with digital payments app, Masary.

We have already seen a heightened level of activity in the first few days of the new year. Fawry’s microfinance subsidiary raised EGP310 million in debt to fuel expansion.

Fortunately, Egypt’s first Covid wave was milder than those in other countries. The country managed to get by without going into full lockdown and the country is now one of the few in the world with a positive gross domestic product (GDP) growth outlook for 2020. Despite the mild top-line hit, most startups still felt the impact of Covid-19, with a whopping 83.9 per cent indicating, in May, that they had been negatively impacted by the crisis. The same survey highlighted that 29 per cent of Egyptian startups had suspended operations – an alarming proportion that would have increased with the recent resurgence of the virus. It remains to be seen what the full impact of the second wave is.  

If we look back on 2020, the largest funding rounds for Egyptian startups were not in fintech but healthcare and transport, with Vezeeta raising more than $40 million and Swvl more than $20 million. Yet, fintech still managed to make headlines on several occasions, including new regulations, high profile investment rounds and exciting launches. It was an eventful and exhilarating year for the fintech ecosystem in Egypt.

Fawry’s success story has undoubtedly encouraged investments in other e-payments venture that will help dynamise this space in coming years. The industry is still massively underpenetrated as cash remains king but will remain as one of the more active areas within fintech in coming years.

The company is yet to announce its fourth-quarter results in 2020 but the first nine months of the year the company reported $57 million in revenues – a steady 45 percent growth rate every year. The Covid-19 pandemic has accelerated the growth of the company.

"By the end of this year, we will have an investment or two in the companies we are studying," he clarified.    Sabry said that the company, which also operates in the UAE, has a plan to expand in the region. "During this year, we will be present in at least two Arab countries.”

Fawry’s CEO pointed out that the company, which invests about LE 120 million annually in developing its technologies, focuses more on increasing its investments in banking services, mobile devices and commercial chains.

In August 2020,  Fawry became a Unicorn officially, Fawry’s former Managing Director Mohamed Okasha announced on his LinkedIn account, clarifying that the company’s market capitalization hit $1 billion.   A unicorn is a business term to indicate a privately held startup company valued at over $1 billion.   Fawry is the first Egyptian company to reach a market cap of $1 billion.

ess than six months after becoming the first billion-dollar technology company in Egypt, Fawry has hit another milestone by surpassing the $2 billion market cap for the first time. Its stock has doubled in the last six months and closed at an all-time high of EGP 46.90 today, pushing its market cap to over EGP 32 billion. This makes it the fourth most valuable company listed on The Egyptian Exchange (EGX) and it seems that it’s only a matter of days before it takes the second position. The Egyptian payments firm had gone public in August 2020 by listing its shares on EGX at the price of EGP 6.46 per share. The share price has surged over 7x after company’s public market debut about eigtheen months ago.

Being the leading the electornic payments player in Egypt, Fawry is arguably the biggest benificiary of acceleration of digital payments there. It offers hundreds of electronic payment services through its network of over over close to 200,000 service points across Egypt – whcih include ATMs, mobile wallets, retail shops, post offices, and vendor kiosks. Fawry has introduced many new payments and lending products for both consumers and businesses over the last tweleve months and is apparently on additional new services too that are expected to be rolled out within the next few months.

Huawei and TPAY MOBILE have been working closely as part of their ongoing commitment to support developers in the MEA region. This partnership will allow local and global developers to monetize their apps and services through HMS’ In-App-Purchases (IAP) kit across the region. TPAY MOBILE’s Direct Carrier Billing (DCB) service offers all Huawei’s HMS customers in the MEA region the ability to pay for their apps and services through their mobile phone number. This will make it more accessible for Huawei and HONOR device users to pay for online services and apps on HMS.

Dubai: Intigral, the leading over the top (OTT) content provider in the MENA region, today announces the expansion of its flagship Jawwy TV app and OTT entertainment service into Egypt through a strategic collaboration with the leading telecom operator, Telecom Egypt “WE”. This expansion is being enabled by a strategic partnership with TPAY MOBILE, the Middle East and Africa’s leading digital payments platform.

In a country with low banking penetration and high mobile adoption, Sahar Salama saw a business opportunity in creating a payment solution through telecom operators. She used her experience at Link Development to create a direct operator billing model and launched TPay Mobile in 2014. Launched in Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the UAE simultaneously, they now operate in over 18 markets across MENA covering almost 51 mn transactions a day.

Developer of an open mobile payment platform in Dubai. The company's platform leverages the mobile network operator billing relationship and collection network to allow mobile phone users to buy online products and services using only their cell phone number with the purchase costs being added to their cell phone bill or deducted from their balance, enabling telecom operators and online merchants to get a seamless Direct Carrier Billing (DCB) ecosystem.

Mobile payments are a key payment method in the Middle East and Africa, used by over 50% of the population, most of which is underbanked, and TPAY MOBILE leverages direct carrier billing and wallet billing to unlock access to these customers across 24 countries for its merchant partners.TPAY MOBILE is currently present in Egypt, UAE, KSA, Palestine, Jordan, Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman, Tunisia, Iraq, Algeria, Morocco, Turkey, Libya, Sri Lanka, Nigeria, Tanzania, Kenya, Ghana, Mozambique, Uganda, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.

The Company is headquartered in the UAE, with teams based in Egypt. Our shareholders are – Helios Investment Partners , the leading Africa-focused private investment firm, and A15 , the Middle East’s leading tech investment fund.

Founded in 2014 as the first open mobile payment platform of the region, Tpay Mobile was acquired by leading African private investment firm Helios Investment Partner. The firm had acquired a 76 percent stake in Tpay Mobile in 2018, creating a dragon exit for A15, the firm that had founded it. Tpay has previously also acquired its Cairo-based rival DCBEgypt in 2017. Sahar Salama, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Tpay Mobile, said, “Tpay Mobile is on an accelerated growth trajectory, and the acquisition of Payguru fast-tracks our vision to become the leading digital payment platform in the Middle East and Africa, guaranteeing a best in class user experience, and offering innovative services to our partners, and further driving digital and financial inclusion in our region.”

The deal comes at a time when demand for digital payment services is surging due to the coronavirus pandemic. Within the Middle East and Africa region, mobile payments is a popular alternative among 50 percent of the population, most of which is underbanked.

The FinTech sector in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region is also growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 30 percent, much higher than the average global rate of 11 percent

TPAY Mobile is a digital merchant acquirer that enables payments acceptance from more than 54 mobile payment types and wallets, which are connected to more than 580 million consumers. According to Sahar Salama, founder and chief executive officer of TPAY Mobile, the acquisition of Payguru will support their diversification and expansion strategy.

TPAY MOBILE, the leading digital merchant acquirer and mobile payment enabler in the Middle East and Africa, announced the acquisition of 100% of the shares of Payguru, one of Turkey’s leading payment service providers. The transaction remains subject to approvals from the Central Bank of the Republic of Turkey and the Competition Authority.

Payguru offers mobile payments, ATM cash payments, and bank transfer services to its merchants through its integration with Turkey’s three mobile network operators (Turkcell, Vodafone, and Türk Telekom) and 8 major banks in Turkey (Ziraat Bankası, Yapı Kredi Bankası, Türkiye İş Bankası, Garani Bankası, Akbank, TEB Paribas, Vakıfbank and QNB Finansbank).

TPAY Mobile has acquired 2 organizations. Their most recent acquisition was Payguru on Jun 10, 2020.

Bango (AIM: BGO), the data-driven commerce company, and TPAY MOBILE FZ-LLC (TPAY MOBILE, www.tpaymobile.com) the full-service digital payments platform for the Middle East, Africa, and Turkey, have formed a strategic partnership to increase access to digital commerce. This partnership simplifies and accelerates entry into new markets for online merchants by connecting platforms and pooling operational expertise

TPAY MOBILE has pioneered digital commerce and financial inclusion in the Middle East, Africa, and Turkey. Its technology is used by regional digital merchants and international brands like Google, Apple, Unity, Huawei, PUBG and Tencent to connect to consumers across MEA and Turkey. These merchants can now scale globally through the worldwide payment reach enabled by the Bango Platform. In addition, merchants integrated to either Bango or TPAY MOBILE can accelerate revenue growth from their products and services, by using Bango Audiences in marketing programs, which attract more paying customers through payment behavior targeting.

With that problem in mind, Lumkani, partnered with Hollard, a South African-based insurance company, to develop the world’s first hardware-enabled fire insurance specifically designed for informal settlements. To serve clients that had been ignored by traditional financial service providers previously, the company has created an efficient, engaging, and easy to manage experience for its low-income customers.