Mobile Finance

Pan-African payments technology company Cellulant is in the news again, this time thanks to a partnership with B2C e-commerce platform Copia focused on the Kenyan market.

Tigo Money, the fintech business of fixed and mobile telecommunications services provider Millicom, and digital payments company Visa have announced a regional agreement aimed at expanding access to digital financial services and driving financial inclusion across Latin America.

Fintech firm Yabx has announced that it is entering the Nigerian market.

A new app called PostalPay will, it is claimed, slash the cost of sending money from parts of Europe to Uganda.

As mobile and digital money become more widely used across Africa, so public and private bodies are responding to fears of fraud, as recent news from Ghana and Kenya indicates.

Airtel Kenya announced the separation of its mobile money unit from its core network operations as the operator complies with regulations set by the central bank, ending a process three years in the making.

Nigeria’s Globacom has joined the rush to open payment service banks (PSBs) with the launch of its MoneyMaster PSB offering. MoneyMaster was granted a payment service bank licence by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) in 2020.

Orange Money, the mobile money service of Orange, and leading pan-African payments company Cellulant have launched a partnership to enable card-to-wallet transfers for eight banks in Botswana.

The telecoms-led financial revolution is continuing in Africa. This time it’s South Africa’s Vodacom Financial Services that has extended the scope of digital finance with VodaLend Cash Advance, described as a product that gives customers quick and secure access to money when they need it most.

It’s not just Indian operator Reliance Jio that has been making the news for parent company and  multinational conglomerate Reliance Industries Ltd. Now RIL’s technology business Jio Platforms and US technology giant Meta have collaborated to launch JioMart on WhatsApp.

North International Bank (NIBank) has gone live with Temenos to digitally transform its retail banking and private wealth business lines.

Fintech firm VYZYO has announced that its subsidiary TDFP (Tunisian Digital Finance for People) has signed a partnership agreement with local Al Baraka Bank to launch and operate a new mobile wallet service.

Ethiopian mobile money service TeleBirr has now passed the 20 million subscriber mark. In fact the Xinhua agency reports that TeleBirr, a service designed and rolled out with help from Huawei, now boasts more than 21 million subscribers.

Orange Cameroon has been granted permission by the country’s Ministry of Finance to launch Orange Money Cameroon SA, a subsidiary dedicated to financial transactions via mobile phones.

For the second time in a week, Safaricom’s M-Pesa is in the news with one of its products, as the Kenyan mobile money service launches an interest-free loan service for buying goods.

In a reminder of the changing business models of many operators in Africa, it has been reported that the M-Pesa virtual Visa card, introduced in June, is now undercutting Kenya’s commercial banks in the foreign exchange market.

Airtel Africa has launched SmartCash Payment Service Bank, a wholly-owned subsidiary, to provide secure and reliable financial services across Nigeria.

MTN Nigeria, the country’s leading operator and the leading MTN operator by subscriber numbers, has taken 18 Nigerian banks to court over the alleged unauthorised transfer of ₦22.3 billion ($53.7 million) from an account owned by its recently-licensed mobile money Payment Service Bank (PSB) MoMo.

Payments business Cellulant Zambia has announced a digital payment partnership with five leading Zambian water utility companies; Nkana Water, Kafubu Water, Mulonga Water, Chambeshi Water and Western Water.

In what is accurately described as a rare acquisition of a US tech company by an African tech company, MFS Africa, Africa’s largest digital payments network, has reached an agreement to buy Global Technology Partners (GTP), which specializes in creating innovative processing and payment solutions for the prepaid industry.

Ooredoo Maldives has commenced a trial of its International Money Transfer service via m-Faisaa.

Mobily Pay, a mobile wallet powered by leading Saudi Arabia-based telecommunications and digital service provider Mobily, and MoneyGram International, a major name in digital P2P payments, have announced a partnership to launch MoneyGram's international money transfer capabilities on Mobily Pay.

Kenya’s Safaricom and financial services giant Visa have introduced the first M-Pesa GlobalPay Visa Virtual card, a mobile-phone-based system that they say opens up global shopping for Kenyan consumers.

Could free fintech-enabled smartphones be coming to unbanked women in Africa? That’s the promise of a new strategic partnership that aims to help women to be able to save, invest, and access loans from the convenience of their own phones – even if they live miles away from a bank.

Egyptian bank ADCB-Egypt has extended its collaboration with Temenos to deliver next-generation digital payments on the latter’s open platform for composable banking.

With the Safaricom Ethiopia launch still some months off, the country’s state-owned incumbent Ethio Telecom has again taken advantage of its sole service provider position with the introduction of another mobile finance-related service in Africa’s second most populous country.

Two recent announcements underline the continuing drive on the part of fintech groups to bring their technology to African institutions and consumers.

Cloud banking platform provider Temenos has signed up Saigon-Hanoi Bank (SHB) for its digital banking platform, a move for the lender to meet the rising demand for electronic banking in Vietnam.

Trade association the GSMA has launched the Mobile Money API Compliance Verification Service to support the growth of trusted mobile money ecosystems in developing nations.

Grab Holdings Limited, and leading communications technology group Singtel have announced that GXS Bank Pte. Ltd, their digital bank joint venture, supported by a consortium of Malaysian investors, is among the companies selected to receive a full digital banking licence in Malaysia.

NALA, a Tanzania-based fintech company, has teamed up with pan-African payments company Cellulant to power remittance payments from the United Kingdom and United States into Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, Tanzania and Ghana.