M-Pesa
Pan-African digital payments company MFS Africa is acquiring U.S.-based Global Technology Partners (GTP) in a cash-and-shares deal worth $34 million, FT reported today. There are very few deals of such…
Visa and Kenya’s Safaricom launch virtual card to support global digital payments via M-Pesa
Global digital payments giant Visa and East Africa’s biggest telecom Safaricom, the operator of the M-Pesa mobile money product, have today launched a virtual card, enabling millions of M-Pesa users…
Global financial transactions are facilitated mainly by payment processors such as Visa or Mastercard. They are responsible for communication between banks and fintechs to settle transactions for consumers and businesses…
MTN Uganda introduces overdraft facility as it steps up competition in digital lending space
Africa’s mobile-money sector remains the most active of any region in the world, according to GSM Association (GSMA), an umbrella body representing the interests of players in the telecommunications industry.…
A digital mobile overdraft facility christened Fuliza by Kenya’s biggest telco Safaricom Plc is giving the country’s popular loan apps a run for their money barely three years after its…
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Sequoia Heritage, Stripe and others invest $200M in African fintech Wave at $1.7B valuation
Francophone Africa has its first unicorn, and if you’ve been following tech on the continent, you will be very unsurprised to hear that it’s coming from the world of fintech. Wave, a U.S. and Senegal-based mobile money provider, has raised $200 million in a Series A round of funding. The…
Pan-African fintech company Interswitch plans to fire up its corporate venture arm again — according to CEO Mitchell Elegbe — who spoke at TechCrunch Disrupt on Wednesday. The Nigerian founder…
South Africa-based renewable energy startup Sun Exchange has raised $3 million to close its Series A funding round totaling $4 million. The company operates a peer-to-peer, crypto-enabled business that allows…
It seems the demand for Safaricom’s M-Pesa payment product never eases. Since its 2007 launch in Kenya, the fintech app has commanded over 70% of the mobile money market in…
Visa just connected to Africa’s most powerful mobile payments network. The global financial services company and Kenyan telecom Safaricom — operator of the M-Pesa mobile money product — announced a…
In March, the virus gripping the world — COVID-19 — started to spread in Africa. In short order, actors across the continent’s tech ecosystem began to step up to stem…
Africa is using digital finance as a means to stem the spread of COVID-19. Governments and startups on the continent are implementing measures to shift a greater volume of payment…
Pan-African e-commerce company Jumia is adapting its digital retail network to curb the spread of COVID-19. The Nigeria headquartered operation — with online goods and services verticals in 11 African…
Africa’s largest innovation incubator, CcHub, will offer funding and engineering support to tech projects aimed at curbing COVID-19 and its social and economic impact. The Lagos and Nairobi based organization…
Kenya’s largest teleco, Safaricom, will implement a fee-waiver on East Africa’s leading mobile-money product, M-Pesa, to reduce the physical exchange of currency in response to the COVID-19 outbreak. The company…
VC firm TLcom Capital closed its Tide Africa Fund at $71 million in February, and announced plans to invest in 12 startups over the next 18 months. The group —…
Amazon Web Services has entered a partnership with Safaricom — Kenya’s largest telco, ISP and mobile payment provider — in a collaboration that could spell competition between American cloud providers…
Nigerian digital payments startup Paga has acquired Apposit, a software development company based in Ethiopia, for an undisclosed amount. That’s just part of Paga’s news. The Lagos based startup will also…
Over the least decade, Africa has been in the midst of a startup boom accompanied by big growth in VC and improvements in internet and mobile penetration.
Africa-focused payment startup PalmPay has launched in Nigeria after raising a $40 million seed round led by Chinese mobile-phone maker Transsion. The investment came via Transsion’s Tecno subsidiary, with participation…
Safaricom’s Nairobi-based Alpha innovation incubator may have an uncertain future, according to sources. With two high-level departures, and the passing of Safaricom’s CEO Bob Collymore, there are questions on how…
Nigerian fintech firm Interswitch has been circulating in business news around a possible IPO on the London Stock Exchange. Last month Bloomberg News ran a story — based on unnamed…
OPay, an Africa-focused mobile payments startup founded by Norwegian browser company Opera, has raised $50 million in funding. Lead investors include Sequoia China, IDG Capital and Source Code Capital. Opera…
Fintech startup Flutterwave has partnered with Visa to launch a consumer payment product for Africa called GetBarter.
Forging another link between Africa and China’s digital economies, the African-focused money transfer startup SimbaPay and Kenya’s Family Bank have launched an instant payment service from East-Africa to China via WeChat.
Nigerian digital payments startup Paga is gearing up for an international expansion with $10 million in funding let by the Global Innovation Fund. The company is planning to release its payments product in…
Forty-seven and a half million dollars is a big commitment to African technology companies — even with the recent uptick in VC investment on the continent.
When it comes to monetizing digital social interactions, Kenya’s Safaricom has its own order. American tech companies such as Facebook and Twitter offered social networks first, then moved to commercialize…
Safaricom, Kenya’s largest telecom company and provider of the nation’s mobile money service, M-Pesa, has launched a new innovation center in Nairobi. Named Safaricom Alpha, a priority of the incubator…
The movement of capital around the globe is of paramount importance to an increasingly globalized society. As companies, workers and jobs become more fluid across permeable borders, it will become…
