THE MTN Group has announced a new mobile money partnership with Africa’s leading payments technology company, Flutterwave, that will allow businesses integrating Flutterwave in Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Rwanda, Uganda and Zambia to receive payments via MTN Mobile Money (MoMo).
MTN group chief digital and fintech officer Serigne Dioum said that as they progressed on their journey to becoming the largest fintech platform in Africa they would empower millions of businesses to embrace e-commerce in their markets to accept digital payments from MoMo consumers.
“We believe this is an enabler to accelerating digitised payments in Africa. Building strong ecosystems through partnerships is central to our platform strategy and we will continue to invest in expanding the reach of our platform to consumers and businesses in Africa,” Dioum said.
MTN MoMo is a fintech platform providing consumers and businesses with an electronic wallet, enabling electronic transfers and payments as well as access to digital and financial services. At the end of June this year, the platform had 48.9 million active users and 581 514 merchants.
MoMo enables businesses to accept and make payments within the mobile money ecosystem. This new partnership will enable Flutterwave to offer MTN Mobile Money as a payment method to its business customers.
Flutterwave founder and chief executive Olugbenga “GB” Agboola said that Africa has one of the highest growth rates for mobile money adoption and e-commerce in the world.
“It makes sense that we help provide a seamless payment method to support and ensure African businesses reap the full benefits of the e-commerce boom in the region.
“Our goal has always been to grow a new wave of prosperity in Africa by creating more avenues for businesses in Africa to accept payments. With this partnership, we can achieve this while creating endless possibilities for our customers,” said Agboola.
Flutterwave is an African-based fintech company that provides a payment infrastructure for global merchants and payment service providers across the continent. It was founded in 2016 by a team of ex-bankers, entrepreneurs and engineers.
“We decided to provide the award-winning technology core needed to provide businesses all around the world with a powerful, reliable and intelligent payments gateway. Its vision is to make it easier for Africans to build global businesses that can make and accept any payment, anywhere from across Africa and around the world,” said Agboola.
In recent years, Africa has witnessed an explosion in mobile penetration as smartphone adoption has risen rapidly. According to the GSMA, an industry organisation that represents mobile network operators worldwide, Africa will hit the half-a-billion mark of unique mobile subscribers this year and the continent will reach 50 percent subscriber penetration by 2025.
Sub-Saharan Africa alone boasted more than 45 percent of the world’s mobile money accounts with the number of account holders exceeding half-a-billion by last year, according to statistics company Statista.
Through this partnership, MTN and Flutterwave would positively contribute to this trend by increasing mobile money usage and penetration in Africa to improve local economies and livelihoods as well as create opportunities for individuals and businesses across the continent.
The new partnership will further expand on Flutterwave’s previous collaboration with MTN, beyond Uganda and Rwanda – with the potential of deepening adoption of digital payments and e-commerce in Africa, a sector expected to reach $29 billion by next year, according to Statista.
BUSINESS REPORT ONLINE