We have observed how countries seek to develop and innovate technologies in their territories, allowing them to improve the quality of life of their citizens with the growth of their economy. For developing countries this issue is fundamental, so we bring you the case of Kenya.
The financial technology unit of Equity Group Holdings Ltd. announced that it is negotiating with six Ethiopian banks to collaborate on cross-border mobile payments and e-commerce, allowing citizens and outsiders to conduct transactions comfortably. The objective seems to be to encourage foreign investment and renew tourism.
Current situation
Finserve Africa Ltd., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Kenya's largest lender by market value, is targeting remittances from three million Ethiopians living outside the country, managing director Jack Ngare said in an interview.
"We are looking to work with six banks to facilitate cross-border transactions, as well as electronic commerce," said Ngare in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi. In addition, the Fintech business also has eight remittance companies already connected to its platform, he said.
Ethiopians residing abroad have sent approximately 4,600 million dollars last year as remittances, accounting for 25% of the country's foreign exchange inflow.
"We're going to do internal remittances, and that's good for Ethiopia, because they need to attract a lot of foreign exchange."
Equity had to work with an Ethiopian sponsoring bank to seek approvals, and the talks should conclude in three to six months, he said, without giving further details. Finserve received a license to operate a mobile virtual network in 2014 and uses the infrastructure of the local companies of Bharti Airtel Ltd.
Chinese Power
With its technological power established in a stable and growing way in China, it intends to build its influences across the globe, causing it to show interest in this opening by Finserve, allowing it to point to payments for trade in the six markets in those operating Equity, such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Uganda.
He has subscribed to Alipay.com Co. Ltd., a Chinese third-party payment platform and WeChat, a mobile payments and social media application of Tencent Holdings Ltd. in a merchant aggregation platform.
China was the largest trading partner in sub-Saharan Africa last year with about $ 120 billion in trade, more than double the 2007 total. Finserve expects to provide approximately one billion shillings ($ 9.92 million) of that business in around four months, said Ngare.
"We see him as an important facilitator of payments for everything that is happening in the Sino-African trade, as well as for the tourists who now come to this part of the world," he said.