Flutterwave, Africa’s leading payments technology company, has announced a mobile money partnership with MTN Group, Africa’s largest telecommunications provider.
This new partnership will enable Flutterwave to offer MTN Mobile Money as a payment method to its business customers.
Businesses in Cameroon, Cote d’Ivoire, Rwanda, Uganda and Zambia will be able to receive payments via MTN MoMo through Flutterwave.
MTN Mobile Money is a secure electronic service that enables MTN Mobile Money wallet holders to store funds, send and receive money, make payments and do a number of other transactions simply using their mobile phone. At the end of Q2 of 2021, MTN MoMo had 48.9 million active users and 581,514 merchants.
In recent years, Africa has witnessed an explosion in mobile penetration with the rise in smartphone adoption. According to the GSMA, this year Africa will hit the half a billion mark of unique mobile subscribers and the continent will reach 50% subscriber penetration by 2025.
According to Statista, Sub-Saharan Africa alone is responsible for more than 45% of the world’s mobile money accounts with the number of account holders exceeding half a billion by 2020.
Through this partnership, MTN and Flutterwave will positively contribute to the rapid penetration of mobile money usage in Africa thereby improving local economies and livelihoods as well as create opportunities for individuals and businesses across the continent.
Olugbenga “GB” Agboola, Founder and CEO of Flutterwave, said: “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.”
Serigne Dioum, MTN Group Chief Digital and Fintech Officer said: “As we progress on our journey to becoming the largest fintech platform in Africa, we will empower millions of businesses to embrace e-commerce in our markets to accept digital payments from MoMo consumers. We believe this is an enabler to accelerating digitized 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.”
