NEWS
Interswitch to support rollout of ACI ’ s enterprise payment platform in Africa
ACI Worldwide and Interswitch Group ,
Africa ’ s integrated payments and digital commerce company , announced a new frontier in their 20-year-old relationship which consolidates Interswitch ’ s relationship with ACI from reseller to strategic partner status across multiple markets in the Sub- Saharan Africa region .
The partnership will enable banks , fintechs and other financial institutions in the region to progressively transform and modernise their payments infrastructure through ACI ’ s revolutionary Enterprise Payments Platform .
On the back of this partnership , Interswitch will incorporate the full range of payment solutions that form part of the ACI Enterprise Payments Platform into its technology stack , enabling banks and financial institutions across Africa to respond rapidly to regulatory mandates , new competition and evolving trends in a fastchanging payments landscape .
The ACI Enterprise Payments Platform is an end-to-end payments hub solution for retail and wholesale payments and encompasses all the capabilities of ACI Issuing , ACI Low Value Real-Time Payments , ACI Acquiring , ATM and Self-Service Banking , and ACI Fraud Management . The solution enables banks to future-proof their payments infrastructure and meet new customer demands for all payment types across consumer , merchant and corporate payments .
Interswitch will offer new innovative products and services in Nigeria and 31 other markets in Sub-Saharan Africa where the payments sector is experiencing an unprecedented revolution and is poised to witness significant further growth on the back of a growing young population , increased digitisation and progressive regulatory outlook .
“ We are thrilled to announce the extension of our long-term partnership with Interswitch ,” said Thomas Warsop , President and CEO , ACI Worldwide . “ We are excited about our new strategic partnership with ACI Worldwide , which essentially consolidates our 20-year relationship across Sub-Saharan Africa ,” said Mitchell Elegbe , Founder , Group Managing Director and CEO at Interswitch .
Ripple partners with Onafriq to enable digital cross-border payments with Africa
Ripple , the vendor in enterprise blockchain and crypto solutions , and payments fintech Onafriq , previously MFS Africa , announced that they are partnering to facilitate digital asset-enabled cross-border payments between Africa and several new markets , including the Gulf Cooperation Council , GCC , the UK and Australia . Onafriq is utilising Ripple Payments , Ripple ’ s crypto-enabled payments technology , to open up three new payments corridors between Africa and the rest of the world . Customers of PayAngel in the UK , Pyypl in the GCC , and Zazi Transfer in Australia are now able to make speedy and costeffective remittance and business payments to recipients in 27 countries across Onafriq ’ s pan-African network1 .
Using Ripple ’ s crypto technology , Onafriq is eliminating the traditional problems associated with cross-border payments such as lengthy transfer times , unreliability and excessive cost . In this way the partnership is bringing faster , more efficient , and costeffective international money transfers to Africa , and is set to accelerate financial inclusion across the continent .
“ For a number of years , Ripple has supported crypto-enabled , cross-border payments to individuals and businesses , and we are particularly excited to expand the reach of our solution into Africa thanks to our Onafriq partnership ,” said Aaron Sears , SVP , Global Customer Success at Ripple .
“ Connecting our partners PayAngel , Pyppl and Zazi Transfer with Onafriq over Ripple Payments will bring the benefits of faster and more cost-effective cross-border payments to individuals seeking to send money into Africa from around the globe .”
Onafriq has the largest mobile money movement footprint across Africa at a time when mobile money is a significant driver of financial inclusion and has revolutionised access to financial services across the continent . The fintech ’ s payment hub connects over 500 million mobile wallets across 40 African countries , and operates across more than 1300 payment corridors on the continent , underpinning regional payment interoperability and seamless cross-border payments .
14 INTELLIGENTCIO AFRICA www . intelligentcio . com