Fintech: Kenyas Wapi Pay seeks payment solutions between Asia and Africa

Kenyan based financial technology (fintech) company Wapi Pay has moved to strengthen payments on its Afro-Asia corridor under a new partnership with Singapore based Fomo Pay.

The two firms are expected to boost the payments corridor by allowing for cheaper and faster funds remittance.

“These new payment rails will open up Kenyan and African market to the billion Asia market, facilitating employment creation under accelerated trade and via e-commerce,” noted Wapi Pay Executive Director Paul Ndichu.

The new partnership is expected to facilitate the expansion of the Kenyan fintech into the region with plans underway to set up shop in Ghana, Zambia, Uganda and Nigeria by the end of August.

Wapi’s new partnership, which was arrived at during the just concluded Afro-Asian fintech festival – by the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) co-hosted by the Monetary Authority of Singapore – makes for the first fruits from the engagement between the two partner Central Banks.

The pair of reserve banks who reached a memorandum of understanding to further their collaboration on Monday are keen to leverage on their newly found engagement to push further their goal for universal financial inclusion.

“Collaboration offers the best chance for creating an effective eco-system for financial inclusion,” noted CBK Governor Patrick Njoroge.

On it’s part, Wapi Pay has already pioneered Afro-Asia payments having partnered with San Francisco based Flutterwave and Chinese social platform We-Chat (Weixin) to offer real-time payments to customers in China and South-East Asia.

The fintech’s services are already being used by banks and remittance companies in the East African region to support merchant payments.

Payments and remittances are usually key to Kenya’s import and exports receipts.

Kenya’s trade to Asia accounted for about Ksh.361 billion ($3.5 billion) in revenues across 2018 while trade to the region from the rest of Africa was valued at over Ksh.21 trillion ($ 204.2 billion) in a similar period.