Mastercard and MTN Group Fintech have entered into a significant partnership to introduce a prepaid virtual card within MTN’s Mobile Money (MoMo) ecosystem across 13 African markets. This collaboration aims to expand Mobile Money services, promote financial inclusion, and offer innovative payment solutions.
As part of the agreement, MTN MoMo users will gain access to a prepaid virtual card, allowing them to make seamless point-of-sale payments directly from their MoMo wallets. This initiative also benefits merchants, enabling them to accept card payments and enhance the overall payment experience.
According to MTN, the prepaid virtual card will provide MoMo customers access to over 100 million acceptance points globally, empowering merchants to accept card payments effortlessly and strengthening the platform’s cross-border money remittance services.
With 60 million active MoMo wallets among its 290 million subscribers, MTN’s collaboration with Mastercard covers markets in Benin, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Eswatini, Ghana, Liberia, Nigeria, Republic of Congo, Republic of Guinea, Rwanda, South Africa, Uganda, and Zambia.
This strategic partnership follows Mastercard’s recent investment of US$200 million in MTN Group Fintech, aiming to support mobile money programs across Africa and bring a significant portion of the continent’s unbanked population into the financial mainstream.
Besides benefiting individual users, small businesses using MTN MoMo will receive Mastercard’s SME-in-a-Box solution, facilitating their online migration by enabling acceptance of various digital payments at a minimal cost.
Mastercard’s objective is to include a billion people and 50 million SMEs in the global digital economy by 2025, with the collaboration with MTN representing a significant step towards this ambitious target. The partnership not only promotes financial inclusion but also drives the adoption of digital payment solutions, fostering economic growth and resilience across Africa.
Source: Innovation Village