Global payments technology company, Mastercard is expanding its Mastercard Engage programme to Sub-Saharan Africa – Lagos, Nigeria and Nairobi, Kenya. The programme would be introducing fintech industry players in these cities to global partnership opportunities.
Mastercard Engage is a global partnership and development programme that connects financial institutions, businesses and IoT manufacturers with the right technology partners that can help them deliver innovative payment solutions.
Launched in 2017, the programme helps to build digital payment technology ecosystems which speed up the rate at which innovative solutions are launched for consumers and businesses.
The programme does this by addressing 3 key challenges:
- The need for payment solution providers to constantly evolve their offerings;
- The growing pressure for financial services organisations to harness digital innovation to offer secure, compliant solutions; and
- The need for advanced, convenient financial solutions to empower business and consumers.
The Mastercard Engage programme now has over 160 fintech partners which is triple the amount it had when it was launched. These partners all play in various fields in the fintech ecosystem including; deploying digital wallets, enabling tokenization, facilitating instant payouts and launching mobile point of sale (POS) solutions.
These partners have been fully vetted to meet industry and Mastercard standards and are able to advance with Mastercard as the payment ecosystem continues to innovate.
“At Mastercard, we believe partnerships – particularly with regional fintechs with a deep understanding of the local environment – are crucial for ongoing innovation that delivers relevant payment solutions to empower communities. Engage connects financial institutions and merchants with technology partners within a broad innovation ecosystem, helping companies create and launch the most innovative payment solutions for businesses and consumers.”
Omokehinde Adebanjo, Area Business Head, Mastercard West Africa.
And now, with events to happen in Nigeria and Kenya, the programme will be launched to fintech startups in the cities of Nairobi and Lagos. The chosen startups would have their solutions accessed globally as it will be listed on the Engage directories.
In addition to the listing, the startups also get access to “Academy for Engage” – an education and training programme, as well as regional Mastercard events.
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