Safaricom’s M-PESA and PayPal have announced a strategic collaboration to enable account linking and seamless fund transfers across their networks.
The collaboration aims to empower more than 35 million M-PESA customers and two million businesses and micro traders in Kenya to access PayPal’s global network.
By first linking their PayPal and M-PESA wallets, users can easily transfer funds from their PayPal accounts into their M-PESA wallets, and vice versa.
This service is designed to enhance the experience for customers and businesses transacting between the two platforms. The solution is currently available to Safaricom M-PESA customers in Kenya, with plans to roll out the service to the other M-PESA markets in the future.
Chief Financial Services Officer, Safaricom, Esther Waititu said “As globalization and digitization continue to reshape how people and businesses connect, our partnership with PayPal is a bold step forward in enabling seamless, worry-free, safe, secure, and inclusive digital payments.”
This collaboration, she said, empowers over thirty-five million customers and two million businesses and micro-entrepreneurs across Kenya to participate in the global digital economy by conveniently sending and receiving payments across more than 200 markets.
“It’s part of our commitment to unlocking opportunities and transforming lives through the power of M-PESA,” she added.
On his part, Otto Williams, Regional Head and General Manager for the Middle East and Africa, PayPal noted that building seamless connections between the global economy and local financial ecosystems is crucial to expanding digital financial inclusion.
“We are thrilled to enable millions of M-PESA’s customers across Africa connect more easily to PayPal’s international customer base,” he added.
The partnership will tap into the emergence and growing popularity of the gig economy that has seen a rise among Africans accepting online jobs for clients across the world.
It equally marks a growing trend of interoperability between fintech providers with a goal of providing customers with a digital financial ecosystem that meets their needs by combining different capabilities.
PayPal is a leading global payment processor with more than 400 million active PayPal accounts operating across 200 markets, while M-PESA is Africa’s leading mobile money service connecting more than 50 million customers across Africa, 2 million businesses and micro traders, with more than $1.1 billion transacted daily.
Ghana
Meanwhile, in Ghana, the government and Bank of Ghana are in talks with PayPal to restore access to PayPal for Ghanaians this year.
It has been impossible for Ghanaians to get PayPal accounts because the country was blacklisted due to alleged rampant abuse of the platform several years ago. The ban gave room for fintechs in Ghana to grow and penetrate the digital finance and money transfer market.
Now there is room for PayPal to collaborate with payment service providers (PSPs) in Ghana to ensure sanity and shared value, and that is at the centre of the ongoing negotiation between government and PayPal ahead of the making PayPal available in Ghana again.
