
Extending services across Africa
MasterCard Worldwide, Comviva Technologies and Tutuka are collaborating to extend financial inclusion to millions of consumers across Africa (view press release). The new partnership, combining MasterCard’s global electronic payments network, Comviva’s mobiquity mobile payment platform and Tutuka’s prepaid processing platform aims to enable customers to purchase goods and services at millions of physical and online retailers worldwide where MasterCard is accepted, as well as transfer funds and pay bills.
Operators will be able to provide mobile money services using Comviva’s mobiquity platform to offer their customers prepaid MasterCard cards or Virtual Card Numbers (VCN) linked to their existing stored value accounts. Operators will also register and link consumer mobile numbers against a unique MasterCard Prepaid card which will be issued to them.
“The ubiquity of mobile and interoperability are the keys to the penetration of electronic payments in Africa,” said Mung Ki Woo, Group Executive, Mobile, MasterCard Worldwide. “This solution leverages our biggest asset, the MasterCard Worldwide network, to bring ubiquitous acceptance to mobile wallet consumers across Africa in an efficient and cost effective manner.”
The collaboration between MasterCard Worldwide, Comviva Technologies and Tutuka is a result of the MasterCard Mobile Money Partnership Program that was launched in February 2012, which aims to help more than 2.5 billion financially-underserved consumers worldwide gain access to formal financial services through their mobile phones.
Whitepapers
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