According to CNN, the South African communications company Vodacom announced it was partnering with Alipay, part of China’s Alibaba group, to create a super app that will provide multiple financial services. Integrating with its VodaPay app, Vodacom says the new service will let users pay utility bills and transfer money, as well as connecting them with online merchants and suppliers.
Vodacom CEO Shameel Joosub was asked by CNN’s Eleni Giokos about, why did he feel that they needed to team up with Alibaba to launch a product like Super App?
Shameel replied, “we moved $24.2 billion a month through the M-Pesa platform, but when we looked around the world, we were quite excited when we saw what Alipay was doing. We saw it almost as an evolution from the success that we’ve had and how they managed to bring everything together on the back of a smartphone.
“We’re in the business of connectivity, so it’s evolving from mobile connectivity into fiber and even into connectivity from space. I think there are a lot of developments in the financial services space. We’re quite a large player with more than 55 million customers buying a financial service product from us across the continent. Mainly the big focus is to connect the next 100 million people, but also to drive both digital inclusion and financial inclusion,” adds Shameel.
Still not clear when the app will launch however, Vodacom promised to share more information with the public soon.
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