Top officials speak to the media at the Central Bank Payment Conference in Berlin.

Business Bureau, Gulf Today

Leading African payment gateway Innovate 1 Pay has announced that it is launching its Dubai office, bringing easy and seamless money transfer and payment services to African expatriates in the region. A market leader on the African continent, Innovate 1 pay is licensed by the Central Bank of Nigeria to provide services including international money transfers and wholesale foreign exchange management, as well as being the exclusive distributor of foreign currency to Bureau de Change (BDC) operators in Northern Nigeria.

The UAE and African countries ties is on solid track. Dubai Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Dubai Chamber) has already announced its plans to host the fifth edition of the Global Business Forum (GBF) on Africa on November 18-19 in Dubai.

Organised under the theme Scale Up Africa, GBF Africa 2019 will bring together African and UAE governments and business leaders to explore avenues of economic cooperation and to facilitate bilateral trade and investment flows.

The high-level forum will place a key focus on forging the connections that will enable scale-up, and explore how public and private sector players in Africa and the UAE can work together to sustainable partnerships.

Africa is set to surpass China and India as a job market by 2040, and with the recent visa reforms in the UAE, Dubai has emerged as an attractive destination for Africans to pursue career advancement and professional fulfillment. Innovate 1 Pay’s secure and convenient payment gateway and financial services platform, which integrates seamlessly between Dubai and several African nations, looks set to emerge as the solution to address this expanding market segment and its unmet needs.

Innovate 1 Pay Chairman Mahmood Ahmadu articulates the opportunity by positioning his vision from a human-centric and ease of transaction perspective. “With the maturing of financial markets in Africa, we have expanded our presence to a total of 56 countries currently, and with the promise that the new UAE visa regime holds for African professionals, we believe the prospects for growth in addressing this demographic is very promising indeed” he said. “The next generation of financial services needs to reflect customer expectations around secure and quick transfer of funds. Our relationship with government bodies and comprehensive presence in the African market positions Innovate 1 uniquely in being able to leverage these strengths, and amplify them with the use of appropriate and user friendly technologies”, Mahmood Ahmadu added.

The impressive performance of Innovate 1 Pay represents the tremendous room for growth and expansion that exists at the intersection of increasing demand, market growth and the outreach potential of tech-enabled services. The company was universally lauded for its efforts to empower financial inclusion at the recent Central Bank Payment Conference in Berlin, which included representatives from the European Commission, the Federal Reserve, Deutsche Bundesbank, Visa, and the Assistant Governor of Australia’s Reserve Bank, among others. At a forum featuring nearly 200 thought leaders representing a hundred financial organizations and more than 50 central banks from around the world Innovate 1 Pay created huge interest and stood out among a field of exhibitors that included a stellar lineup of stalwarts, such as Visa and Vocalink Mastercard.

Also felicitated as a recipient of the Euro-Knowledge ‘Most Innovative IT company of the year award’ at the British House of Lords, in April this year, Innovate 1 Pay is gaining global acclaim as a company that reconciles sterling business performance with outstanding social impact. According to company CEO Anthony Nwachukwu, the time for a concerted effort to extend financial inclusion in Africa is right now. “Africa is currently the second fastest growing continent, after Asia, and we are looking at an average GDP growth of 5% across the continent that has lasted a decade now”, Anthony Nwachukwu points out. “Africa is home to 40 per cent of the people in the world who lack access to banking services and we at Innovate 1 Pay see our business mission within the context of this larger social goal”, he elaborated.

Bringing financial inclusion to all is possibly one of the most important steps in empowering untapped human potential, more equitable wealth distribution and a universally prosperous world.

Innovate 1 Pay is one of Africa’s leading providers of payment gateway, international money transfer and foreign exchange services. It can address the needs of either individuals or organizations, through a diverse portfolio of solutions.

The company’s quick, secure and intuitive processes facilitate seamless multi-channel transfers for both banked and unbanked customers.

Headquartered in Garki Abuja FCT (Nigeria), and with a global operations office at Jumeirah Lakes Towers, Dubai UAE, Innovate 1 Pay is Nigeria’s largest provider of payment services, having processed more than a million transactions, for clients within Nigeria as well as globally, on their platform.