According to McKinsey, a consulting firm, the revenues of African fintech companies are projected to grow 8x to reach $30 billion by 2025. That estimate is credible when you remember that fintech is the operating system of markets. In fact, when companies fix customer frictions, they want to get paid. In other words, unless there is a seamless way to compensate producers for the value they create in the markets, by paying them, the equilibrium point between demand and supply fails.
This explains why Africa is emerging as a fintech continent and Nigeria has emerged as one of the best breeding grounds for fintech unicorns (startups worth at least $1 billion). But this breed requires new thinking, far beyond the old model of just embedding APIs at checkout pages and points. Indeed, fintech must unlock new prospects by actually driving and stimulating new verticals.
Interswitch, the fintech pioneer has shown a recent dance move: it has launched Quickteller Transport through its digital consumer lifestyle and payment platform. According to a press release, it will help “users to easily search and book interstate tours from multiple travel operators across Nigeria. Users will also be able to filter their search to specific or preferred operators, compare fares based on criteria such as vehicle type, departure point and time, as well as access specialized features provided by transport operators, including seat selection and preferred pick-up point options, all at their convenience.”
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We are in 2022 and this is the beginning of the era of application tools in Nigeria where companies will unlock more value from mobile internet. And fintech firms just won’t become distributors of APIs, but ecosystem operators across verticals, as the industry moves into a new phase of development. Expect #playbooks as Quickteller Transport in multiple verticals, as apps continue to organize our lives, hosted on our smartphones.
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