We will benefit from the fintech ecosystem — Hubtel CEO

The CEO of Hubtel, an e-commerce platform, Alex Bram, has stated that the company will not give up on developing new products and services as part of efforts to deal with the unemployment situation in the country.

He noted that although the company had experienced a significant increase in headcount, from 60 employees at the time of rebranding in 2017 to a robust team of over 270 employees across eight cities in the country, it was not satisfied with the numbers.

Addressing journalists in Accra ahead of the celebration of the 18th milestone, Bram indicated that each department had grown by more than 100 percent in the last six years.

In her recent visit to President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, the Director-General of the World Trade Organization, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, urged Ghana to scale up investment in the booming fintech industry to take advantage of its $4 trillion global value . online shopping.

She said the country was performing well in offering some digital trade and professional services outsourcing businesses, with many women involved in the trade, and called for more efforts to make major inroads into the sector

Bram noted that it was to take advantage of this growing industry that his company received a full license to operate as an Enhanced Payment Services Provider in 2022, and by the end of that year had become the country’s largest fintech company in terms of transaction revenue and income.

He attributed the extraordinary growth to the commitment and hard work of the team at Hubtel who remained the backbone of the company, driving its success and ensuring that goals and objectives were achieved.

App

Bram said prior to the launch of the Hubtel app in 2012, the company launched MPower Payments, a complete end-to-end online and mobile payment solution that enabled consumers and merchants to send, use and receive payments.

He added that “MPower introduced the MPower Mobile Point of Sale application which allowed businesses to accept various forms of cashless payments.

However, it did not achieve the desired level of success.

“Hubtel faced similar challenges when they first launched the Hubtel app in 2017.

The aim was to connect customers and businesses through the app and improve and make the commercial experience more convenient and easier,” he added.

Bram said the target was not achieved during the first launch.

After its launch, the Hubtel app faced a series of hiccups, system glitches and product failures. These issues ultimately led to a less than lukewarm response from the general public.

“Convinced that they were on the cusp of something special, the Hubtel team persevered and launched a new venture to rebuild the Hubtel app and its associated platform.

Within five months, the company relaunched a fully functional and refreshed product, it says.

Leaders

According to Bram, supported by innovative discerning leaders, a focused management team and a young and tireless workforce, things started to look up again for Hubtel and in 2019, Hubtel received approval from the Bank of Ghana to operate as a Payment Service Provider (Enhanced).

“By 2021, highlights that the company processed almost 8.3 percent of all successful mobile money payments in Ghana, according to data from the Bank of Ghana and the Ghana Interbank Payment & Settlement Systems.”

“In early 2023, the company celebrated a significant milestone with over 500,000 app downloads on the Google Playstore alone,” Bram said.

From its inception in 2005 as SMSGH, the CEO said, the company had undergone a remarkable transformation, evolving from being the primary SMS solution-based messaging business to a fully licensed payment and digital transformation services provider.

– On reflection, a lot has been achieved in the last 18 years.

However, it is the company’s ability to embrace and overcome failure that has been critical to its growth and success, he said.

History

In 2005, two talented and ambitious students from the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Alex Bram and Ernest Apenteng, set out to revolutionize how businesses connect with their customers through SMS messages.