Vodacom Group Ltd. has developed Africa’s first super-app with the help of China’s Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. allowing subscribers a wide range of services including taking out loans, shopping online and making standard mobile payments.
The application, called VodaPay, will be available to South African customers in the coming weeks, and will help Vodacom expand financial and e-commerce services in its home market in the absence of new high-speed broadband spectrum. The application is comparable to Tencent Holding Ltd.’s WeChat, used by more than 1 billion people, Chief Executive Shameel Joosub said in an interview.
“The world is moving towards e-commerce, and while leveraging what we already have, we also need to grow that side,” he said.
Mobile operators in Africa have invested heavily in financial technology to fill a gap left by a lack of physical banking infrastructure. Vodacom’s Johannesburg rival MTN Group Ltd. is looking to carve out and possibly list its financial services business, while Airtel Africa Plc is pursuing similar options.
Vodacom, majority owned by the UK’s Vodafone Group Plc, is looking to expand its financial technology offering in South Africa while waiting for the government’s long-promised spectrum auction, which it says is needed to expand broadband service and drive down data prices. The super-app partnership also represents an expansion opportunity for Alipay, which has been fighting an antitrust probe in China.
Kenyan Partner
Vodacom’s push into e-commerce will be replicated by Kenyan partner Safaricom Plc, whose M-Pesa mobile money service accounts for about a third of revenues, Joosub said. M-Pesa will start offering more online retail and financial products in Vodacom’s international markets, such as Tanzania, the CEO said, along with its core payments business.
Vodacom upgraded its profitability targets in terms of improved prospects for Safaricom and other businesses outside South Africa, while announcing improved full-year profits and sales. Operating profits are now expected to increase by mid to high single digits over the next three years, the company said in a statement, up from a mid-single digit target set in November.
The company is awaiting a response from the Ethiopian government on an approach to buy one of two new operating licenses in the country, along with partners Safaricom and Vodafone.
“The key to our business is our mobile money and financial services proposition, so if we are successful with the license in Ethiopia, we will be encouraging the government to license those services as well,” Joosub said.
