The availability of emerging technology that hovers around the cohort socio-economic sector has tweaked the African literate mindset to bid for accelerated evolution of life up to that phase where humans can be able to teleport means of transportation or being able to download real-time food from the web. In Kenya where adamant indigenes are bred, the likes of Visa and Kenya’s Commercial Bank (KCB) have issued a white paper-related kind of partnership to lead FinTech innovation via software-based contactless payments infrastructure that completes pay-as-you-go on one tap.
This report is quite appalling in terms of the KCB and Visa’s approach to producing a seamless contactless payments infrastructure similar to the FinTech solutions Safaricom failed to progressively manage via the standalone M-Pesa mobile money one-tap seamless payment network. M-Pesa flopped with frontline high-end contactless payments solutions five years ago which is quite a remarkable timeline for the Kenyans to stall on reviving Safaricom’s default on misusing NFC technology.
The KCB’s acting director of retail banking, Michael Kungu said the partnership with the juggernaut e-payment service provider will alter the commercial bank’s commitment to impact innovation in East Africa via the latest partnership that consents to continue where M-Pesa left off. The FinTech product the Kenyan commercial bank and Visa is introducing is incorporated with their resources to innovate the near-field communication protocol that relates to 4cm distance devices per users’ discretion to seamlessly connect without taping when devices are close enough.
The partnership has an already baked software system to manage the contactless payment infrastructure powered by NFC technology designed to specifically interact with available smart device connectivity to complete seamless transactions without physical contact or the need for contactless cards and other hardware equipment for e-payment solutions.
Techbooky Africa suggests that the NFC-powered contactless e-payment infrastructure will survive the Kenyan market challenged with digital products adoption to further FinTech service comprehension which determines penetrated technology innovation that also promotes digital literacy. This challenge questioned Safaricom’s M-Pesa operations that got overwhelmed to close shop on promoting contactless payment infrastructure that was dependent on real-time hardware equipment to complete contactless card transactions on one tap.
Aside from Safaricom & the M-Pesa discombobulated contactless payment solutions via the disconnected NFC one-tap system form of contactless e-payment solutions that is biased per real-time card issuance, other financial technology companies that practice the card-based contactless e-payment solutions include Standard Chartered Bank, ABSA, the failed Safaricom’s M-Pesa, etc.
This makes Visa’s presence in the Kenyan FinTech ecosystem a significant operation backed up by the local commercial bank to lead the unprecedented FinTech innovation via a software base contactless payment NFC infrastructure. “Eliminating the need for a dedicated terminal and enabling the merchant to use their cellphone to accept card payments is revolutionary and a significant game changer within the digital payments ecosystem,.” Kungu said.
