28 Nov eCommerce and Mobile Money - The Sweethearts of Sub-Saharan Africa: Who is courting who?

Mobile Money market penetration has been a key driver in catalysing growth of eCommerce sales across the African continent which are expected to grow 75% over 5 years to reach almost $30bn by 2022.   Other drivers are rising middle class incomes, increasing connectivity, financial inclusion, young adult populations, and smartphone penetration 

To zoom in on mobile payment capability, there were about 130 mobile money services serving almost 400m mobile money accounts in Sub-Saharan Africa, which is the same number of mobile money accounts in the whole of the rest of the world!  

The market penetration of mobile money adoption exceeds 60% in an increasing number of countries including Kenya, Ghana and Zimbabwe.  This means that majority of these country locals with a smartphone can potentially use it to pay online at merchants and participate in the global economy.  

Mobile money is giving cards a run for their money and eliminating the risks associated with COD deliveries by eCommerce merchants.  Is eCommerce driving mobile money growth or is mobile money growth driving eCommerce? There is a very fertile local eCommerce market albeit a little oligopolistic with large scale players who have raised significant amounts of capital to get in on the ground floor and own the market when it comes of age.

To conclude, Mobile Money and eCommerce are great bedmates - they are symbiotic, they catalyse socioeconomics, and they have a positive impact on the populations and countries in which they are successful.  

If you are a multinational eCommerce company entering the African market, please contact us now to take care of your online payments.

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A big thank you to https://www.gsma.com/r/mobileeconomy/sub-saharan-africa/ for the stats and inspiration for this article