Tanzania’s leading digital, technology and communication company, Vodacom Tanzania has opened its M-Pesa API in a move set to entice local and international developers into creating innovative new use cases for the leading mobile payments service.

Vodacom M-Pesa, the country’s leading mobile financial system has undergone lots of transformation over the years including a historic migration and upgrade to a second generation platform which is robust, faster, more secure, futuristic and more importantly hosted locally in Tanzania for easier maintenance. The platform has since then diversified earning accolades and international recognition including a GSMA certification.

While addressing developers and Fintech ecosystem stakeholders Hisham Hendi, Vodacom Tanzania CEO said the opening of the M-Pesa API is another step to fuel innovation in Tanzania around Fintech and digital business. “As a company with a vision to digitize Tanzania, we support the innovation ecosystems to come up with solutions that transform lives which is why we have now opened our API making it easier for businesses and developers to integrate with our M-Pesa system allowing them to test and enable a wide range of extra capabilities to the system that will bring real change."

The opening up of M-PESA API's complements other recent ingenuities by the company like Lipa kwa Simu an interoperable service, IMT and M-Pesa App all aimed at creating a cashless society and driving a digital economy. “The fully-fledged development infrastructure enables businesses to work independently with their developers and opens space for innovations in re-designing their payment interface independently, creating a customized payment system without directly engaging us,” the CEO noted.

On his part, Epimack Mbeteni, director, Vodacom M-Pesa said the new open M-PESA API enhances digital user experience making it more convenient, faster and efficient to integrate payments systems onto the M-PESA financial services platform. He called on developers to take make use of them and devise new applications for business-to-consumer, consumer-to-business and business-to-business that can be plugged into the open tech backbone.

“With the Open M-Pesa API’s it is now faster and easier for you to test the integration of your prototypes with our system, we hope to see more ideas, applications and businesses tap into our vast system to offer more and improved services to customers” he concluded
Customers and end users will benefit from the innovation of developers in getting more customized payment services. It also opens up possibilities for further innovation of unique service options associated with M-Pesa.

The opening of the M-Pesa API is another step towards achieving Vodacom’s drive to promote a digital society by fueling innovation in financial technology (fintech) and payment ecosystems in Tanzania.

About Vodacom Tanzania
Vodacom Tanzania Plc is the country’s leading mobile operator and mobile financial services provider. We provide a wide range of communication services for consumers and enterprise – including voice, data and messaging, video, cloud and hosting, mobile solutions and financial services – to over 14.1 million customers. Vodacom Tanzania Plc and its subsidiary companies are part of the Vodacom Group registered in South Africa, which is in turn owned by Vodacom Group Plc of the United Kingdom. It has been registered on the Dar es Salaam Stock Exchange (DSE) with registration number ISIN: TZ1886102715 Stock name: VODA. For further information, please visit our website: www.vodacom.co.tz

About Vodacom M-Pesa Tanzania
Vodacom M-Pesa is Tanzania’s largest mobile financial service introduced by Vodacom Tanzania PLC in 2008. Now GSMA certified and with over 8 million customers, M-Pesa has significantly contributed towards financial inclusion and economic activity in the country.

Customers deposit and withdraw money from their M-Pesa wallets through over 106,000 agents across the country. The M-Pesa ecosystem connects businesses, banks and government agencies making digital payments possible. To date, M-Pesa continues to be the market leader in mobile financial services, rolling out innovative services such as savings & Loans, Virtual Debit cards, Overdraft services, Group savings, E-payments and many more, which address the real needs of Tanzanian thereby enhancing financial inclusion and deepening.