Telecommunications giant; Safaricom has secured a mobile money license from the Ethiopian government. The license will now make it possible for Safaricom’s mobile phone based money transfer service, payments service and micro financing service to be launched and begin operations in Ethiopia.
With this, Safaricom will now become the very first non Ethiopian telecommunications company that will be granted a mobile money license, a little over a year after it first secured its telecommunications license that made it possible for it to carry operations in Africa’s second (2nd) most populous nation with over 115 million people living in it.
The news was made public by the Minister of Finance in Ethiopia; Ahmed Shide who did so during the official launch of the telecommunications services and network for Safaricom Ethiopia in the country’s capital; Addis Ababa.
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Safaricom is also the first company to launch a mobile service that is in direct competition with Ethio Telecom which is owned by the Ethiopian government. As at the time of putting this article together the 2G mobile service, 3G mobile service and 4G mobile service for Safaricom Ethiopia are now live and operational in the country including its Capital; Addis Ababa and Dire Dawa which is its second biggest city.
By April of 2023 Safaricom Ethiopia is also looking to set up its services in at least twenty five (25) cities so as to fulfill its license obligation of reaching a population coverage of 25 percent.
The securing of a mobile money license by Safaricom is coming after the central bank in Ethiopia (The National Bank of Ethiopia (NBE)) implemented a number of regulations which made it possible for non Ethiopian companies to set up a mobile money services in the country.
Safaricom’s mobile money service; M-Pesa will now be a direct competitor to the mobile money service; Telebirr which is owned by Ethio Telecom and was launched in May of 2021. Telebirr now has a total of more than 20 million users.
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As it stands, Safaricom Ethiopia is owned by an international consortium that is made up of Vodafone Group, Safaricom PLC, Vodacom Group, Sumitomo Corporation, and British International Investment (BII) which is the United Kingdom (UK)’s development finance institution.
The Horn of Africa; Ethiopia has since 2018, commenced its liberalization programme which now makes it possible to open the doors of its banking sector and telecommunications sector so as to encourage growth the speedy digitalization of the nation’s economy and increased investments from international establishments.
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