President William Ruto has hinted at a possible partnership between Safaricom's M-Pesa with international tech giant Apple saying that would expand its global market.
Ruto said the new partnership would also incorporate another international payment firm, Paypal to accommodate global customers.
“Safaricom is developing a partnership with Apple Inc to integrate MPESA and the Paypal platform to extend MPESA’s transactional reach globally,” he said.
The President spoke on Saturday after visiting Silicon Valley in San Francisco Bay, US.
President Ruto lauded M-Pesa for its reach on the African continent, saying it boasts over 51 million customers in seven countries.
Ruto said the growth of M-Pesa was consequential in fostering connectivity following the recently unveiled 5G internet network by Safaricom.
The unveiling of the network made it the fastest in the continent.
“You will hear Sitoyo Lopokoiyit give his presentation on M-PESA, the mobile money innovation that has transformed payments, challenged traditional banking services and innovatively solved transactional security issues,” the President noted.
"M-PESA is also Kenya’s confident announcement to the world that we are ready, able and willing to play in the big tech league. Our mobile penetration is the highest on the continent, close to universal. 4G5G coverage is 96%, with major urban centres across the country connected to 5G networks.”
Ruto held talks with Apple CEO Tim Cook, Intel's Pat Gelsinger, Google CFO Ruth Porat and executives from Nike, GAP and Levi Strauss.
He urged the tech giants to invest in Kenya because of the country's conducive environment as Africa’s start-up hub.
“The reason for Kenya’s strong performance in attracting VC funding boils down to investor confidence: the knowledge that a start-up that succeeds in Kenya is highly likely to scale to the rest of Africa,” he said.
“Venture capital flows to Kenya in large volumes because there is a conducive environment for innovators to test their products.”