Paymob, MENA’s market-leading digital payments provider startup, revealed this month that it will begin operations in Pakistan this month, capitalizing on a sector that has seen a startup funding frenzy.
Paymob, a Cairo-based startup that allows online and offline merchants to accept and transmit payments, sees a big opportunity in Pakistan, according to Islam Shawky, the company’s CEO and co-founder. He stated that the company expects to have 100,000 merchants in Pakistan within the first two years and that it now operates in Egypt, Jordan, and Kenya, with plans to expand into Saudi Arabia later this year.
In Pakistan, Paymob has a big market opportunity. It boasts a population of over 220 million people, and its cities are home to a variety of retail establishments and small companies. Just over 80,000 POS terminals and fewer than 3,000 e-commerce gateways are used by over 4 million SMEs. Paymob’s ability to bridge the digital financial divide is well suited to the market, and it matches the company’s criteria and goal to develop further across MENAP and globally.
The State Bank of Pakistan recently released digital onboarding laws, which empower and enable instant onboarding. It’s just one of the many beneficial initiatives the State Bank has done to help MSME merchants and the ecosystem become more digital.
Paymob also wants to expand its ‘Tap-on-Phone’ payment acceptance mechanism service to Pakistan merchants, which was recently revealed as an industry first in Egypt in cooperation with MasterCard. Merchants will be able to accept payments directly from their mobile phones as a result of this. This will very certainly have a big impact on the Pakistani market.
“We are very happy to be launching Pakistan,” Paymob’s CEO and Co-Founder Islam Shawky remarked. This is an important step after our successful journey as the leader in the Egyptian payments environment, where we provide innovative financial solutions to tens of thousands of merchants.” “Our focus is on small and medium businesses, which are an important part of the economy but are underserved,” Shawky added. “In emerging markets, there is a tremendous disparity.”
“Paymob is guided by the conviction that SMEs are the backbone of any economy and that helping them represents the country’s digital economy.”
Mastercard has praised Paymob’s market launch, describing it as an outstanding partner for building Pakistan’s payment ecosystem and making a significant contribution to the country’s digital payments transition.
“Paymob’s commitment to growing the payments ecosystem is a very optimistic indication for Pakistan,” said Atyab Tahir, Country Head of MasterCard Pakistan& AFG. Mastercard — and the financial services sector as a whole — will have the right partner in Paymob to help them establish a network of digitally equipped retailers that accept non-cash payments. We look forward to a day when digital payments are accepted everywhere.”
Paymob, which was founded in 2015, provides a variety of tools and APIs that allow online businesses and traditional retail shop merchants to receive and transmit payments. Merchants can use Paymob’s payment APIs to take payments from their consumers using a variety of payment methods, including cards, mobile wallets, BNPL, direct debit, and more.
Image Credit: Paymob
