Zone Expands Decentralized Payment Network With Baxi, FairMoney, And KongaPay Integration
Zone, Africa’s fastest-growing payment infrastructure company, has announced the integration of three prominent fintechs—Baxi by Onafriq, FairMoney Microfinance Bank, and KongaPay—into its decentralized payment network. These additions follow the launch of Zone’s decentralized PoS Payment Gateway, ZonePOS, and a strategic partnership with Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System (NIBSS) to decentralize Payment Terminal Service Aggregator (PTSA) functions using blockchain technology.
This move builds on Zone’s recent onboarding of major financial institutions like First Bank, UBA, and Zenith Bank. The inclusion of Baxi, a leading payment service provider, FairMoney, and KongaPay, a licensed mobile money operator, underscores the growing appeal of Zone’s regulated blockchain technology across diverse segments of the financial services industry.
Zone’s regulated blockchain network, secured with a payment switching and processing license from the Central Bank of Nigeria in 2022, is Africa’s first of its kind. The integration of these fintechs will enable them to benefit from:
- Direct Transaction Routing: Reducing intermediaries for faster, more reliable, and scalable transactions at lower costs.
- End-to-End Transparency: Enabling automatic reconciliation to eliminate chargebacks and chargeback fraud.
- Same-Day Settlement: Offering quicker transaction settlements for financial institutions and their customers.
Zone’s CEO and co-founder, Obi Emetarom, welcomed the integration, highlighting it as a significant step towards transforming the payment landscape in Africa.
In his words,
“We are excited to welcome Baxi, FairMoney, and KongaPay to our network. Their integration is an important step in our journey to advance the payment landscape in Africa and beyond. It underscores the growing trust in our technology and its ability to deliver on our promise of reliable, frictionless, and universally interoperable payment experiences across various financial service verticals. As we continue to expand and enhance our payment network, we remain committed to connecting every monetary store of value and enabling a truly inclusive financial ecosystem.”
This expansion of Zone’s network and its recent partnership with NIBSS to enhance Payment Terminal Service Aggregator (PTSA) operations using blockchain technology demonstrates the growing acceptance and transformative potential of regulated blockchain in mainstream finance. It sets a new standard for payment processing in Nigeria and potentially across Africa and other emerging markets, promising improved customer experiences and operational efficiency, along with reduced transaction costs, and enhanced financial inclusion.
