By Our Reporter
Airtel Uganda has been recognized and awarded for its continuous innovation under the Airtel Money services that has accelerated financial inclusion in Uganda.
The telco scooped the 2021 FinTech Innovation Award at the 18th annual East Africa Com Virtual Awards ceremony held last week in Nairobi – Kenya together with Comviva, a global leader in mobile solutions offering digital VAS, mobile finance and customer management solutions for telecom operators.
According to East Africa Com, the awards organizer, The Fintech Innovation Award honours top companies and products leading in Financial Technology (FinTech) innovations in East Africa. Airtel Money is one of Uganda’s top financial inclusion drivers that enable mobile phone subscribers, especially the financially underserved population, to transact in the digital economy.
Powered by Comviva’s mobiquity platform, Airtel Money provides a mobile wallet to consumers linked to their Airtel mobile number, allowing them to transfer money, get loans and make payments instantly, easily and securely, anytime, anywhere.
Speaking about the Award, Andrew Rugamba, the Airtel Money Director at Airtel Uganda mentioned that; “We are very excited about winning the 2021 Fintech Innovation Award. This win is a result of hard work and continued investment in tech-driven reliable and affordable innovative solutions aimed at giving our customers the desired experience as they transact using a wide range of products and services we offer.”
“As Airtel Uganda, we pride in being a financial service partner our customers can trust as they send and receive money using safe, secure and affordable Airtel money services.”
The increased demand for cashless transactions has spiraled a steady growth of the mobile financial services in Uganda. According to the Uganda Communications Commission 2020 4th Quarter Market Performance Report, active mobile cash transaction wallets increased to 22.5 million between October and December, 2020 from 20.9 million in Q1 2020, demonstrating the fast growth in uptake of mobile cash transactions in Uganda.
During the same period, active mobile agents increased from 227,736 in September 2020 to 235,790 agents in December 2020, to support increasing demand in mobile cash transaction services.