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Silicon Pay using FinTech to ease payments

By Our writer  

Away from its negative consequences, the COVID-19 pandemic was an eye-opener to individuals and businesses. It brought the role and overall importance of digital financial services (DFS) at the forefront.

Further, the pandemic opened opportunities for Financial Technology companies (FinTechs) to come up with innovative solutions that have since transformed the way people make and receive payments.

Among FinTechs benefiting from this wave is Silicon Savannah Limited, a technology company whose Silicon Pay solution is easing payments for several businesses.

According to the Silicon Pay Chief Executive Officer, Patrick Settuba, the firm offers a fully integrated suite of payments products including collections, bulk payments, utilities, and bank transfers through its Application Programming Interface (API). For about three years in business, the company has over 900 retained clients and 15,000 active merchants and users. This includes about 30 percent women users. Silicon Pay is also supporting about 500 women SACCOs on matters collections and pay outs.

 “COVID-19 affected businesses but it paved way for the growth of digital payments as businesses moved online because they could not do physical meet-ups and collections. More people got to know about the online services that we offer and they tried them out,” he says.

To stay on top of their game, Settuba says Silicon Pay integrated new products and services to meet its clients’ evolving financial needs. For instance, it integrated mobile wallets to cater for customers who receive money in different currencies.

It also forged partnerships with key service providers such as e-commerce platforms, to provide more services to its clients.

To make it easy for businesses to onboard, Settuba says that the company uses the tiered Know-Your-Customer (KYC) principle, which also helps them guard against fraud.

“To understand who we are dealing with, we incorporated KYC standards to better understand the customer we are dealing with. We thus take extra steps by asking them to prove their identity, nature of the business to make sure the source of a customer’s funds is legitimate,” Settuba notes.

He adds that their system enables users to monitor their funds on their dashboard in real-time and can withdraw through mobile money instantly whenever they need it.

Additionally, the platform enables users to transfer funds instantly to their preferred bank accounts on request and receive the funds in a few hours depending on the time the request is made.

40-Days 40-FinTechs

Silicon Pay is among the firms taking part in the 2022 40-Days 40-Fintechs initiative and has been featured on Day 7.

Now in its third edition, #40Days40FinTechs has quickly grown into one of the world’s premier showcase events for the innovations that are enabling ever more people to join the digital economy space. That is surely going to remain the case, in large part due to the inspiration and collaboration that our partners Level One Project, Mojaloop, ModusBox, and Crosslake Technologies generate, but mostly because of the continuing generous support of the Gates Foundation.

Digital Innovators and FinTechs around East Africa should be more eager to embrace 40 Days 40 FinTechs as Season three covers physical destinations in Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Burundi and Rwanda.

Run under HiPipo’s Include Everyone program that also encompasses other initiatives such as FinTech Landscape Exhibition, Women in FinTech Hackathon, Summit & Incubator and the Digital and Financial Inclusion Summit and Digital Impact Awards Africa; the #40Days40FinTechs platform aptly provides a setting for the various players and stakeholders involved in digital and financial technology to exhibit their products & Services and also share their ideas on how more of us, especially those unserved and underserved by the present financial systems, can be brought into the fold.

The 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative offers participants useful tools and an introduction to the industry’s emerging technologies, such as Mojaloop Open Source Software, and guidance from Level One Project foundational material. The skills gained from this initiative cover Level One Project Principles, Instant and Inclusive Payment Systems (IIPS), Inclusive Finance and FinTech in general.

According to HiPipo CEO Innocent Kawooya, this year’s edition will cement achievements of the previous editions – where over 60 FinTechs have been transformed – but also build on them to leverage digital financial inclusion in East Africa and beyond.

“As HiPipo, our extensive effort and advocacy is partly for the intention of championing digital innovation and interoperable instant and inclusive payment systems (IIPS) in Africa to a point where our innovators enjoy and achieve sound profit margins to help them keep designing and deploying affordable and inclusive financial services for the poor,” Kawooya said.

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Ticteq is using FINTECH to reduce Tickets’ purchase hustle and commotion

Our Reporter.

For those that have attended events in Uganda, you are familiar with the hustle and bustle involved in buying entry tickets. This includes long queues, higher prices than originally advertised and fraudsters selling fake tickets among other issues.

But all this will soon be history; if event organizers and revelers can incorporate technology in the ticketing journey.

Already on the market is a solution that brings together event organizers and party-goers on a single online platform called Ticteq.

Ticteq is an online ticketing company that deals in events ticketing and crowd funding. So far, the platform has sold over ten thousand (10,000) tickets, has sixty thousand (60,000) subscribers and has digitally transacted in excess of sixty million shillings (UGX 60m).

According to George Katuramu, the Ticteq Director, the solution has allowed event organizers to shift from the slow, costly and inconveniencing manual process to a digital one that allows them to register and upload their events on the Ticteq platform for potential customers to purchase tickets.

Using the platform, event organisers can contact people who have bought tickets, and customers can also get refunds in case they are unable to attend.

“This is a complete solution for someone who wants to organize a successful event, without worrying about tickets, fake notes, coins or being cheated at the entrance,” Katuramu says, adding that one simply visits the Ticteq website to buy a ticket using either MTN Mobile Money, Airtel Money or a credit card. The money is automatically remitted to the event organizer’s mobile or bank account.

He further explains that even though the long COVID-19 lockdown set them back, the platform is fast picking up given that it gives events stakeholders a variety of advantages including safety and settling transactions in real time.

“We were affected by COVID-19 because all events were cancelled. But since we resumed events, we are picking up from where we had stopped. We have already had a few successful events and there is hope and growth.”

Away from ticketing, Ticteq is also offering a crowd-funding product that allows people to share their causes with the public, and raise funds to address their pressing needs.

The causes supported by this platform, according to Katuramu, can range from education to medical to social, among others.

“With our portal, you can always know who donated, the total number of people who donated and the total amount donated and you can withdraw the money to your mobile money account or a bank account at any time. When a person makes a donation, the benefactor automatically receives the money instantly at no cost,” he says.

Although the product would salvage many people who we usually see on social media platforms conversing for financial support, Katuramu notes that most Ugandans are yet to appreciate the power of crowd funding.

“Most Ugandans think that crowd funding is for people who need organ transplant or surgery which is not true; it is for everyone. You may need tuition to complete your education or need money to travel, you can raise it through crowd funding,” he says.

“Simply share your story, giving details of what you need to do and how you want to do it. The people who will like your story and get touched to contribute towards the cause; they will do so,” he explains.

Ticteq is the sixth participant of the 2022 40-Days 40-FinTechs initiative.

40-Days 40-FinTechs

Now in its third edition, #40Days40FinTechs has quickly grown into one of the world’s premier showcase events for the innovations that are enabling ever more people to join the digital economy space. That is surely going to remain the case, in large part due to the inspiration and collaboration that our partners Level One Project, Mojaloop, ModusBox, and Crosslake Technologies generate, but mostly because of the continuing generous support of the Gates Foundation.

Digital Innovators and FinTechs around East Africa should be more eager to embrace 40 Days 40 FinTechs as Season three covers physical destinations in Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Burundi and Rwanda.

Run under HiPipo’s Include Everyone program that also encompasses other initiatives such as FinTech Landscape Exhibition, Women in FinTech Hackathon, Summit & Incubator and the Digital and Financial Inclusion Summit and Digital Impact Awards Africa; the #40Days40FinTechs platform aptly provides a setting for the various players and stakeholders involved in digital and financial technology to exhibit their products & Services and also share their ideas on how more of us, especially those unserved and underserved by the present financial systems, can be brought into the fold.

The 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative offers participants useful tools and an introduction to the industry’s emerging technologies, such as Mojaloop Open Source Software, and guidance from Level One Project foundational material. The skills gained from this initiative cover Level One Project Principles, Instant and Inclusive Payment Systems (IIPS), Inclusive Finance and FinTech in general.

According to HiPipo CEO Innocent Kawooya, this year’s edition will cement achievements of the previous editions – where over 60 FinTechs have been transformed – but also build on them to leverage digital financial inclusion in East Africa and beyond.

“As HiPipo, our extensive effort and advocacy is partly for the intention of championing digital innovation and interoperable instant and inclusive payment systems (IIPS) in Africa to a point where our innovators enjoy and achieve sound profit margins to help them keep designing and deploying affordable and inclusive financial services for the poor,” Kawooya said.

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Card Pesa is keeping start-ups and individuals afloat with instant collateral-free loans

Our Reporter.

Regardless of how persuasive loan advertisements are, getting credit in Uganda is one complicated hustle; more so for those in the informal sector – who happen to be the huge majority.

When one visits a formal financial institution, the paperwork, waiting time and costs involved to process a loan become a huge turn-off. This forces many to turn to loan sharks who have outrageous conditions; despite having instant cash.

Many ask those seeking credit to sign off their collateral security as sale agreements with a mutual understanding that when the loan is repaid, the sale agreement will become null and void. This particularly leaves those seeking credit between a rock and a hard place.

Nevertheless, there are digital solutions that are closing this credit gap. One of those organizations that is revolutionizing and democratizing credit is Card Pesa.

Card Pesa is a tier-four Non-Deposit Taking Microfinance Institution that uses online and cellular platforms to provide small working capital and emergency loans.

The Card Pesa platform is built to use Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD) and online applications to deliver credit to you wherever you are for as long as you can connect to a telecom network. It is automated and therefore service time from the point you request for credit to the point you receive the credit is a matter of seconds.

The solution enables people access collateral-free working capital loans instantaneously to invest in their businesses so as to maintain or increase their earnings. It also provides personal emergency loans to its subscribers.

Instead of asking for physical collateral, CardPesa assesses the borrower’s creditworthiness and loan limits using five Cs – the borrower’s character, capacity, capital, available conditions in the environment and collateral – which in this case is in form of one’s biodata, references and one’s business or workplace.

According to Victoria Birungi, the Card Pesa Head of Operations, the company is committed to funding everyone’s hustle for as long as you prove that you are involved in a profitable activity, need money and have the capacity to repay.

“We are extending loans for business and emergency services to different types of people. To get started, you are required to sign up to the platform by visiting www.cardpesa.com/signup. After signing up, our team gets in touch with you and your submitted references to confirm that the information you have given us is actually correct. Depending on how responsive you are, you will be able to access funds within 48 hours,” Birungi said;

She added: “At the end of the day, all the steps you go through help find out that you are involved in an economic activity so that we are able to fund your hustle.”

Basing on one’s credit history on the platform, their limits can be increased to millions and even given better service plus longer repayment periods. To provide the loan service, Card Pesa integrated into Airtel Money, MoMo Pay and banks to easily provide instant credit to its clients.

Card Pesa is the third participant to be showcased in the 2022 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative.

40-Days 40-FinTechs

Now in its third edition, #40Days40FinTechs has quickly grown into one of the world’s premier showcase events for the innovations that are enabling ever more people to join the digital economy space. That is surely going to remain the case, in large part due to the inspiration and collaboration that our partners; Level One Project, Mojaloop, ModusBox, and Crosslake Technologies generate, but mostly because of the continuing, generous support of the Gates Foundation.

Digital Innovators and FinTechs around East Africa should be more eager to embrace 40 Days 40 FinTechs as Season three will cover physical destinations in Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Burundi and Rwanda.

Run under HiPipo’s Include Everyone program that also encompasses other initiatives such as FinTech Landscape Exhibition, Women in FinTech Hackathon, Summit & Incubator and the Digital and Financial Inclusion Summit and Digital Impact Awards Africa; the #40Days40FinTechs platform aptly provides a setting for the various players and stakeholders involved in digital and financial technology to exhibit their products & Services and also share their ideas on how more of us, especially those unserved and underserved by the present financial systems, can be brought into the fold.

The 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative offers participants useful tools and an introduction to industry’s emerging technologies, such as Mojaloop Open Source Software, and guidance from Level One Project foundational material. The skills gained from this initiative cover Level One Project Principles, Instant and Inclusive Payment Systems (IIPS), Inclusive Finance and FinTech in general.

According to HiPipo CEO Innocent Kawooya, this year’s edition will cement achievements of the previous editions – where over 60 FinTechs have been transformed – but also build on them to leverage digital financial inclusion in East Africa and beyond. “As HiPipo, our extensive effort and advocacy is partly for the intention of championing digital innovation and interoperable instant and inclusive payment systems (IIPS) in Africa to a point where our innovators enjoy and achieve sound profit margins to help them keep designing and deploying affordable and inclusive financial services for the poor,” Kawooya said.

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Kawu is using FinTech to make school life a joy to live

Our Reporter.

The word Kawu must be familiar to whoever attended boarding schools in Uganda. Kawu is that period in a boarding school when a student’s pocket money and grab – read packed eats and drinks – are over and the only thing left to feed on are the meals served by the school kitchen. These meals are usually porridge, posho and beans.

The word Kawu is an abbreviation for Kawunga (Posho) and Kawukuumi (beans weevils) served in most schools.  

After going through long spells of Kawu, a group of young Ugandans don’t wish to see others in boarding schools suffer the same fate. As such, they came up with a digital solution for managing student’s pocket money and expenditure.

Named Kawu, the platform allows students to safely keep their money and spend it without wastage. It enables parents and guardians to periodically send money to students, manage their expenditure and also teach them financial discipline.

“In the past, the arrangement has been that parents and guardians leave money with teachers, matrons, wardens and canteen attendants. The student would then go and ask for the money whenever they need to spend. Sometimes, those left with the cash, get emergencies and end up spending this money with hope of refunding it. This arrangement is tiresome, risky, time consuming and doesn’t benefit those that keep the money,” Steven Kakooza, a director at Kawu Uganda explained the rationale behind the Kawu platform.

He added: “But with Kawu, a student has a smart card which s/he uses to make payments at school canteen and also withdraw money in case a need for cash arises. The teachers, matrons, wardens and canteen attendants are the agents that enable the transactions. They get a commission for this. All they need is a smartphone to enable the transactions. A student only needs to have the Kawu smart card. For the parents, they just need to log on to the APP, send money to the student’s smart card, and set periodic expenditure limits. Kawu benefits all stakeholders.”

Since rolling out the platform at the start of the year, Kawu is already active in 20 schools and serving over 1,000 students.

“We have received a lot of positive reception everywhere we have gone. We are actually overwhelmed by the requests from different schools that want to enroll on to Kawu. Over 90 per cent of the schools we visit wish to have their students on Kawu. The team is now focusing on ensuring that we are able to accommodate the huge numbers that we are bringing on board. We are very optimistic that thanks to Kawu platform, Uganda’s students are going to become cashless very soon.”

According to Kakooza, Uganda’s financial inclusion story should include everyone regardless of age and location.

“People always admire the flowers but ignore the roots yet without roots, the flowers couldn’t grow. For our case, we are enhancing financial inclusion and teaching financial literacy right from schools so that by the time these students leave school, they are equipped with sufficient knowledge to do better financially,” Kakooza said.

Kawu Uganda Limited is the second participant in the 2022 40 Days 40 Fintechs initiative.

40-Days 40-FinTechs

Now in its third edition, #40Days40FinTechs has quickly grown into one of the world’s premier showcase events for the innovations that are enabling ever more people to join the digital economy space. That is surely going to remain the case, in large part due to the inspiration and collaboration that our partners; Level One Project, Mojaloop, ModusBox, and Crosslake Technologies generate, but mostly because of the continuing, generous support of the Gates Foundation.

Digital Innovators and FinTechs around East Africa should be more eager to embrace 40 Days 40 FinTechs as Season three will cover physical destinations in Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Burundi and Rwanda.

Run under HiPipo’s Include Everyone program that also encompasses other initiatives such as FinTech Landscape Exhibition, Women in FinTech Hackathon, Summit & Incubator and the Digital and Financial Inclusion Summit and Digital Impact Awards Africa; the #40Days40FinTechs platform aptly provides a setting for the various players and stakeholders involved in digital and financial technology to exhibit their products & Services and also share their ideas on how more of us, especially those unserved and underserved by the present financial systems, can be brought into the fold.

The 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative offers participants useful tools and an introduction to industry’s emerging technologies, such as Mojaloop Open Source Software, and guidance from Level One Project foundational material. The skills gained from this initiative cover Level One Project Principles, Instant and Inclusive Payment Systems (IIPS), Inclusive Finance and FinTech in general.

According to HiPipo CEO Innocent Kawooya, this year’s edition will cement achievements of the previous editions – where over 60 FinTechs have been transformed – but also build on them to leverage digital financial inclusion in East Africa and beyond.

“As HiPipo, our extensive effort and advocacy is partly for the intention of championing digital innovation and interoperable instant and inclusive payment systems (IIPS) in Africa to a point where our innovators enjoy and achieve sound profit margins to help them keep designing and deploying affordable and inclusive financial services for the poor,” Kawooya said.

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AgriShare is using FinTech to improve farmers’ livelihood as Season Three of 40 Days 40 FinTechs kicks off

Our Reporter.

No serious storyteller can narrate Uganda’s post-independence story without giving prominence to the famous Luweero triangle. It is that pivotal but that is a story for another day.

For decades, farmers in Uganda have earned very little, sometimes nothing from their produce and farmland due to issues such as failure to source the right inputs, absence of modernization equipment and inability to access ready markets among others.

But this may soon be a thing of the past, if the latest developments in the sector are anything to go by.

Based in Luweero, a group of youth is taking lead in the modernization and commercialization of Agriculture. They are doing this through a digital-based platform named AgriShare.

AgriShare is a social enterprise which uses mobile digital technology to connect farmers to services like land for hire, tractors, irrigation equipment, and labor and value addition equipment.

The web-based application is also targeting youth, Uganda’s largest population cluster who grapple with unemployment.

Launched in Uganda in 2021, AgriShare already has over 15,000 subscribers and over 10,000 transactions. Even so, AgriShare’s story started in Zimbabwe in 2017 where over 50,000 people are using the platform. Encouraged by this success, the platform is now expanding in other African countries with Malawi next in queue, with a launch planned for this year.  

Agro-based Economy.

Agriculture in Uganda employs more than 70 per cent people, but Ugandan farmers are also the poorest. Farm productivity is substance-based because of the absence of equipment and other essential farming services.

“Over 70% of land in Uganda is arable for agriculture, yet less than 30% is under cultivation. Predominantly, the most used tools used are rudimentary. Admittedly, they are most times too expensive to afford. The twist is though, as some struggle to get equipment, others have them lying idle,” says Paul Zaake, the Managing Director at AgriShare.

Zaake says he has built a network of agents to help farmers and service providers, who may not be familiar with smart phones.

“All we are doing is to change the way Agriculture is done in Uganda. We are here to improve food security. But most importantly, we are here to ensure that farmers have joy, create employment and boost our economy,” Zaake noted. 

How it works

Any farmer with a smartphone can download the Agrishare app and order equipment like labor, irrigation pumps, and resources like land and labor.

On the other side, a farmer with excess or idle resources can list them on the Agrishare application and earn extra money when they are hired out. In a nutshell, the application is where resource owners meet resource-seekers.

With concerns of low smartphone penetration and high internet charges, Agrishare has agents spread across the country, to help farmers book or list resources.

AgriShare is the first participant to be featured on the 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative, season three that has officially got underway today, the 13th of June, 2022.

40-Days 40-FinTechs

Now in its third edition, #40Days40FinTechs has quickly grown into one of the world’s premier showcase events for the innovations that are enabling ever more people to join the digital economy space. That is surely going to remain the case, in large part due to the inspiration and collaboration that our partners; Level One Project, Mojaloop, ModusBox, and Crosslake Technologies generate, but mostly because of the continuing, generous support of the Gates Foundation.

Digital Innovators and FinTechs around East Africa should be more eager to embrace 40 Days 40 FinTechs as Season three will cover physical destinations in Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Burundi and Rwanda.

Run under HiPipo’s Include Everyone program that also encompasses other initiatives such as FinTech Landscape Exhibition, Women in FinTech Hackathon, Summit & Incubator and the Digital and Financial Inclusion Summit and Digital Impact Awards Africa; the #40Days40FinTechs platform aptly provides a setting for the various players and stakeholders involved in digital and financial technology to exhibit their products & Services and also share their ideas on how more of us, especially those unserved and underserved by the present financial systems, can be brought into the fold.

The 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative offers participants useful tools and an introduction to industry’s emerging technologies, such as Mojaloop Open Source Software, and guidance from Level One Project foundational material. The skills gained from this initiative cover Level One Project Principles, Instant and Inclusive Payment Systems (IIPS), Inclusive Finance and FinTech in general.

According to HiPipo CEO Innocent Kawooya, this year’s edition will cement achievements of the previous editions – where over 60 FinTechs have been transformed – but also build on them to leverage digital financial inclusion in East Africa and beyond.

“As HiPipo, our extensive effort and advocacy is partly for the intention of championing digital innovation and interoperable instant and inclusive payment systems (IIPS) in Africa to a point where our innovators enjoy and achieve sound profit margins to help them keep designing and deploying affordable and inclusive financial services for the poor,” Kawooya said.

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#40Days40FinTechs #LevelOneProject Season Three Is Here!

We are proud to say that the second HiPipo 40 Days 40 FinTechs that ran in the months of July and August, 2021 set the bar very high. Even though it started soon after the partial lifting of the 2021 lockdown, it was tremendously successful.

#40Days40FinTechs has quickly grown into one of the world’s premier showcase events for the innovations that are enabling ever more people to join the digital economy space. That is surely going to remain the case, in large part due to the inspiration and collaboration that our partners; Level One Project, Mojaloop, ModusBox, and Crosslake Technologies generate, but mostly because of the continuing, generous support of the Gates Foundation.

Digital Innovators and FinTechs around East Africa should be more eager to embrace 40 Days 40 FinTechs as Season three will cover physical destinations in Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Burundi and Rwanda.

Run under HiPipo’s Include Everyone program that also encompasses other initiatives such as FinTech Landscape Exhibition, Women in FinTech Hackathon, Summit & Incubator and the Digital and Financial Inclusion Summit and Digital Impact Awards Africa; the #40Days40FinTechs platform aptly provides a setting for the various players and stakeholders involved in digital and financial technology to exhibit their products & Services and also share their ideas on how more of us, especially those unserved and underserved by the present financial systems, can be brought into the fold.

The 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative offers participants useful tools and an introduction to industry’s emerging technologies, such as Mojaloop Open Source Software, and guidance from Level One Project foundational material. The skills gained from this initiative cover Level One Project Principles, Instant and Inclusive Payment Systems (IIPS), Inclusive Finance and FinTech in general.

As captured by its name, 40 Days 40 FinTechs always delivers over two months of exhibition, dialogue and discussion, one not seen in the sector before. The initiative continues to generate enormous publicity, demand and pull for instant and inclusive real-time retail payment systems.

Last, but definitely not least, it draws the most attention yet to what is undeniably the future of digital financial services – interoperability.

Several participants are going on to innovate for sectors beyond just the traditional financial services but are making forays into healthcare, education, lending, remittances, agriculture, Robo-advisor, Payments, RegTech, InsurTech, crowdfunding, neo-banking, cryptography, cryptocurrency, Interledger, Blockchain, cross-border payments, retirement schemes and new ways of operating bonds and real estate among others. In their day-to-day operations, they are changing the lives of the likes of rural farmers, women, merchants, small business holders (formal and Informal), and unemployed youth, in a way creating forays for digital youth champions, women and other special interest groups (SIGs).

Not to be overlooked are the various governmental policymakers and regulators who continue to participate in the different discussions and activities we host. It is evident that demand for FinTech, DFS, IIPS, and interoperability has rapidly grown in recent years due to the impact of the broader HiPipo Include Everyone Program.

For the FinTechs, the cost-free exposure aided by the generosity of the Level One Project; an initiative of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’s Financial Services for the Poor (FSP) program, which is part of their Global Growth and Opportunity division, is still of immeasurable value.

“As HiPipo, our extensive effort and advocacy is partly for the intention of championing digital innovation and interoperable instant & inclusive payment systems (IIPS) in Africa to a point where our innovators enjoy and achieve sound profit margins to help them keep designing and deploying affordable and inclusive Financial Services for the Poor. It was thus pleasant for us to learn that up to 25 of our season two participants not only continued to enjoy increased client engagement and better bottom lines as a direct result of participating in the 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative but are also helping to generate economy-wide efficiencies by digitally connecting millions of low-income consumers that are learning to transact at a fast rate,” Innocent Kawooya, the HiPipo CEO noted.

“But this is just the start, and we acknowledge there is a lot more to do. Season three of 40 Days 40 FinTechs is here, starting mid-2022 with optimism that the initiative will impact even more lives and livelihoods going forward.”

We are alive to the current market realities which continue to inform ours and our partners’ thinking, in regards to ensuring the healthiness and overall safety of participants throughout the different activities. Furthermore, we believe that, just like last year, FinTechs will take up the challenge and use the opportunity to ride the wave of appreciation for cashless payments the pandemic has brought. We need to be prepared with appropriate products and have the appropriate real-time retail payment systems in place to support an inclusive, interoperable digital marketplace that is both thriving and safe.

“It will be exciting to see what the participants have to offer. And again, various stakeholders will be on hand for more discussion and debate, with this time round extra insight from the likes of banks and MNOs. We anticipate extensive discussion on Instant and Inclusive Payment systems, Central Bank Digital Currencies(CBDC), advancing convenience for users, cross-border payments and on micro-lending products (especially those offering facilities to persons and communities that are still on the bylines of finance and trade for example; women, PWDs and other SIGs),” said Innocent Kawooya, the HiPipo CEO.

40 Days 40 FinTechs Initiative is implemented by HiPipo in partnership with Crosslake Technologies, ModusBox, and Mojaloop Foundation, and generously sponsored by the Gates Foundation.

It is ultimately also HiPipo’s hope that more people, from all walks of life, will be drawn to the advocacy for financial inclusion. Together, we will bring the day when it is at 100% ever closer.

Registration is on first-come, first-served basis so qualifying FinTech stakeholders operating in Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, and other parts of the continent are encouraged to book their slots before 11th June 2022.

So see you soon.

SCOPE
ProjectDate
40 Days 40 FinTechs13th June to 30th July 2022
FinTech Landscape Exhibition11th August to 12th August 2022
Women In FinTech Hackathon10th to 16th September 2022
Women In FinTech Summit16th September 2022
Women In FinTech Incubator26th September 2022 to 6th January 2023
Digital and Financial Inclusion Summit18th November 2022
Digital Impact Awards Africa18th November 2022

Ends.

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Damali Ssali Joins the HiPipo Foundation Board

It is with great pleasure that we announce that Damali Ssali has honoured the invitation we extended to her and agreed to become a Board Member of the HiPipo Foundation. Damali joins Hon. Eng. David Karubanga, Rose Busingye and Innocent Kawooya, with a worthy mention being made of Prof. Maggie Kigozi and Dr. Frederick Wamala – Ph.D, SABSA, CCSP, CISSP who regularly serve in an advisory role for the Board.

Damali is a business & finance expert with a passion for ideas, innovation and technology that fosters Financial Inclusion. She is the Founder and CEO of the Ideation Corner, a platform on which she has profiled a number of individuals whose expertise and initiatives are a cause for optimism that Ugandans can take the lead in their development and march to prosperity. She recently ascended to Uganda’s Ambassador for the United Nations Women’s Entrepreneurship Day Organization.

And it is mainly through her irrepressible advocacy for the financial empowerment of women that Damali has found a shared passion and common cause with HiPipo. She has thus been a partner, mentor, facilitator, keynote speaker and Chief Guest in a number of our activities. She also, at a moment’s notice, eagerly extends a hand of friendship and words of advice to those we entreat her to engage.

We are greatly excited that as part of the HiPipo Foundation Board, Damali shall take the lead in our Women-in-FinTech initiative, guiding us through existing activities like the Hackathon, Summit and Incubator, as well exploring more avenues to improve and increase our efforts towards a future where women have unencumbered access to the digital financial services they need.

Echoing this, Board Chairman Hon. Eng. David Karubanga said, ’At HiPipo we have been honoured to engage a number of extraordinary ladies, like our dear advisor Professor Maggie Kigozi. Ambassador Damali Ssali fits in that formidable mold, and we are supremely glad she has joined us. With her, and with the continued support of the Gates Foundation, HiPipo should positively change even more lives’.

Overall, it remains the HiPipo Foundation’s objective to continually include those who are passionate to ‘Include Everyone’.

Welcome, Damali!

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Commencement Of The We Will Win Initiative

HiPipo and the Ideation Corner, with great pleasure, announce the start of the We Will Win initiative, a project that is set to make extraordinary inroads into the development and growth of Uganda’s film industry.

The We Will Win initiative is the brainchild of and a collaboration between a number of like-minded influential players in the finance and entertainment industry. Together, we are The Consortium, and include HiPipo itself, The Ideation Corner, NG Films, MET Images, Koncepts & Sakyas, and Decent Africa.

Innocent Kawooya, the HiPipo CEO, is serving as the President, Technical Services, and Damali Ssali, the Ideation Corner Founder, is serving as President, Financial Services: they are the powerhouse duo spearheading the project.

We Will Win is a revolutionary and multi-pronged approach to steer to audiences and markets alike a high volume of quality films, all conceptualised, directed, and produced in Uganda, and all telling our stories our way. We Will Win is to offer technical and financial support at all levels of these productions, from the script to the shoot to the editing room, and then go even further to secure market for these visual stories.

This approach should see Uganda’s film industry move forward in leaps and bounds, not only by improving quality both in front of and behind the camera, but also by introducing Ugandan film to vast new interest and markets, both internally and externally, thus letting the industry emerge as the creative and empowering force it doubtless has the potential to be. HiPipo will call on its extensive experience in the same, having been the first Ugandan enterprise to produce and then place a local production onto an international streaming platform and the Ideation Corner will leverage its vast experience in social impact funding.

Be it action, drama, comedy or horror, be it mind-bending science-fiction or slapstick animation, experimental film or mythological fantasy, Uganda is a place of countless stories yet to be told and multitudes of voices ready to unfold and enthrall the world. Through our music and culture, we have shown we can hold the world’s attention. We Will Win is the springboard on which to make this vast creative leap forward, going even further in our storytelling and our entertaining. Yes, the time has come for us to stop looking for versions of our stories in those already told by others, but to finally go all out and tell our very own, and in our own way.

The wider picture of the We Will Win initiative speaks to how the creative industries are critical to the Sustainable Development agenda. They are the bedrock of innovation, and are an important factor in the ever evolving services sector. They support entrepreneurship and contribute to job creation, cultural diversity and gender diversity. As such the United National General Assembly declared 2021 the International Year of the Creative Economy of Sustainable Development.

#WeWillWin #IdeationCorner!

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HiPipo & IDEATION CORNER ANNOUNCE WOMEN’S DAY CELEBRATION, & CONCLUSION OF INAUGURAL WOMEN IN FINTECH INCUBATOR

As part of our continuous efforts to not only improve the quality and variety of digital financial services, with a special emphasis on those that cater for the unbanked and underserved, but also to ensure that the delivery of these services offers rewards to the innovators, HiPipo sought to build on the gains made from the 2nd Women-in-FinTech Hackathon & Summit. And this we have successfully done by engaging the Hackathon’s top teams in the inaugural Women-in-FinTech Incubator. 

The essence of the Incubator is to empower the innovators with entrepreneurial and operational skills to complement their already formidable technical acumen. Thus, over the course of 90 days, the Incubator participants have been part of multiple online sessions and face-to-face group consultations, with even a cocktail thrown in for good measure. The facilitators, who included HiPipo CEO Innocent Kawooya and Ideation Corner Founder Damali Ssali, covered a vast range of topics to ready the participants for the business journey ahead. Core to the Incubator was to create linkages between the Level One Project principles and how they can be the firm foundation on which a successful FinTech vehicle is built.

We at HiPipo are glad that March 8th, the International Women’s Day, has served up a fantastic opportunity. In conjunction with the Ideation Corner, we intend to also use that day as the conclusion of the Incubator. It was Damali Ssali, who recently ascended to the Ambassadorial role for Uganda at the United Nations Women’s Entrepreneurship Day Organisation (WEDO), and is now also an Advisory Board Member of the Africa Continental Chamber of Commerce and Industry, who helped us shape the idea.

It is greatly symbolic for all of us that the day set aside to remind all that women must be given the opportunities to fulfill their potential, that all forms of discrimination and sexism that have been placed in their path need to end, and that the world will only truly bridge its development gaps if women are fully brought into the innovation space, syncs perfectly with what the Women-in-FinTech Hackathon & Summit in particular and indeed the HiPipo Include Everyone program in general, stands for- to break all biases that hinder the acquisition and adoption of life changing digital financial technology.

And to all those that have successfully taken part, we can assure you that this is just the beginning. HiPipo will continue to be there for you as you set forth to conquer the world with your innovations. Our promise of service is the least you deserve for choosing to make the world a better place through the power of digital financial technology. So handing you your certificates on March 8th is just another landmark in our shared journey. Congratulations, dear friends!

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Of mood boards, apertures and universal values: #WomenInFinTech #LevelOneProject Incubator

Arthur expounded on what he referred to the ‘values desirable as social beings’. He explained these as the values that are common and constant to every human being, regardless of their background or status. These include integrity, respect, loyalty and responsibility. They work as uniting factors for any team and/or organisation. In fact, it is nigh impossible for productive working relationships to be built without them inculcated into a team.

Emmanuel Kintu continued on the Fundamentals of Photography, detailing what camera modes there are (automatic and manual), and also touched on speed and aperture priority. He alerted the participants to the fact that henceforth they will need to take time to ‘plan’ for what kind of image/photo they want, especially as they communicate about their products/services. Will it look better in black & white? Should the background be blurry in order for the focus to be on the subject in the foreground? Such are the questions they needed to get used to asking themselves.

Steven Kimuli brought in the aspect of a mood board: it being a collection of textures, images and text related to your company, and thus being essential to the creative process so that efforts directed towards design are not haphazard, and are indeed aligned with your desired creative direction. He also gave pointers on what to look out for in order to hire the right team for a design job, alerting all to the fact that design has its own specialisations, and knowing who to approach reduces on the portfolios you would end up sifting through.

For Innocent Kawooya, the Tiered KYC angle he tackled today was to explain how The Level One Project advises financial players to be innovative and flexible about gathering KYC data. The process should not be overly complicated for the targets i.e. the onus is on the innovators to find fitting ways to onboard those they are interested in, ensuring at the very least they now have a transactional account. He also contributed to the values discussion, as part of a response to a participant who talked of an unfortunate time when she went unpaid for services she had provided. His warning to the participants was for them to endeavour to pay their debts, warning of instances to come when the temptation might come to delay a payment instead settling it immediately.