BankservAfrica, Africa's largest automated clearing house (ACH), has invested in the local payment industry and the growth of the sector by awarding two payment companies a combined interest-free loan to the value of R1.2 million.
“As a leading payment organisation within the financial and payment sector BankservAfrica has a vested interest in the overall wellbeing of the local payment industry. We believe it is our responsibility to continually invest in the transformation and future success of the sector.
“As such, we have identified two payment companies still in their infancy and are providing them with an interest-free loan of R600 000 each for five years to invest in their enterprise development initiatives and grow their businesses in accordance with the spirit of the B-BBEE Codes of Good Practice, as well as from a skills point of view,” says Shergeran Naidoo, head of enterprise risk management at BankservAfrica.
Naidoo explains their choices of which companies to support were guided by the development needs within the industry including IT product innovation, B-BBEE transformation and the financial and operational sustainability potential of the companies. This led to Transact Connect and Triloq Payment Services being chosen.
Says Estevao Tokata, founder and managing director of Transact Connect, says: “It is very encouraging to have a company like BankservAfrica's support and investment in emerging black companies within the payment industry. One of the founding ideas of the organisation has been to provide the industry with strategic innovative payments solutions and payments modelling.
“We value the fact that BankservAfrica recognises our contribution to the payments industry, for example our one-of-a-kind training programme: Understanding the South African Payments Framework and Landscape, which is aimed at banks and the payments industry at large.
“To this effect we will use some of the funds to assist in patenting the intellectual property developed around very specific payment products. Furthermore, this loan from BankservAfrica will assist our growth and elevate our initiatives and ability to further our transformation agenda in attracting and developing black skills within the payments industry.”
Veeren Naidoo, CEO of Triloq Payment Services, welcomes the support from BankservAfrica saying it will do a lot for expanding their business whilst offering a platform to further market their offerings.
He further adds: “As our focus is in the online payment space, we will use the funds to invest in digital marketing initiatives for our innovative virtual prepaid card offering 1-2-Pay-Online and our bill presentment and payment service AcceptEmail. These types of partnerships with big business are necessary in order to ensure cross-pollination of industry knowledge and skills so that sustainable BEE companies may be developed.”
BankservAfrica's Naidoo says this financial assistance will contribute significantly towards the overall transformation of the payment industry and allow smaller B-BBEE players such as Transact Connect and Triloq Payment Services to grow and strengthen the supply chain within the sector and to become role models for other B-BBEE companies. - I-Net Bridge