Kenyans using M-Pesa hit 30 million mark
Safaricom’s M-Pesa has crossed 30 million customers using the service every month in Kenya.
The milestone comes a few days after M-Pesa marked its 15th year since its launch in March 2007.
Kenya remains M-Pesa’s most active market accounting for more than 30 million of the service’s 51 million customers across Kenya, Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mozambique, Lesotho, Ghana and Egypt.
“M-PESA’s success has been achieved on the back of consistent focus on the needs of our customers by ensuring that we are constantly delivering innovations that add value to their lives. We thank all our customers for getting us to the 30 million monthly active customers milestone. As the country goes digital with growing smartphone usage, we are committing to continue exploring and delivering life-changing innovations in a digital world” said Peter Ndegwa, Safaricom’s Chief Executive.
M-Pesa transactions increased by 16.1 percent for the third quarter ended December 2021, strengthening Safaricom’s revenue portfolio.
“Our M-Pesa platform, including Safaricom, continues to scale at an impressive rate with transaction values up to 16.1 percent to exceed Ksh.3.2 trillion per month,“ said Vodacom in its third-quarter results.
The company had waivered transaction charges against amounts not more than Ksh.1000 on March 16, 2020, to cushion Kenyans from harsh economic times due to the coronavirus pandemic.
This, was, however, reinstated on December 31, 2021, after the telco received a nod from the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK).
Safaricom’s M-Pesa revenue surged 48.5 percent to record a whooping Ksh.13 trillion up from Ksh.9 trillion.
The growth in M-PESA customer usage has been driven by the launch of various innovations over the years including financial services such as M-Shwari, KCB M-PESA and Fuliza.
The telco established both local and global partnerships that enable customers to send and receive money, and to make payments across the world including with PayPal, AliExpress and Western Union.
The last two years have seen M-PESA record explosive growth in business usage with the number of businesses accepting payments on its Lipa Na M-Pesa service more than doubling from 173,000 in April 2020 to more than 387,000 today.
Safaricom and Vodacom are focusing on growing the service in other markets with a goal of bringing them to the same level of maturity as Kenya.
Safaricom launched M-Pesa Africa in April 2020 with a goal of consolidating M-Pesa’s resources, strategy and roadmap across the continent.
M-Pesa Africa is investing in a common platform that will empower all markets to offer M-Pesa’s entire range of services and products.
It has also invested in an M-Pesa Super App both for customers and for businesses, with the customer app available in Kenya, Tanzania, Mozambique and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
