PAGA PLANS ON TAKING OVER MOBILE BANKING IN AFRICA WHILE CELEBRATING 15YEARS OF EXISTENCE
By Kareem Abiodun
Nigerian Fintech company, Paga says it processed 335 million transactions, worth over N14 trillion or $32 billion, in the past 15 years.
The company’s founder and CEO, Tayo Oviosu, disclosed this in Lagos at an event to mark the company’s 15th anniversary.
He, however, noted that 80% of the transactions have been recorded in the last five years.
The figure from Paga confirms the rising embrace of mobile money in Nigeria. Recent data released by the Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement Systems (NIBSS) revealed that mobile money operators in the country, including Paga, Opay, and Palmpay, among others, processed transactions worth N17.2 trillion between January and March this year.
Foremost online payments platform, Paga has become a preferred Choice of people in the market as they introduced three new possibilities for Nigerians to benefit from for a safer, easier and quick transactions to secure their money.While counting the company’s milestones in the last 15 years, Oviosu said one of the biggest achievements of the company was the several people it was able to empower through job creation.According to him, the company has created 1,000 direct jobs and over 100,000 indirect jobs through its agents spread across the country.
The Founding Chief Executive Officer of Paga, Tayo Oviosu, made this known in a brief interactive media session on Thursday at their Lagos headquarters during the celebration of the company as they celebrate 15-years of financial freedom to all Nigerians.
According to Oviosu, Paga has been making life easy for people by impacting the communities and society at large, stressing that Paga of today is different from the past years of agent type business.
The CEO said,PAGA has transformed into robust-innovations which offers a lot of convenience beyond what banks offer.
“The Paga most people had known before is not the Paga of today, when we set out on this business. We initially launched out with agent-network with the vision of how to deliver financial freedom to all Nigerians and even Africans. Paga as of recent, has expanded beyond the agent network,” he said.
The CEO buttressed that in order to bring financial freedom to the people,the company has introduced three new lines of business which are Consumer device service which allows smartphone users to download the Paga application (App), using the Apple store, Play store or dial *242# on any mobile device.
“Paga today is a three-line payment-consumer payment, Platform as a Service (PaaS) and Doroki. With Paga App, you can have money in the App, link your bank account,sneak your card or get a Visa card or the virtual Visa card on the account,” he said.
Oviosu recalled the inception 15years with no infrastructures in place, the word ‘Fintech’ didn’t exist, however two years ago it was open to allow others technological companies use the infrastructure which is called Platform as a Service with over 250 businesses in different sectors using the infrastructures.
The CEO described the third possibilities-Doroki as the youngest and super App. suitable for retailers to manage their business without hassle.
The Newsstar gathered that Paga was recognized as African’s fastest growing company by Financial Times and Statista Awards 2023.
The CEO assures the customers of another evolution where physical notes does not exist and everyone can do transaction very quickly without hindrance in their daily activities in the next few years.
It would be recalled that Paga recorded as at the end of first quarter of 2024-ending March, 335 million transactions worth over N14 Trillion since inception which is about USD32 billion Dollars.
“When we celebrated 10 years, five years ago, then and now, we have grown volume five times while our transactions value is Seven times in the last five years and it is broad-based growth. This has created jobs in Nigeria and Ethiopia with over 200 staff, over a thousand direct jobs and over one hundred thousand indirect jobs,” he said.
