Author: John Nyabuto

As demand for mobile connectivity, digital services and mobile financial solutions continues to grow, Airtel Kenya has expanded its customer access network across Nairobi with four new customer touchpoints. The new locations, comprising customer care shops at Development House in Nairobi’s Central Business District (CBD), Freedom Heights in Lang’ata, Magunas Superstores – Utawala, and at Garden City Mall, are intended to improve service accessibility across some of Nairobi’s fastest-growing residential and commercial corridors. The expansion forms part of Airtel Kenya’s broader strategy to double its customer service footprint across the country before the end of the year in a bid…

Flutterwave has announced a strategic partnership with Tempo to introduce stablecoin-based settlement options for cross-border payments across the continent.  Flutterwave will integrate Tempo as a settlement network across both its consumer remittance product, Send App and its enterprise solution, Flutterwave for Business. Cross-border payments in Africa remain expensive and slow. Remittance fees to Sub-Saharan Africa average around 7%. This is higher than the global average and well above the United Nations target of 3%. With this integration, Flutterwave will expand its payments infrastructure to include Tempo as an additional settlement rail alongside its existing systems. The main goal is to…

MoneyGram has launched MGUSD, a native US dollar stablecoin. This is designed to power its global payments infrastructure and expand access to digital dollar-based financial services for cross-border money transfers. The stablecoin will serve as the foundation of MoneyGram’s blockchain-based payments stack. It will enable users to hold, send and convert dollar-denominated balances through a self-custodial wallet embedded in the MoneyGram app. MGUSD launches in the United States first but there are plans to expand it globally. “The stablecoin market has largely focused on the asset itself. MoneyGram is taking a fundamentally different approach. Starting with our distribution platform, we’re using stablecoin as a…

Binance has announced the appointment of Sammy Mutua as the new General Manager for Africa. Mutua brings over two decades of experience in the financial services industry in Africa. He has previously worked and held senior leadership positions at M-Pesa Africa, Visa Sub-Saharan Africa and Letshego Group. Mutua will work closely with regulators, industry players and institutional partners to support the development of sustainable digital asset ecosystems as part of his new role. His focus will include building trust, strengthening collaboration, and identifying use cases where blockchain can deliver tangible value. “Africa represents one of the most important regions for…

In its latest Industry Trends report, TheBoardroom Africa argues that the era of expansion-led growth is giving way to what it calls “institutional proof”. This is a model where performance, governance and sustainability take precedence over narrative-driven growth. Drawing insights from 30 senior leaders across more than 20 sectors including, financial services, healthcare, energy and technology, the report highlights a major shift in how capital is deployed across the continent. Contributors such as Omoyemi Akerele, Beatrice Murage, Steve Cadigan, Lavina Ramkissoon and Sangu Delle point to four structural shifts reshaping Africa’s economic trajectory. One of the most notable changes is…

ACI Worldwide, an original innovator in global payments technology, today announced the extension of its long-standing partnership with UBX Tanzania Limited, Tanzania’s leading national payment service provider. The extended partnership marks a significant milestone in a relationship that spans nearly two decades and is focused on strengthening infrastructure resilience, enhancing scalability and enabling innovation to support Tanzania’s rapidly evolving digital economy. UBX currently powers the core payments infrastructure for 18 banks in Tanzania, supporting a nationwide network of over 250 ATMs and processing more than 1.3 million transactions monthly. Through this extended collaboration, UBX is positioned to accelerate the onboarding…

Tanzanian fintech, Swahilies, has been granted a Payment Service Provider (PSP) license by the Central Bank of Tanzania. The fintech announced the development via LinkedIn, noting that it has worked with more than 15,000 small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) through its bookkeeping and embedded finance solutions. If you have a startup you want featured on TechArena, let us know through this contact form here. With the new license, Swahilies will now be able to develop and roll out its own financial products in partnership with licensed institutions. It will also be able to scale services designed for higher transaction volumes. “This license now…

Tata Motors has announced the launch of new electric trucks for the Kenyan market. The company unveiled four electric vehicle (EV) models, including tippers, pick-ups, and mini-trucks. These trucks are targeting industries such as logistics, construction and mining. Tata plans to begin by testing the vehicles locally with select customers before moving toward a wider rollout and eventual local assembly. Tata currently assembles vehicles in Kenya through Associated Vehicle Assemblers (AVA) and says its EV strategy will follow a similar path, positioning Kenya as a potential hub for electric commercial vehicle production in the region. This comes as commercial transport…

Payoneer has announced an extension of its strategic partnership with Upwork, marking 15 years of collaboration supporting the global freelance economy. Under the renewed agreement, Payoneer will continue to serve as a primary wallet and “Direct to Local Bank” payout partner for Upwork, supporting both existing and new international Upwork customers across Africa, Asia Pacific, Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East—backed by Payoneer’s reach across 190 countries and territories. The collaboration also marks a new phase of joint innovation. Upwork will join Payoneer as a Design Partner to explore stablecoin-enabled payouts to help address rising demand from freelancers seeking faster, more flexible access to…

In conjunction with its participation at the AI Everything Kenya x GITEX Kenya conference, global cybersecurity company, Kaspersky, has revealed that from January to the beginning of May 2026, Kaspersky solutions detected more than 92,000 attacks of malware and potentially unwanted applications worldwide disguised as popular Artificial Intelligence (AI) agents and AI services. Cybercriminals exploited trusted brands to lure victims into downloading malicious files, with fake ChatGPT applications accounting for 49% of all detected attacks, while Claude and Gemini each represented 18%.  Since the beginning of the year, Kaspersky researchers have identified more than 15,000 samples of malware masquerading as agentic AI software, including…