KCB

KCB Bank to acquire a minority stake in Pesapal

Staff Writer·
BusinessFeatured
KCB Bank has announced that it has entered into an agreement to acquire a minority stake in Pesapal Limited. Pesapal is a fintech that offers various solutions for businesses to accept and process M-Pesa and card payments online, offline, and on mobile.

Pesapal was founded by Agosta Liko in 2007 and has grown to having over 300 people across the East African region processing at least 250,000 transactions daily. It has over 30,000 merchants mostly in the hospitality industry.

In a statement, KCB said the agreement will allow the lender to tap into Pesapal’s network and technology to develop innovative payment and related solutions for small and micro enterprises across Kenya.

“The investment sets the stage for development of innovative payment and other related solutions for Kenya’s small and micro enterprises, enhancing value for shareholders of both Pesapal and KCB,” the bank said in the notice signed by Bonnie Okumu, Group General Counsel and Company Secretary.

The transaction, which is subject to approval by the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK), was issued with the approval of the Capital Markets Authority (CMA).

KCB

This comes a few months after KCB entered into an agreement to acquire 75 percent shareholding in Riverbank Solutions Limited a financial technology firm. This is in a bid to strengthen KCB Group’s distribution network across the region.

Through Riverbank’s technology platform, ‘Zed 360’, KCB is expected to provide its SME and MSME-customers with business management tools. These include inventory management, financial reporting and payroll management.  Which will ease their financial operations, enhance visibility and empower- informed decision making for both the customer and the Bank.

Riverbank also offers three other solutions namely Swipe platform for agency banking services, Zizi for revenue collection and CheckSmart for social payments. Once the transaction is completed, Riverbank will become a subsidiary of KCB Group Plc.