Visa Expands Payment Business Access Across Africa

AFRICAN BUSINESS AND ECONOMYJuly 3, 2026 at 10:20 AM UTC

TLDR

Visa expanding Visa Pay access across Africa through SDK for banks, fintechs, mobile money operators
SDK enables faster launch of virtual cards and payment services in various African markets
Visa Pay's SDK includes issuer processing, customer experience tools, tokenisation readiness, and contactless payment feature

Visa is expanding access to Visa Pay across Africa through a software development kit that allows banks, mobile money operators and fintechs to add Visa Pay features to their existing mobile apps.

The SDK will help issuers launch virtual cards and payment services faster. Visa said the product is designed to let banked and unbanked consumers move money and make payments across participating banks, fintechs and mobile networks.

Issuers adopting Visa Pay’s SDK are spread across several African markets, including Ghana, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan, Comoros, Mauritius, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Tanzania and Sierra Leone.

The SDK includes issuer processing, built-in customer experience tools, tokenisation readiness and Visa-certified security and compliance features. Visa said this should make deployment easier in markets where infrastructure limits can slow digital payment rollouts.

Visa Pay is also expected to add new features, including Tap to Pay, which will allow users to make contactless payments by tapping their phone at compatible checkout terminals. Godfrey Sullivan, Visa’s head of products and solutions for Central and Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa, said the product can support e-commerce, remittances, mobile money-linked virtual cards, humanitarian payments, person-to-person transfers and future contactless services.

Key Takeaways

Visa Pay’s SDK rollout shows how global payment networks are adapting to Africa’s mixed financial infrastructure. Many consumers use mobile money, some use banks and others rely on fintech wallets, so payment products need to work across different systems. By giving issuers a toolkit they can embed into existing apps, Visa can expand virtual cards, digital payments and mobile-linked services without requiring every institution to build full payment infrastructure from scratch. That matters in markets where banks and mobile money providers want to move faster but face technology, compliance and security constraints. The inclusion of countries such as Sudan, DRC and Sierra Leone also shows that digital payment growth is not limited to Africa’s largest fintech markets. The next test will be adoption by consumers and merchants. Virtual cards and mobile payments only scale when users trust the product, merchants accept it and transactions are reliable. If Visa Pay works across banks, fintechs and mobile networks, it could help widen digital payment access across the continent.

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