Building new digital low-cost financial services to Nigeria, starting with instant money transfers
About
Applicant name: Azimo Ltd
Innovation Name: Partnership with Interswitch for instant transfers to Nigeria
Innovation Type: Service
Website: http://www.azimo.com
Mission: To build new digital low-cost financial services to Nigeria, starting with instant money transfers
Innovation Description: Azimo built a direct API connection to Interswitch, who has built and operates the infrastructure switch with real-time access to all banks in Nigeria. This allows Azimo to offer its customers to send money for bank deposit in Nigerian bank account within a few seconds. This is the first step in our common strategy to better serve the Nigerians wherever they are located around the world.
Innovation Inspiration: Nigeria is one of the top receivers of remittances and the second one in Africa, with flows that reach $25 billion, accounting for over 6% of GDP and exceeding the country’s oil revenues. There were 1.24 million Nigerians reported to be living abroad in 2017 and that number is likely to be higher, especially as people often have a second nationality. The Nigerian diaspora needs a faster, cheaper, safer way to send money back home. Azimo’s partnership with Interswitch solves that problem by offering instant transfers to Nigerian banks at a fraction of the cost of the traditional MTOs.
Who benefits from the innovation most? The Azimo service for instant transfer to a bank deposit in Nigeria benefits both the senders and their beneficiaries. The senders save time and money as they can send money via the Azimo app in just a few taps with very low fee and a great exchange rate. The beneficiaries benefit by receiving the money instantly and also get a bit more for the same amount, as Azimo is cheaper than traditional MTOs. This is very important to the millions of Nigerians that depend on the remittances coming in from abroad.
What are you most proud of about your innovation? We are most proud to be able to serve the millions of Nigerians that live in Europe and send money back home. We are also excited to have partnered with Interswitch – the leading African fintech company. In the longer term, the partnership will allow us to build new mobile-based financial services for the companies’ rapidly expanding customer base.
The Azimo service with Interswitch:
– delivery to any bank account in Nigeria
– instant delivery
– millions of customers using it
Status of Innovation: In-market
Innovation Active Since: 08/28/2018
Applicant Type: Private Company
Headquarter City: London
Headquarter Country: UK
Year Founded: 2012
Main Category
Main Category Choice: Innovation for Africa
Why do you think you should win this category?:
We are connecting Azimo (our app and webpage) via a direct integration to Nigerian’s real-time payments infrastructure that enables instant transfers to all Nigerian bank accounts. 5 out of the top 10 sending countries of remittances to Nigeria are in Europe. Azimo serves all these 5 sending markets (UK, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Spain) and the inflow of remittances amount to over $7.1 bln. (source: KNOMAD)
Azimo solves the problem of expensive and inefficient money transfers for the Nigerian diaspora in Europe.
Secondary Category
Secondary Category Choice: End-user Experience
Why do you think you should win this category?
In the category of End-user Experience, our project/partnership with Interswitch can also be considered a game-changer as the Azimo app allows senders to send money to their families in Nigeria within seconds of completing the transaction. Our digital product eliminates the need to go to a offline money transfer shop and pay more to send money to Nigeria that will only reach the beneficiary in hours, if not days.
Team Members
Full Name: Dora Ziambra
Role: COO
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/
Full Name: Michael Kent
Role: Executive Chairman
Link: https://www.linkedin.com/in/
Supporting Links
Azimo’s Country Page for Nigeria: https://azimo.com/en/send-
Entry Representative
Full Name: Dora Ziambra
Role: COO
