With the consolidation of several leading fintech and payment solutions providers under the name, adumo, the largest independent payments processer in South Africa has been established and aims to promote growth for South Africa’s small, medium and micro enterprises (SMMEs).
Adumo CEO and co-founder Paul Kent explains: “Driving financial inclusion by reconstituting the payments environment is critical. The world of payments is becoming increasingly complex. We see our role as to make it simple and efficient for our clients, providing a flexible ecosystem and one stop fintech solution that increases turnover and ultimately enables growth for SMME’s across South and sub-Sahara Africa and the economy at large.”
With the recent consolidation, adumo will provide clients with a financial services platform that enables an ecosystem of integrated value-added financial and business services. The offering will assist SMME’s in getting paid, growing and optimising their businesses, driving significant value across all merchant categories.
Currently, adumo exceeds a processing value of R80 Billion per annum in formal markets across South Africa, Namibia and Botswana. With a vision “to be a catalyst for growth for businesses across South Africa and sub-Saharan Africa through the provision of financial inclusion across every client tier”, the newly-constituted adumo went on an acquisition trail of successful niche fintech businesses between 2019 and 2021, that could help realise this adumo vision. The strategy saw the coming together of a number of fintech brands: Sureswipe; Innervation Pan African Payments; Innervation Rewards; iKhokha; Humble; Switchpay; Wirecard -rebranded as adumo online – and GAAP.
Through the consolidation of the various fintech products and solutions into one brand, and providing omni-channel or multi-channel options catering for in-store and online needs, adumo has created a one-stop fintech solutions business for its customers. Other than receiving payments via credit cards or alternative payments, clients can obtain working capital for business growth linked to the turnover through adumo card machines.
In addition, they can make use of adumo’s loyalty solution in their stores to improve customer loyalty and increase repeat business/sales.
Newest to the adumo offering is that consumers are also able to gain access to in-store credit from adumo’s merchant stores, without the merchant having to install an expensive in-house credit providing facility.
The new consolidated offering has already been experienced by many of adumo’s customers, and it’s visibly helping them to grow their businesses and save money. Kent adds that: “Vertical integration and sector specific segmentation is the ingredient that will catalyse growth for customers”.
“There is no doubt that competition in digital payments has driven significant savings across all merchant categories, as transaction fees have reduced,” Kent says. “And we are very proud to have played a large part in disrupting this market in terms of pricing and offering. As we look forward, our vision is to continue to be a catalyst for growth for our customers. We have already received feedback that proves our ecosystem has been a key determinant for increasing turnover in our customers’ businesses.”
With reference to new devices, these are android based, improving and simplifying the user interface, increasing transaction speed, and delivering increased connectivity options and overall improved reliability. They are in beta testing, with roll-out intended for this year.