Standard Bank Group has arranged sustainability-linked, multi-currency facilities to support M-KOPA’s growth in Kenya and Uganda.
M-KOPA’s solutions provide underbanked customers with instant access to everyday products and services via its flexible credit model. Customers are able to acquire a broad range of productive assets such as high-quality smartphones, solar powered systems, electric motorbikes as well as digital financial services, which include cash loans and health insurance, all accessed through digital micropayments, in East and West Africa, thereby stimulating financial access and inclusion.
Since its inception in 2011, M-KOPA has provided over $1-billion in credit to more than 3-million customers, thereby avoiding 2,2-million tonnes of carbon emissions through clean energy products and allowing almost 2-million individuals to access high quality smartphones, positively impacting over 5,5-million lives on the continent.
M-KOPA has entrusted Standard Bank Group, through its subsidiaries, Stanbic Bank Kenya and Stanbic Bank Uganda, to act as mandated lead arrangers for two sustainability linked multi-currency facilities. The syndication, valued at a total of $202-million, $165-million in Kenya and $37-million in Uganda, included seven lenders, and is the largest syndicated facility in the Fintech sector in Africa and the largest syndicated sustainable finance facility in East Africa.
“Standard Bank Group remains an important partner in our growth journey, and they remain supportive of our aspirations to ensure that Africa continues to grow and ultimately thrive. Not only does Standard Bank provide an innovative and bespoke approach to our financing needs, their knowledge and understanding of the African continent enables us to achieve our ambitions,” says Jesse Moore of M-KOPA.
A business like M-KOPA requires a reliable mechanism to raise funding in multiple currencies to expand geographically. Standard Bank’s ability to structure and arrange solutions that cater for several currencies means M-KOPA is well equipped to hedge the risk of foreign exchange in its funding structure.
“Supporting M-KOPA is in line with our purpose of driving sustainable growth for Africa and her people. Financial inclusion not only enables economic growth, it also accelerates it. M-KOPA has, in a short time, managed to positively impact so many lives by enabling access to solar powered systems and smartphone connectivity, which are a vital part of enabling the economic empowerment of all,” comments Anneke Lunde, executive: sustainable finance at Standard Bank Corporate and Investment Banking.