Kandua launches AI-powered home companion
Kandua, a wholly owned Santam subsidiary, has announced the launch of Jess, an artificial Intelligence (AI) powered home companion aimed at improving trust, safety and certainty in the home services sector. Jess is a conversational AI interface that brings to life the...
Visa, FNB, RMB partner to launch Visa Commercial Pay
Visa, in partnership with First National Bank (FNB) and Rand Merchant Bank (RMB), have announced the launch of Visa Commercial Pay (VCP) in South Africa. Visa Commercial Pay is a fully integrated business-to-business (B2B) payment solution designed to simplify how...
Banks need a decisioning backbone for the AI era
For years, banks have modernised around channels. For example, mobile apps became better, onboarding became faster and customer engagement became more personalised. These improvements matter because customers feel them every day. But there is a more difficult shift...
SA’s digital wallet goldrush has a licensing problem
South Africa’s prepaid card and digital wallet market is valued at $13,5-billion as of 2026, with an anticipated compound annual growth rate of 11,9%, reaching $21,2-billion by 2030. By Paul Wenborn, product manager, and Yaaseen Sheik, company counsel at Ecentric...
Kwik Payments goes live with ACI
Global payments company ACI Worldwide has announced that Kwik Payments, a South Africa-based payments service provider (PSP), has successfully gone live on the ACI Payments Orchestration Platform. The partnership represents a pivotal milestone in ACI’s expansion...
AI makes it profitable to find and serve those invisible to legacy lending
The credit market is the engine room of the South African economy, but for many financial institutions and aspiring business owners alike, that engine is currently running on a partial cylinder. By Eshmael Mpabanga, regional head: southern Africa and senior...
From greylist to greyed out: The hidden risk in SA’s payment infrastructure
South Africa has been off the greylist for just over four months, and now we risk hitting a different, perhaps more worrying, kind of greyish trap: being "greyed out" of the global SWIFT payments network. By Marna Roos, senior client consultant at AfriGIS But the...
Nedbank partners with Jumo to expand financial inclusion
As living costs rise, many South Africans are finding it increasingly difficult to build emergency savings, leaving them vulnerable when unexpected expenses arise. Research by Nedbank reveals consumers' growing preference for smaller loan amounts over shorter terms...
Banks have digitised the wrong things, and customers are paying for it
Technology has advanced. Human needs haven’t. The industry has confused removing friction with delivering care, writes Bradley Elliott, CEO of RelyComply. Your chatbot just told a grieving widow to check the FAQ. Somewhere, a product team celebrated the deflection...
Iress accelerates platform modernisation with Thoughtworks
Iress has announced a strategic partnership with global technology consultancy Thoughtworks to accelerate platform modernisation and unlock AI-enabled growth across its Wealth businesses. The partnership will support Iress in executing its strategy to modernise core...
Naked gives a final car insurance quote in ChatGPT
South African insurance platform Naked believes it has become the first company in the world to successfully develop and deploy a native app in ChatGPT that can provide a final, binding car insurance quote. The launch also appears to make Naked the first South African...
Experian announces Agent Trust for AI-driven commerce
Experian has launched Experian Agent Trust, a framework that establishes a secure, verifiable link between consumers and AI agents. As AI agents begin to search and transact autonomously, they introduce a fundamental challenge for businesses: how to trust an action...